Spirit of the apple
Calvados, the fruit brandy for which Normandy in France is so famous, will no longer be the best-kept secret of the region. In fact, it is headed straight for the largest potential market in the world — China. Mathew Scott reports.
Vincent Boulard can hardly contain his excitement as he sits down to take his place along the oak-wood dining table. His first suggestion here inside the Restaurant Normand is that we indulge in a dish that will allow us to sample some of the produce plucked from the Normandy region of France that surrounds us. We are presented with a fondue that and Deauville — calvados has always been features steaming hot pots of Camembert, a little secret we like to share with our Livarot and Pont-l’Eveque, the cheeses friends. In this way calvados has been unique to the region, and into which we taken to around 80 countries over the begin to dip and smother chunks of ham, years but never before into China. For sausage, potato and apple. us this is like the final piece of the puzzle
But Boulard has an agenda today, dining and now the whole world can share this with us in a room carved out of an secret with us.” ancient oak barrel that was once used to Before sitting down to lunch we had age the apple brandy the locals here call been taken on a tour of the stone-walled calvados. Pere Magloire distillery across the road
Since the 1500s, distilleries around Normandy here in Pont l’Eveque (founded in 1821) have been producing this potent and have been walked through its history brew, which alongside the rich scent of — and the history of the region — by the fruit from which it is borne can often Boulard’s colleague Marie-Anne Saloux. reveal the tastes of other fragrances such The distillery’s museum features the as pear and even honey, and which, like tools of its trade as it has been passed the local department, takes its name from down through the centuries, from the the Latin phrase used by ancient seafarers ancient hoe’s that tilled the local soil and for the cliffs which mark the local coastline. apple orchards, to the creaking wooden grinding wheel that once turned the
What Boulard wants to share is the more than 200 varieties of apples into the news that the region’s three leading brand “must” that would become cider, first, of calvados have struck an agreement with before being run through copper stills the Vanchine Wine distribution outfit and then aged in those oak barrels as the in Shenzhen that will begin to see their distilling process transformed into calvados products introduced — for the very first brandy. time — into the Chinese market. With an alcohol content of around 40
“I cannot really explain just how excited percent, calvados comes in four grades we are by this news,” says Boulard, director — Trois pommes (at least 2 years old), of public relations at the Spirit France Reserve (at least 3 years old), VSOP (at premium spirits group, which controls least 4 years old) and XO (at least 6 years the Pere Magloire, Boulard and Lecompte old but often up to 50 or more years old). calvados labels. “Calvados really first became famous
“For us here in Normandy — and in outside this region in the 1920s,” says particular around the towns of Trouville Saloux. “In Paris and New York it became the drink of high society where the fashionable set would sip it on the rocks, with tonic or in cocktails.”
During the World War II, local pilot Marcel Lefevre of the famed NormandieNiemen Regiment — which had been relocated after the fall of France to the Eastern Front to fight alongside Russian forces and was noted for its bravery in battle — was so inspired by the courage he believed calvados gave him that he had the face of the character found on the Pere Magloire label painted on the side of his aircraft.
“It is a drink that people seem to form a very personal relationship with,” explains Saloux. “People also become very particular about how — or even when — they drink it.”
Hence there are those who will only take their calvados straight as a digestive, or those such as the famed bartender Colin Field from the Ritz in Paris who likes to add its apple flavors to his cocktails. The liquid is also commonly used in the region for cooking, again adding its apple flavors to tarts or to cream sauces such as those used with escalope dishes.
“But only very young calvados — 2 years old — should be used for cooking,” laughs Saloux. “My brother once saw someone used XO calvados in a sauce and nearly had a heart attack.”
Just how popular the drink has become globally is reflected in its export figures. Of an estimated 10 million bottles of calvados the Normandy region produces each year, it is estimated more than 50 percent is now sent to overseas markets.
For Boulard, the challenge now is win over the taste buds of a Chinese consumer.
“We are welcoming more and more Chinese tourists to our region, and they are learning more and more about what we think makes Normandy special,” he says. “And calvados lies at the very heart of that.” Contact the writer at sundayed@chinadaily.com.cn.