Phosphates? I have heard all manner of theories about the secret of making great wine. Here was a new one, and I shuddered at the thought of Alain stirring chemicals into his wine vats. But no, he laughed, phosphates are tilled into the soil in order to enrich the quality of his wine. “At Hermitage,” I said, “you have that one steep slope with its perfect southern exposure. Here you have all the little plots that are so varied as to soil and exposure.” “At Hermitage,” Alain answered, “they have only two soil types, granite and limestone. That’s all. Here we have a myriad of types, so we can do
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