Guest Column

Bordeaux: Re-discover the city of fine wine
October 22, 2021

Post-lockdown, it is time to travel and taste wine again. Bordeaux has new places to stay and eat and there is something for every taste and budget. BTW guest columnist and Bordeaux native Brinda Bourhis explores

Like many cities around the world, Bordeaux lifted its COVID19-related lockdown and curfews in May 2021. After over 18 months of gloom, a number of new hotels and restaurants have been flourishing in this city that is home to the finest wines in the world. Although I have lived in Bordeaux for over 20 years now, discovering these new places was a new adventure, and I could see there was an eagerness to welcome back visitors – both locals and international visitors in the not-too-distant future.

Here are just a few hotels and restaurants to put on your ‘to-do list’ for your next trip to this beautiful city, where l’art de vivre forms part of its DNA!

Hotels

Renaissance Bordeaux by Marriott International

Lobby of the Renaissance Hotel, close to the Cité du Vin

Located a few minutes away from the Cité du Vin (Bordeaux’s wine museum) in the docks area, the Marriott hotel group opened this four-star hotel with 149 rooms. in June 2021. You can’t miss it: the entrance features two silos that once were oil factories in the 19th century. This place is hip… as soon as you step foot into the lobby, you have a view of the hip Art Deco coffee shop that opens onto an urban oasis (a garden with comfy areas to hang out). The rooms have conserved a raw concrete look that is enhanced by gold leaf abstract frescos and works of art.

The key attraction is the rooftop swimming pool with a view of the city centre from the ninth floor. Although not of the same dimensions as the skyscrapers in Asia or NYC, this is quite unique in Bordeaux.

Room rates: From €200 including breakfast for a double room

Reservations: On Booking.com or the hotel website

Website: www.renaissancebordeauxhotel.com

Moxy by Marriott International

MOXY HOTEL LOBBY
A casual vibe at the lobby in the Moxy hotel

Just next door to the Renaissance is the Moxy hotel, targeting the millennials headed to Bordeaux for a short stop-over. Here the concept is ‘grab & go’- there is no fancy lobby, just an open living space where everything takes place: from digital check-in to self-service fridges for snacks or drinks. It is a spot for socializing with its bar and sofas for people to chill in, and table tennis for those seeking to be more active.

There are 133 rooms with views of the Wet Docks or the oasis garden that it shares with the Renaissance. It is ideal for friends travelling together as some of the larger rooms can accommodate up to four people.

Room rates: From €125 including breakfast for a double room

Reservations: On Booking.com or the hotel website

Website: www.moxybordeaux.com

Villas Foch

The lobby at Villa Foch;(right) a bedroom

If you are looking for a 5-star luxury stay in downtown Bordeaux, Villas Foch is a boutique 20-bedroom hotel near the Places des Quinconces, the biggest square in Europe. Set in a quiet street, the interior design of this hotel is exquisite with typical Girondine stone walls and sophisticated velvet and wooden furniture. The rooms are spacious, ranging from 20m2 to 65m2. You will also find a spa under a vaulted stone ceiling with its sauna and fitness centre. 

Although such luxury accommodation is often occupied by wealthy foreign visitors, the hotel director is confident that once travel conditions are authorized, Villas Foch will be on the radar for clients worldwide.

Room rates: From €300 to 700 for a double room

Reservations: On Booking.com or the hotel website

Website: www.villasfoch.fr

Clos des Queyries

  • Clos des Queyries
Clos des Queyries, an elegant B&B in an 18th century chateau

Airbnb is popular everywhere, however, the concept of being greeted personally and looked after by the host can no longer be taken for granted. Often, it is self-check-in, with keys in a lockbox and just email contact with the host.

At Clos des Queyries, the husband-and-wife team Sebastien and Sylvie Dehlinger live on-site and have spent 3 years totally renovating the 18th-century chateau that they bought in 2017, converting it into a 4-bedroom B&B. Slightly off the beaten track in the suburbs of Bordeaux in the Bastide area,  the place is close to the tramway. This is a guesthouse with character.

The owner, Sylvie spoke to me about how she enjoyed decorating each of the 38m2 bedrooms, seeking unique pieces of furniture and objects from antique shops to give a more personal touch.  

The guesthouse is surrounded by a 1200m2 garden where guests can relax in the sunshine or take their breakfast that is included in the price.

