Day 13: Easy does it, Tiger

No, this isn't a story about Tiger Woods, although you do know that I watched him win his first US Masters at Augusta National in 1997 and got him to autograph the program, don't you?

I can name drop with the best of them, but the Tiger in question was a stuffed toy in a window in a store on the Rue d'Alsace, just a couple of doors up from where I've been staying in Beaune. My friend Helena has a fetish for collecting a stuffed toy from each place she visits (I'm not sure how long she has to be there for the place to qualify ... perhaps it's one souvenir per trip) and she spied this particularly dashing Tiger and gave me instructions for its capture. Luckily for David, it easily exceeded her limit of 40 euros. The miserable cat was a whopping 53 euros!

Strange that this stands out as the event of the day, but that's what happens when you leave blogging till days after the fact. Well, I did eventually haul my sore head and tired body down to the Palais de Congrès in Beaune for a triple-header of tasting.

I had high hopes of finding a decent producer from the Macon region, but anything decent was well overpriced, in my opinion. I mean, I have a great producer from Montagny, with 1er cru chardonnays selling for less than $50, and people resist, even though they are listed in many three-star restaurants in France. It's like the current fascination with Chablis -- which is cool, I love the stuff -- while people reject the whites from the Cote de Beaune. OK, guys, you know it's all chardonnay, right? Is it the absence of oak that makes Chablis so appealing, or the price, or do people think it is another grape variety altogether? And is white Burgundy confusing? Do people think it is decoloured pinot noir? Or are they worried about premature oxidation (seems strange, given that most wine is drunk almost immediately). Are they took oaky or too expensive?

Anyway, there was nothing to move me from 131 Macon winemakers ... right, I didn't try them all, but I used the scientific method of sampling every bottle that stood out on the trial bench, whether by label appearance or the "je ne sais quoi" of the domaine name. Then I worked my way around the hall to those that had appealed from the run-through, and to those I already knew and had earmarked for investigation.

From this I decided there was nothing that would woo the unadventurous drinkers out there in the big brown land. I moved on to scour the 64 producers from Aloxe-Corton, Chore-les-Beaune, Ladoix-Serrigny, Pernand-Vergelesses and Savigny-les-Beaune (are you starting to get the idea of what a momentous task this event presents?) and checked out the two stands of interest in the Beaune lineup of 25, Domaine des Croix and Camille Giroud.

It was a good opportunity to catch up with the charming David Croix, winemaker at both domaines, and have a look at some of their 08s. He never obfuscates, but then again that's the first time I've used that word in a sentence, so I can't be too sure ;-) No, there is no deceit about the man: if you call reduction and it's there, he'll concede it. If you tell him his 05 and 06 Corton Charlemagne were fat and heavy, he will tell you why (the vineyard ripens so quickly it caught him off guard the first two years, and, just like that, the 07 and 08 are light, fresh and mesmerising!)

Right, enough of this. I hadn't eaten anything all day and was feeling light-headed. I beat a hasty retreat and prepared for one of the dullest nights of my life, the Saveurs du Monde, an event when the organisers try to showcase just how adaptable Burgundy is by offering the wines of several producers with some odd dishes from some of the best local chefs.

The food, although served in tiny portions to people who had to queue for ages to get it, was nice enough, and the wines satisfactory, but the event started late and then groaned into gear with a couple of boring speeches, the worst by a woman from the sponsor company, who went into excrutiating detail about how and why her decanters and glasses were so wonderful. I hate that company now and will never buy their products. I hope she's happy ;-)

I couldn't stand this for long ... I left after an hour or so and went back to my friends' place for a proper dinner. Sigh. It's tough getting beyond the superficial sometimes!