{"id":2513,"date":"2025-03-16T08:46:07","date_gmt":"2025-03-16T07:46:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/champagne-bond500.com\/?post_type=product&p=2513"},"modified":"2025-03-16T09:04:40","modified_gmt":"2025-03-16T08:04:40","slug":"taste-of-things-course","status":"publish","type":"product","link":"https:\/\/champagne-bond500.com\/eng\/produit\/taste-of-things-course\/","title":{"rendered":"Taste of Things Learning"},"content":{"rendered":"

Juliette Binoche serves up some exquisite culinary drama in \u2018The Taste of Things\u2019<\/h1>\n
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Since it premiered and\u00a0won a directing prize<\/a>\u00a0at the\u00a0Cannes Film Festival<\/a>\u00a0last May, Tran Anh Hung\u2019s \u201cThe Taste of Things\u201d has been described \u2014 and sometimes dismissed \u2014 as a gastronome\u2019s delight, a worthy heir to the food-porn throne occupied by classics like\u00a0\u201cBabette\u2019s Feast\u201d<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0\u201cEat Drink Man Woman.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0None of this is incorrect. For much of this absorbing and pleasurable movie, we are in a rustic 19th century French kitchen, savoring, with our eyes and ears if not our tastebuds, the preparation of one exquisite dish after another. Each course is practically a feast unto itself: vol-au-vent, roasted veal loin, poached turbot, baked Alaska \u2014 and that\u2019s just the first half-hour.<\/p>\n

Warm light streams in through the windows, glinting off battered copperware and catching the faint sheen of sweat on Juliette Binoche\u2019s radiant, steam-bathed face. Her character, Eug\u00e9nie, has spent more than two decades cooking for and alongside the renowned gourmet Dodin Bouffant (Beno\u00eet Magimel). When we first meet Eug\u00e9nie, she is preparing a lavish meal for Dodin and his coterie of culinary devotees, as we see in a gloriously luxuriant sequence that has the panache and precision of a great musical number. The music, in this case, arises not from a conventional score, but rather from the diegetic accompaniments of soup bubbling in a pot, butter sizzling in a pan and utensils scraping against crockery.<\/p>\n

Hung, a French Vietnamese filmmaker whose eye for cinematic sensualism was on display in early works like\u00a0\u201cThe Scent of Green Papaya\u201d<\/a> and \u201cCyclo,\u201d here achieves something of a culinary contact high. If \u201cThe Taste of Things\u201d is two-plus hours\u2019 worth of haute-cuisine eye candy, it could also be plausibly defended as one of the year\u2019s great action movies: In a perfectly modulated and sustained 40-minute opening sequence, Eug\u00e9nie guts a fish, boils eggs, funnels sauce, spoons quenelles and torches meringues, commanding the kitchen with effortless, near-wordless assurance. The dishes come together like dazzling, sometimes ingeniously surprising set-pieces, nudged along by the robust, sweeping movements of Jonathan Ricquebourg\u2019s camera and the turbot-charged rhythms of Mario Battistel\u2019s editing. (Cooking was supervised by the famed French chef Pierre Gagnaire, who served as the movie\u2019s culinary director.)<\/p>\n

In time, the action spills out into the dining room, where Dodin and his companions (played by actors including Patrick d\u2019Assum\u00e7ao, Fr\u00e9d\u00e9ric Fisbach and Emmanuel Salinger) devour and discourse in the grand and very Gallic tradition. A few wisps of plot materialize in between sips of wine and dollops of philosophizing. Mostly, though, there is a warm atmosphere of unhurried indulgence and guilt-free pleasure, as well as an unspoken acknowledgment that pleasure is serious business. Dodin is known throughout France as \u201cthe Napoleon of the culinary arts,\u201d and Eug\u00e9nie, his unofficial but long-standing Jos\u00e9phine, has established her own formidable reputation.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou are an artist,\u201d one of the diners beams at her in a flush of postprandial gratitude. Eug\u00e9nie brushes aside the compliment, claiming herself to be a mere disciple in the shadow of a genuine great like Antonin Car\u00eame. But \u201cThe Taste of Things,\u201d which will represent France in the upcoming Oscar race for international feature, contradicts her in every gleaming frame.<\/p>\n

