THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, May 21, 1995 TAG: 9505180074
SECTION: FLAVOR PAGE: F3 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: HUMBLE STEWARD
SOURCE: JIM RAPER
LENGTH: Long : 109 lines
THERE ARE perfect occupations. I know because I've chanced upon a few people who have them.
I wanted to swap jobs with the lifeguard at San Antonio Beach on the island of Ibiza. The same thought crossed my mind when I met an octogenarian who grows blueberries and blackberries on a mountaintop in southwestern Virginia.
But Robert Kacher's job comes first on my wish list. He travels in France about five months a year, selecting wines to import into the United States.
In the late-1980s, I noticed the Robert Kacher Selections sub-label on bottles of French wine. Not long afterward, I concluded that this chap was importing well-made wines and pricing them fairly.
I pictured him as a white-haired gentleman, perhaps a privileged Brit who had been taught to speak French by his nanny. And I assumed he had a zillion years of experience in the wine trade.
In recent months, however, I began to hear about an altogether different Mr. Kacher.
Local wine merchant Peter Coe and Norfolk restaurateur Joe Hoggard spent time with Kacher in French wine country over the winter, and they returned from their separate trips with stories of a young (43), enthusiastic and down-to-earth wine expert. He was every bit an American, they said, but able nevertheless to build close relationships with small-scale grape growers and wine producers in France.
``Farmers,'' Kacher said the other day, when I finally met him at Hoggard's Ships Cabin restaurant. ``I'm just a guy who works with farmers. French farmers.''
He's come a long way from the collegian who went to France to roam. He didn't speak the language then, but he loved the wines and the winemakers, and a career was born.
He worked for established importers before setting out on his own less than a decade ago, and he has built his Washington, D.C.-based company into a relatively small but influential player in the nation's wine industry.
His is a handmade company that deals in handmade wines, and that is the secret to his success, Kacher says.
He discovers - and sometimes invests expertise and money in - individual French farms that grow noble grapes and produce good wine on the premises. There are producers in his stable who had never exported their wines before they hooked up with Kacher Selections.
He also knows American tastes. Europeans, on the whole, are much more tolerant of non-fruit flavors in wine. Not many Americans lust after wines that taste like leather or wet cardboard, or worse.
So Kacher avoids those small-scale French producers whose wines smell - and taste - suspiciously like the barnyards of their origin. He also avoids those who overproduce in their vineyards.
Instead, he encourages vineyard management that results in small crops of intense grapes, and demands meticulous production practices. By doing so he has lined up wines that arrive here with no funky baggage. Fruity and fresh is the best way to describe them.
The importer was at The Ships Cabin recently for an afternoon seminar and evening wine dinner. Here are my notes on wines he poured:
Vinet's Domaine dela Quilla 1993 Muscadet de Sevre et Maine Sur Lie ($9) - A light, green-apple and slightly spritzy white from the Loire that mates nicely with raw oysters.
Lucien Albrecht 1993 Pinot Blanc Alsace ($10) - A wide variety of foods can be served with this full-bodied, ripe-apple example of pinot blanc.
Domaine Lalande 1993 Chardonnay Vin de Pays des Cotes de Gascogne ($10) - A summer chardonnay, braced with notes of vanilla from oak, but still light and refreshing.
Hecquet's Chateau Calabre 1993 Montravel ($9) - A sauvignon blanc from the Bordeaux region that is golden in color from extended skin contact and has a peachy nose. But its taste of hay and spice is true to the varietal.
Toques and Clochers 1993 Chardonnay Limoux ($20) - Kacher and French associates are pioneering wonderful chardonnays from the Limoux district near Carcassonne that is best known for sparkling wines. This tastes of tropical fruit and has a clean, long finish.
Selosse Champagne Grand Cru Brut Blanc de Blancs ($40) - Wow, what a yeasty and chardonnay nose! Tastes of fresh bread and pears, with mineral notes. Creamy and delicious.
Domaine Marc Morey 1992 Chassagne-Montrachet Virondot ($45) - Not a humble wine; pricey, but a fine example of premier cru white Burgundy.
Gelin's Domaine Des Nuges 1993 Beaujolais-Villages ($12) - A bold, bright-berry mouthful. This has fresh Beaujolais charm, but with body to carry through the finish.
Domaine Joblot 1993 Givry Clos du Cellier aux Moines ($32) - A premier cru red Burgundy from the Cote Chalonnaise that is cherry infused and approachable now, but will be better after a couple years of bottle aging.
Chateau Fourcas-Loubaney 1991 Listrac ($19) - Not a blockbuster from Bordeaux's Haut-Medoc, but a competent, cedar-tinged claret. IMPRESSIVE PERFORMANCE
I have praise, too, for the cuisine of Bobby Huber, Ships Cabin chef. His seven-course meal was a delight, and well-schemed to match the Kacher wines. The performance was all the more impressive because Huber and his kitchen staff served 85 at the wine dinner while also accommodating regular customers.
The first course of lump crab and shrimp covered by thin slices of white turnip was inspired by a dish Huber tasted on a recent trip to Paris. (Hoggard, who is no stranger to epicurean excursions himself, has enabled Huber to travel to San Francisco, New York and France for food and wine research.)
Other courses, all delicious, were carpaccio of scallops with extra virgin olive oil and finished at the table with fresh-squeezed lemon juice; steamed mussels in saffron broth; flounder stuffed with wild mushrooms and shallots in a white wine reduction; bacon-studded salmon with chives and reduction of beet juice and red wine; cheese plate, and bittersweet chocolate mousse with fresh raspberries and orange sauce. by CNB