Room rates: From € 195€ to 230 including breakfast

Reservations: On Booking.com or the guesthouse website

Website: www.leclosdesqueyries.com

Hotel la Zoologie

The colourful Hotel la Zoologie and (right) a room, near Gare Saint-Jean

Here is a convenient spot just a few minutes from Bordeaux’s railway station, Gare Saint-Jean. The building dates back to 1901 when it was the Institute of Zoology, a place where scientists and academics studied the life of animals and nature. Hotels T, a family-run hospitality business from Paris bought the Institute to make it into a hotel with 40 rooms. The challenge here, as the director explained, was to conserve this official historical building while creating a contemporary and practical 4-star hotel.

They achieved this by adding two wings to the original Institute with a botanical garden in the middle – a space for relaxation and fine dining. Each room is original and has a reference to nature. You’ll find forest bamboo floors, curtains in African wax fabric, and ornaments from the past.

Other services offered include a cocktail bar, restaurant, rooftop, and spa.

Room rate: From €220 to 600

Reservations:    On Booking.com or the hotel website

Website: www.hotelzoologie.com

Restaurants

Avant Comptoir du Palais

  • Avant Comptoir tuna and raspberry
The tuna in raspberry marinade at Chef Camdeborde’s Avant Comptoir restaurant

Bordeaux is quite close to Spain, famous for its tapas (small portions of cold and hot food). Julien Camdeborde, a young Chef decided to open his own style of a tapas eatery in the heart of Bordeaux. Here, the convivial atmosphere is matched with a choice of over 60 tapas. Lift your gaze to the ceiling and you will see the complete menu featured in numerous small posters with the tapas and their photos.

Julien is originally from the South-West of France, and his idea is to offer not only traditional Spanish tapas such as tortillas or ham croquetas but also more original tapas made with local ingredients. At Avant Comptoir, you can savour raw tuna in raspberry marinade, beef croque monsieur, fried squid with chorizo and pomegranate.

Prices for each tapas start from €8

Address: 2 Place du Palais, 33000 Bordeaux

Man Mo

This restaurant is a creation of five friends who once lived in Hong Kong, then moved back to Bordeaux and decided to open a place serving dim sum.

Located in the trendy Place des Chartrons, the dim sum recipes have been revisited with a French touch. For example, you will find dim sum with foie gras, scallops, or even the French creamy cheese Brie with truffle. The restaurant also serves more classical Chinese dishes with noodles, wok-fried vegetables, and soup.

Prices: Menu around €30

Address: 8 Place des Chartrons, 33000 Bordeaux

Restaurant La Zoologie

The restaurant at the Hotel la Zoologie

 As mentioned above, Hotel la Zoologie has a restaurant that is open not only to its guests but also to the public.

From the dining room inside the hotel, you can have an open view of the kitchen where you can see the chef and his team at work, cooking delicious dishes to enjoy either inside or out in the hotel’s botanical garden.

The food here is simple and tasty, made with fresh local ingredients.

The chef, Ronan Ozon prepares dishes such as tataki of salmon, filet of duck with polenta and vegetable tart, praline cream with meringue sticks, each beautifully presented:  a delight for your eyes and tastebuds.

Prices: 3-course lunch menu €25

Address: 151 cours de la Marne, 33000 Bordeaux

About Brinda Bourhis

After five years working for a major Bordeaux wine merchant, British-born Brinda Bourhis has solid knowledge and experience of the wines of one of the finest regions in the world: Bordeaux.
She owns Winevox, a company that provides quality wine education including the WSET course, wine marketing and translations for the French wine industry.
Winevox also runs an on-going ambassador programme in the US for the Crus Bourgeois du Medoc, organising masterclasses at top universities such as Stanford, Columbia, Yale, and staff-training for wine retail stores as well as tastings for private wine clubs and associations.

Cover image: Borja Lopez/pexels

 

Share
Read More
No Comment

Guest Column

Are champagne flutes a thing of the past?
January 10, 2020

Flutes, coupes or tulips… which of these glasses do you drink your Champagne from? Champagne-based wine professional Jiles Halling examines the pros and cons of each type of glass in his guest column

If you go back far enough in history it seems that, even as long ago as the late 17th century when Champagne first appeared on the scene, there was a variety of shapes and sizes of glass to choose from. Short and stubby, tall and narrow, clear glass and opaque glass (the latter was common before riddling and disgorging had been perfected and champagne was often a bit murky).

