Fields of dreams in Grasse, France
There was a time when I considered giving up the travel malarkey to grow roses.
“Streets full of water – please advise.” So went Robert Benchley’s jokey telegram to his New York editor upon first glimpsing Venice’s canals. Many years later, a postcard home to my parents read: “Fields full of lavender – please advise.” I was in Provence, the irony was missed by Mother and Dad, and no helpful reply was ever forthcoming. But I had soon moved on to farms full of roses near Grasse and was seriously considering giving up the backpacking malarkey and becoming a grower of rosa centifolia, supplying not just fancy florists but the great perfume houses of Paris.
Now, many decades later, I join an online chat with Aurelien Guichard, co-founder and perfumer of Matiere Premiere, which translates to Raw Materials. He is speaking from Grasse and I have been supplied with a sample of his Radical Rose and am fully spritzed when he comes on screen.
The terroir of this French region and the art of perfume-making, were inscribed as intangible cultural heritage by UNESCO in 2018. Guichard’s family estate, about 15 minutes from Grasse, typically has many thousands of organic rose bushes awaiting hand-harvesting in season. He says that during the gathering, the rose smell permeates his fingers and it’s so warm and sensual, he doesn’t want to wash his hands. I am swooning and not because of his good looks and smooth accent, but the powerful pull of memory. Opening the square-shouldered and unadorned clear glass sample, which Guichard says is based on “the development bottles” used in the laboratory process, it’s as if a genie has been released. I am transported to the south of France in a flash.
Distinctive smells are such an integral part of travel that when encountered again, no matter where, they awaken and spark the subconscious. The Matiere Premiere range features one high-dosage ingredient in each eau de parfum, so the instant recognition factor is pure. There’s West Australian sandalwood oil in Santal Austral and I am bracing for Neroli Oranger, with orange blossoms from Tunisia. If I can’t be in Provence or the outback or Tunis, I can always close my eyes, breathe deeply and dream.
A Matiere Premiere masterclass will be held online on September 15 at 6.30pm AEST; $49 a person. Bookings via Australian-based Libertine Parfumerie.
SUSAN KUROSAWA
Virtually there
victoria’s High Country is coming to a screen near you. Thanks to the September revival of the region’s program of online interactive events, housebound travellers can still venture virtually into the mountains to meet talented producers and creators.
New to the lineup this month is Luke Dudley (pictured), of Bright’s popular Sixpence Coffee, who will reveal the finer points of making the perfect brew. Beechworth’s Bridge Road craft brewers Ben Kraus and James Dittko will conduct tastings of their latest release, while chef and distiller Hamish Nugent of High Spirits by Reed & Co is guiding guests through his range of gins.
David Ritchie, owner of Delatite Wines, will be showing off his stunning new cellar door in Mansfield and talking about the art of blending. Katrina and Fredo Pizzini, of Tavola Cooking School and Pizzini Wines, are back to deliver a taste of la dolce vita with a combined wine class and gnocchi-making. Drinks have an illicit edge with Dirk Bester of Glenbosch Wine Estate near Beechworth, who will be teaching the basics of making moonshine, while Pfeiffer Wines takes a sophisticated approach with muscat tasting and blending.
Herbal medicine aficionado Naomi Ingleton of Beechworth’s Farmacy Co Clinic will be revealing the secrets to healing potions, and for kids, there’s the chance to take tea with the meerkats of Mansfield Zoo.
Bookings online; allow time for ingredients and other items to be delivered.
PENNY HUNTER
Book club
1979
Val McDermid
The title declares a year and this new release from the Scottish crime powerhouse McDermid is totally evocative of an era, from clothes and cars to customary habits (chain-smoking; fried food for breakfast; getting on the piss at lunchtime) and, especially, music. She includes a Top 40 playlist of the rotation she listened to while “researching, prepping and writing” the book. Hello there, Blondie, Bonnie Tyler, Talking Heads and David Bowie. Who could forget Showaddywaddy? It was The Clash beating in my brain (“I fought the law …”) as the plot developed because McDermid typically delivers a brilliant puzzle and a cast of scruffy suspects. And there’s always a tidy resolution and justice is served.
The book is heralded as “the first in a brand new series of novels introducing Allie Burns, set at pivotal moments of the past four decades …” Allie is an ambitious young news reporter on Glasgow’s Daily Clarion who, in a triumphantly male domain, is assigned tabloid “picture story” beat-ups of the likes of miracle babies and nude stunts. She wants more. “Tonight’s the night …” urges Rod Stewart on her car radio. Teaming up with fellow gung-ho journalist Danny Sullivan, she plunges headlong into two scoops, one involving a tax investment scam and the other “a tartan terror” act being plotted amid the movement for Scottish independence.
There’s a wonderful sense of the newsrooms of the day, with swearing editors, clattering typewriters, disgruntled subs rewriting copy and feted reporters holding court, such as crime correspondent Wee Gordon Beattie, “a wizened little man of indeterminate years … Allie thought he looked more like a retired jockey ... but he sounded more like a crook, talking out of the side of his mouth in a broad Glasgow accent”. She is hooked on the smells of molten lead and ink, staggered by the ease with which the printers fit the stereoplates to the rollers, “handling 52 pounds of lead as if it was nothing more than a carry-out curry”.
Allie, as it transpires, handles herself very well in a crisis and it’s tempting to imagine how much of the author is in this character. McDermid was a journalist in Glasgow on the Daily Record in the late ’70s. We know a lot about her grand achievements but I can’t wait to read what Allie does in the ’80s and beyond.
SUSAN KUROSAWA
Spend it
Australian roasters Allpress Espresso released its debut range of specialty coffee capsules in July, taking on the likes of Nespresso to offer “a café experience at home”. The aim has been to recreate the same Allpress signature espresso bean flavour used by the company’s network of cafe partners across the world. The formulation of the capsules, a project four years in the making, involved a reformulation of Brazilian, Colombian, Guatemalan and Sumatran blends, and a rethink of the grind size and “roast profile with a high top temperature to maximise solubility”. The result is a strong, rich blend with a hint of caramel. The capsules are compatible with Nespresso machines and the taste would likely appeal to coffee drinkers who routinely order single or double espressos or who opt for Nespresso’s stronger options such as Ristretto. Available online, at Allpress Roastery cafes or partner establishments. 10 pack, $12; 60 pack, $70.
SUSAN KUROSAWA