The gentle yet insistent refrain of this movie, which was loosely inspired by Marcel Rouff\u2019s classic 1924 novel \u201cThe Passionate Epicure,\u201d is that Eug\u00e9nie and Dodin are artists. With grace, patience and a witty eye for curiosities (if you\u2019ve never seen the proper way to eat an ortolan,\u00a0voil\u00e0<\/i>), Hung brings a slow-food sensibility to bear on an often fast-food medium.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the artist in Eug\u00e9nie that we love, and that Dodin loves as well. Dish by dish, the two have forged a bond more intimate and sustained than some lifelong couples, though Eug\u00e9nie, who lives in Dodin\u2019s chateau, continues to assert her independence by resisting his frequent marriage proposals. It\u2019s as if their devotion to each other, and to their shared appetite for great food, were too pure and exalted to require the institutional sanction of matrimony. They cook; therefore, they are.<\/p>\n

The rapport between the two leads is extraordinary, and those who know of\u00a0Binoche and Magimel\u2019s own past romantic history<\/a>\u00a0may find themselves especially moved by the tenderness of their on-screen reunion here. Their performances combine emotional delicacy and robust physicality \u2014 those heavy pots don\u2019t lift themselves \u2014 and you can read years of devotion into the way their movements harmonize in the kitchen, or the tenderness with which Dodin prepares a plate of oysters for the woman he loves. The implicit connections between culinary and carnal appetites scarcely need to be spelled out (\u201cYour broth is delicious\u201d is surely one of the year\u2019s sexiest lines), though you don\u2019t mind when they are, usually when Dodin steals up to Eug\u00e9nie\u2019s room for a nightcap and possibly more.<\/p>\n

Their lives are consumed, so to speak, with not only the practice but also the preservation and perpetuation of their art. One of the most significant characters here is a young girl named Pauline (a wonderful Bonnie Chagneau-Ravoire), who works alongside the older Violette (Galat\u00e9a Bellugi) in Dodin\u2019s kitchen, and who, despite her young age, has a precocious palette and the will and desire to become a master cook. Even so, it will be a long journey, and both Dodin and Eug\u00e9nie, enchanted by Pauline\u2019s prodigious gifts, know the sacrifices involved. During intimate evening reveries and at occasional large-scale gatherings, they muse over the decades they\u2019ve spent cultivating their own talents, with joy, satisfaction and maybe a twinge of regret.<\/p>\n

And so despite its generally frictionless flow from meal to meal, its showstopping delicacies and subtly comical asides, \u201cThe Taste of Things\u201d is haunted, from the start, by an awareness of the passage of time. Eug\u00e9nie\u2019s own ailing health, her insistence on carrying on in the kitchen despite mysterious fainting spells, is a recurring reminder that nothing lasts forever, not yesterday\u2019s meals or even tomorrow\u2019s discoveries. Dodin\u2019s own understanding of this may be what spurs him to prepare, in one of the movie\u2019s climactic sequences, not a radical, cutting-edge dish but rather a timeless one, so timeless that it will years later be declared the national dish of France.<\/p>\n

He decides he will make a pot-au-feu, a humble serving of boiled meat and vegetables that he plans to cook and serve with exceptional care. The dish is basically to this movie what the ratatouille was to\u00a0\u201cRatatouille,\u201d<\/a>\u00a0and it\u2019s worth noting that Hung\u2019s movie (known as \u201cLa Passion de Dodin Bouffant\u201d in French) at one point bore the English-language working title of \u201cThe Pot-au-Feu.\u201d I wish that title had stuck, though you should see \u201cThe Taste of Things\u201d under any name. As one crucial scene reminds us, what something is called \u2014 a cook, a wife, an apprentice, an artist \u2014 matters far less than the complex and sometimes sublime reality of what it is.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

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COMTES DE CHAMPAGNE GRANDS CRUS BLANC DE BLANCS <\/strong><\/p>\n

