French Cheese and Wine

Over the last (almost) 13 years I've covered a lot of topics here on Chez Loulou, and the one that I still love to talk about and am most passionate about is French cheese.
But lately cheese has been getting some competition.

My project to taste all the cheese slowly progresses and I continually nerd out with books like The Oxford Companion to Cheese and Mastering Cheese.
I always want to learn more, read more and eat more cheese.

Also, for the last few years I've had the incredible opportunity to offer a French cheese tasting workshop with Paris by Mouth. It is the highlight of my week and the most fun I ever imagined a job could be.



French cheese will always be my greatest love, but now I've fallen for something else.
I'm having a little fling with French wine.

(shhh....don't tell cheese)

Over the summer I enrolled in an intense, online French Wine Scholar certification program and I honestly had no idea what I was getting myself into. I thought that after 15 years in France, enjoying the regional wines and even living in a wine making region for 8 years, I would have a pretty solid base to work from. Well....



Now I wake up in the middle of the night and my mind automatically starts listing the principal villages of the Côte de Nuits from north to south and notes which ones have Grand Crus.
I spend time on the Métro memorizing the unusual grape varieties of SW France and remembering which grape dominates which area of Champagne. Terms like gneiss, semi-carbonic maceration, Portlandian marl and sur lie swirl around in my head. I have flash cards and a dozen highlighters.

I am in awe of how much there is to learn and just how much I didn't know. And it's so much fun! I mean, my brain hurts most of the time and I'm slightly terrified of the exam I have to take at the end, but wine is a fabulous subject to study.

Here's to my new love!