Château de Fargues : La folle ambition des Lur Saluces à Sauternes (French edition) by Hélène Farnault

“To produce a Sauternes, one must be a bit like a Benedictine monk… The history of this wine is often forgotten, overlooked. Yet, this is what consumers want to hear,” says Alexandre de Lur Saluces, owner of Château de Fargues.

What a story indeed! The alchemy of Sauternes turns a grape affected by rot into gold. While the de Lur Saluces family has been established in Fargues since 1492, it was at Yquem, in the 18th century, that a visionary ancestor, Françoise-Joséphine, systematized the selection of grapes affected by Botrytis and the successive late harvests in the vineyard.

What extravagance as well! Carried to the extreme by the de Lur Saluces family! At Château de Fargues, they continue to harvest grape by grape the ideally botrytized grapes. The yield is derisory: one glass per vine! And they refrain from bottling the harvest that would not guarantee the excellence of the vintage. This demand, both in the vineyard and in the cellar, is much more about art than magic.

Alexandre de Lur Saluces, his son Philippe, his daughter-in-law Charlotte, and with them François Amirault, in charge of operations, are leading a crusade to restore Sauternes to its supreme position and affirm its preciousness as well as its modernity.

The impressive fortress of Fargues, beautifully restored, is now a place for cultural exchanges where one can taste the unknown pairings that the wines of the estate allow with carefully chosen dishes.

For this book, renowned chefs (Christophe Bacquié, Éric Briffard, Frédéric Doucet, Michel Guerard, Jean-Michel Lorain, Guy Savoy…) join forces with the ambition of the Lur Saluces family to showcase the complexity of Sauternes by proposing recipes that pair them, depending on the vintage, with fish, warm oysters, poultry, white meats, spices, vegetables, cheeses, exotic fruits…

A whole art, a story, and a way of life highlighted by the texts of Hélène Farnault and the images of François Poincet, photographed throughout the seasons.