Sometime later, perhaps around the time of Louis XVI, although some say rather earlier, the coupe glass made an appearance and, in one variation or another, the coupe remained popular through Victorian times, to the roaring 20s, on into the Hollywood era of the 1950s and even beyond.

Perhaps it’s because of the associations with those, apparently, glamourous times in the past that the coupe glass has a certain nostalgia attached to it: there’s nothing to match coupe glasses for building a champagne pyramid and to this day the coupe is still regarded as the perfect glass for many cocktails. You only have to look at the Moet Golden Hour glass used at this year’s Golden Globe awards.

Champagne served in coupes. Image: Billy Huynh/Unsplash

The criticism often levelled at coupe glasses is that the aromas dissipate before they can be really appreciated and that the effervescence dies away too quickly.

The first accusation is certainly correct – the aromas spread out sideways rather than being focussed upwards towards the nose, but the part about the bubbles dying away too quickly always seems irrelevant to me because the bubbles in Champagne persist for far longer than it takes an average person to finish the glass anyway.

Be that as it may, by the time the 1970s arrived the coupe was falling out of favour and being replaced by the tall and narrow flute.

Flute glasses are certainly elegant – an ideal match with the imagery of Champagne. What’s more, you can see and appreciate the bubbles rising up the glass and, as long as the top of the glass curves inwards rather than outwards, you can get a good impression of the aromas of the wine.

Champagne flutes. Image: Deleece Cook/Unsplash

 So you might have expected the popularity of the flute to be unchallenged for many a year yet, but recently the preeminent position of the flute is being questioned in some quarters.

These days there is a growing body of opinion, especially amongst more practiced champagne drinkers, that holds that flutes are too tall and narrow to appreciate the full complexity of champagne. They’re just not wide enough to swirl the wine and release the aromas and if you insist on trying to swirl the Champagne around in a flute you’ll probably slop it inelegantly over the sides and over your hand too.

The answer, according to this side of the debate, is to go for a much larger, rounder glass, more akin to the type of glass you’d use to serve still white or red wine, and a plethora of variations on this theme are being put forward as the perfect solution by wine writers, glass manufacturers, sommeliers and commentators of all sorts.

Some of the leading Champagne houses, including Veuve Clicquot are advocating larger glasses so that you can add ice cubes to your champagne.

One of the reasons behind the increasing use of larger glasses for champagne is the fact that, for some years now, Champagne houses have been at pains to present Champagne in a rather more ‘serious’ light and to emphasise its qualities as a gastronomic wine to be matched with a wide variety of foods and served during, and perhaps even throughout, a meal.

Modern-day preference: tulip glasses

If you have never had this experience, I can highly recommend it. There are so many different types and styles of Champagne that you can find one to match almost every kind of cuisine imaginable, from the first course to the dessert.

However, with so many conflicting opinions and so many glasses to choose from, making that choice can be a burden as well as a blessing.

It becomes a problem when things become too dogmatic and that can easily happen if you feel under pressure to use one type of glass or another for fear of being seen as unsophisticated, old-fashioned or ignorant if you don’t use the ‘correct ‘ type of glass.

It becomes a blessing when you have the freedom to choose the glasses according to your own preference and to the occasion.

The coupe remains a classic. Image: Rebecca Wiggins/ Unsplash

My own thoughts are that:

  • Coupe glasses are still ideal for Champagne cocktails and to add an unexpected bit of fun to the party.
  • Flute glasses are far from a thing of the past. They’re perfect for classic Champagne receptions when people just want to celebrate some special occasion.
  • Wider, rounder glasses are a good choice when you are serving older Champagnes, probably during a meal, to experienced wine lovers who all have the time and interest to discuss the finer characteristics of the Champagne in the glass.

And the best possible solution?

Try all three types and make up your own mind which you prefer.

Jiles Halling is an Englishman whose career in marketing and sales for major international wines and spirits brands took him to the USA and Japan before spending 17 years living and working in Champagne. Jiles is the creator of My Champagne Expert  – a brand new, comprehensive online course all about Champagne and other books and guides on Champagne.

Share
Read More
1 Comment

Guest Column  / Taste of Food and Wine