Barge Cruising In France Is All About The Wine

Barge Cruising in France

By Heidi Sarna & Edward Anderson

We had a chat with Edward Anderson, owner-operator, along with his wife Cindy, of the luxury 6-passenger Grand Victoria canal barge.

To operate a luxury hotel barge like Grand Victoria, you have to know a thing or two about wine.

Edward & Cindy, owner-operators of Grand Victoria. * Photo: Grand Victoria Cruises

QC: Edward, tell us a bit about how and when you got interested in wine.

Edward: As someone who enjoys food, I’ve always enjoyed good wine. The two seem to go hand in hand.

Growing up in South Africa, I became interested in the wines of South Africa, and developed a taste for probably the most famous of South African wines, Pinotage.

Living in the United States later in life and spending a good deal of time in Northern California, I started to develop a new understanding of wine from this region as well.

However, it was only when I started coming to Burgundy that I truly dug deeper in a quest for knowledge and understanding of the very complex wine region that is Burgundy.

QC: Given the cruising season of Grand Victoria — late April through October — when do you choose the wines offered?

Edward: Each year in March, when our chef sorts out his menu for the season, we set about meeting with wine merchants and creating our wine list.

Grand Victoria’s wine list from in 2021.

QC: What drives your wine selection for Grand Victoria?

Edward: For us, it’s vital that the wine pairs well with the chef’s meals. This is far more important in our opinion than which vineyard the wine comes from.

In Burgundy, all the wine is good, so vineyard selection is a little different than one would expect say in NZ or California.

QC: Do you offer different wines to guests each season?

Edward: For wines served on board, we normally pair the wines around the menu, which typically changes each season, as some produce cannot be found in certain months.

We try hard to give the guests’ palates a complete tour of the region, so we don’t focus on keeping the same wine year after year.

Also, Burgundy does not produce wine like California, for example, so there are very limited quantities of wine each year and this means you cannot stick with the same wine each year.

QC: Tell us a bit about the process of choosing the wines for Grand Victoria.

Edward: We work with a sommelier who helps us pair our wines,. And once that process is done, we then do a wine tasting of those that we’re not familiar with, together with sampling the chef’s new menu choices.

There are six dinners on board each cruise in which the sommelier is involved in the wine pairing process.

With one white and one red per meal, that’s 12 bottles of wine that have been professionally paired.

Fine wines are a big part of barge cruising in France aboard Grand Victoria. * Photo: Edward Anderson

QC: Do guests tend to favor certain wines?

Edward: I would say most of our clients prefer red wine, and in some instances won’t even try the white wine at all.

But generally, we plan on a single white for dinner and a single red, with the offer of a dessert wine.

For wines at lunch, we typically serve something light and refreshing, such as crisp white chardonnay from the region, or rosé from Provence.

Burgundy wines are served at lunch and dinner aboard Grand Victoria

Burgundy wines are served at lunch and dinner. * Photo: Grand Victoria

Typically, we use sparkling wine for our bar, welcome drinks, celebrations etc or if the guests request it. We normally serve Cremant du Bourgogne, a favorite of the region, as our standard sparkling wine always available to guests.

We also serve a Champagne (Veuve or something similar) to welcome guests aboard when they first arrive.

QC: Tell us about the winery tours you offer in port.

Edward: I personally lead all the tours with the guests. The visits are listed on each itinerary as to where we’ll do the wine tasting.

Guests normally will visit Pommard (though it’s currently under renovation), Montrachet, and often also Château du Clos de Vougeot.

Wine tastings however are done at wine houses that offer a variety of wines from the region and are not affiliated with any one specific winery. We feel this provides guests the opportunity to explore the region with their palettes as opposed to just wines from a single vintner.

Burgundy is a complete treasure trove of wine tasting with so many different flavours depending on where exactly in the region you might be tasting.

Guests visiting Montrachet in Burgundy. * Photo: Edward Anderson

QC: How do you educate guests about the wines of Burgundy?

Edward: It makes far more sense for us to give guests a wine education of the region, as Burgundy is different to all other regions of France, as opposed to specific wineries.

Burgundy wine is a bit complicated to understand unless you’ve studied it, which I have, and so I enjoy sharing what I know with our guests.

Many people who have not yet been to Burgundy, assume that the vineyard or wine maker is the most important aspect of a given wine. But in Burgundy, this is not the case.

In Burgundy (especially the Cote d’Or) what is most important is where the grape was grown and in what terroir (soil and climate) it was grown.

It is far more important in Burgundy to know which village the wine came from, and if it is a premier cru or grand cru, and which lot it came from, than which winery produced the wine.