Boozehound - Jason Wilson [90]
Fifty years ago, there were two thousand Calvados producers. Now there are only about one hundred. In the eighteenth century, Calvados was widely exported, even more so than cognac. But, according to Drouin, King Louis XIV, who was a friend of the cognac industry, made a decree that Calvados could not be exported, and could only be sold in Normandy. By the early twentieth century, 90 percent of Calvados was made by farmers for personal consumption and was drunk unaged. If a farmer did put Calvados in a barrel to age, it was as an investment for his old age, when it would be sold to a big producer. Jérôme Dupont, for instance, talked me about his grandmother inheriting barrels of his grandfather’s Calvados, which were seen as “savings.”
“Calvados has a bad image in France because there was a lot of shitty Calvados on the market for years,” Drouin said. “My father’s generation thinks Calvados is a drink for eighty-year-olds, because that’s what our grandfathers drank. But the generation that takes Calvados in their morning coffee is disappearing. People my age, they have absolutely no opinion on Calvados. So maybe there’s an opportunity there.” I saw the challenge firsthand one night in the nearby seaside town of Trouville, where Drouin and Jean-Roger Groult were pouring Calvados-and-tonics during a party at a trendy bar. Just the week before, the local newspaper had featured the “New Generation of Calvados,” and the producers had cringed because the journalist used the old slang term calva, with its connotations of moonshine. But when I asked some young partygoers if calva meant anything to them, they told me, “Nah. Calvados, calva, it doesn’t mean anything except something to drink.” And this, I remind you, was in Normandy.
Drouin took me out into his family’s orchard, where he showed me some of the tiny, odd varieties of apples used to make Calvados. These are not shiny supermarket apples for eating out of hand or baking a pie with. They’re blemished and often bitter tasting—in fact, of the dozens of varieties that grow in Normandy, about 70 percent are bitter or bittersweet. The apples are fermented into cider, which is then distilled twice and put into a barrel to age.
“The way people make cider is very empirical,” Drouin said. “There is no scientific knowledge. I am trained as an oenologist. I’ve been working with wine, but I’ve never faced a challenge like making cider.” Besides working for Barbancourt in Haiti, Drouin had worked as a winemaker in the Languedoc region as well as in Australia and South Africa. So when he returned home, he thought he had Calvados all figured out. “I was so overconfident, I lost half of the cider because I thought I knew what I was doing.” One major mistake is that Drouin used too many sweet varieties in his blend, and his cider lacked the tannins and structure that would protect it against oxidation. After that first year—and after facing the wrath of his father—he began respecting the traditions. At least a little more. He is still applying his training with innovations such as finishing the spirit in port and sherry casks, and even in casks previously used for the fortified wine Banyuls.
“Usually people who like Calvados like spirits with personality,” Drouin said. “Calvados has a strong personality.” We hear so much about Scotch and cognac, and rightly so. But Calvados provides a similarly sophisticated and complex experience. Calvados can be expensive: Drouin’s Hors d’Age sells for around $80; good vintages can sell from $200 to $500; and I once saw an 1865 Calvados from Huet on the shelf at Au Verger de la Madeleine for €2,800.