TASTE OF THINGS IN PAIRING<\/strong><\/p>\n

2011 was a good year for the vines, especially the Chardonnay hailing from the
\nC\u00f4te des Blancs, which produces wines of exceptional quality.<\/p>\n

The 2011 vintage was very different, marked by early ripening and a spring drought.<\/p>\n

This forced the root network to delve deep in the earth in search of the water it needed
\nfor proper growth and resulted in a voluptuous Comtes de Champagne, etched
\nwith truth. The Grands Crus from the C\u00f4tes des Blancs have the components to
\nmature beautifully, while other parts of Champagne will see a challenge.<\/p>\n

The Comtes de Champagne Blanc de Blancs is made exclusively with Chardonnay
\nfrom the 5 villages on the C\u00f4te des Blancs with \u00abGrands Crus\u00bb classification: Avize,
\nChouilly, Cramant, Mesnil-sur-Oger and Oger. This unique terroir is a strip of land
\nmeasuring barely 20km. The thousand-year-old chalk is present on the surface,
\ncreating a real oasis of water and warmth. White grapes flourish beautifully on this
\ntype of soil, from which they derive minerality, strength and aromatic sophistication.
\nTo create the Comtes de Champagne, only the \u00abcuvee\u00bb is used, for an absolute
\nguarantee of sophistication. Of the wines that make up its composition, 5% have
\nbeen aged for 4 months in new oak barrels, one third of which are replaced each
\nyear. These enhance the inherent qualities of the final blend of toasted notes.
\nDuring the 10 years it has spent slowly maturing in cellars, time has worked its
\nmagic, meaning this vintage comes to us with an extraordinary energy and ageing
\npotential. All that remains now is for it to write the rest of its story. The moment you
\nopen this 2011 vintage, a special occasion in itself, it lives up to all expectations. It is
\na unique sensory experience, a visual and gustatory delight! With a beautiful golden
\nshimmer through colours of straw yellow and reflections of gold; the mousse is fine,
\ndelicate, creamy and captivating.
\nThe nose takes you into a world of maturity and voluptuousness. It exhales delicious
\nnotes of gingerbread, liquorice and meringue. This Comtes de Champagne delivers
\naromas of delicate white fruit: vine peach, cherimoya and mandarin peel subtly
\nblended with light touches of almond pastry.
\nA wine of great mineral power, dense and rich with Chardonnays flexing their iodine
\ncharacter.<\/p>\n

The generous palate is built upon a chalky structure, giving it charm and
\nprecision. This smooth wine takes you on a journey through aromas of candied fruit
\nand sweet spices like aniseed and coriander.<\/p>\n

Really capturing a moment in time, the freshness of this Comtes de Champagne
\n2011 suggests that it offers all the ageing potential that is to be expected of such a
\ncuvee.<\/p>\n

The finest example of the Maison Taittinger style, the Comtes de Champagne
\nis rare. It is subject to a great deal of care and attention until it reaches peak
\ncondition, and the criteria that must be met for its creation means that it cannot be
\nproduced on a large scale.<\/p>\n

Perfect for a special celebration, this champagne is the ideal match for a seafood,
\nshellfish or fish entr\u00e9e. With an ideal serving temperature of 11\u00b0C, this cuv\u00e9e
\nsurprises from the first sips with its incredible youthfulness and its crystal-clear, taut
\ntexture<\/p>","protected":false},"featured_media":2527,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"product_brand":[],"product_cat":[19],"product_tag":[],"class_list":["post-2513","product","type-product","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","product_cat-non-classe","first","instock","sale","taxable","shipping-taxable","purchasable","product-type-simple"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/champagne-bond500.com\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product\/2513","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/champagne-bond500.com\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/champagne-bond500.com\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/product"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/champagne-bond500.com\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2513"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/champagne-bond500.com\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/champagne-bond500.com\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2513"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"product_brand","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/champagne-bond500.com\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_brand?post=2513"},{"taxonomy":"product_cat","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/champagne-bond500.com\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_cat?post=2513"},{"taxonomy":"product_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/champagne-bond500.com\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_tag?post=2513"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}