Even those of us whose only experience of brandy or cognac is in seeing it poured over Christmas pudding and set alight - odd custom - might be interested to know that the cognac business in France is going through a bad time commercially. There was always a bit of codology when old buffers rolled their brandy in a glass big enough to act as a fish-bowl. The rolling around - to get the full aroma, it is said - the sniffing and exhaling were as solemn as a religious rite. Whether French people went through that process is less certain. But in these islands it was rife. So much so that people who want to drink brandy - maybe with a dash of water - often ask that their favourite be put into an ordinary wine glass. The new thinking in the Cognac region of central-west France seems to be that taking brandy neat anaesthetises the taste-buds, and you don't savour it properly. Or so says an article in the magazine Europ. Now, ice restores the taste of certain brands. This goes against the drinkers' orthodoxy of centuries. A revolution is needed to bring cognac out of the "ghetto" of being merely a digestif or after-dinner liqueur.
The trend now is to induce the young generation to take to newer brandy products. Hennessy, Europ tells us, has produced Pure White, Remy Martin, Platinium; Courvoisier has brought out Ose brand. All of these are younger than those taken after a meal and are meant for long drinks and cocktails. Hennessy's is white because it has matured over only three years. Cognac, of course, is made from distilled wine. "A very healthy product," one man is quoted as saying. "It is natural, no added chemicals. . .and of course you can lessen the alcoholic content by mixing it with Perrier water." Some of the producers are on a small scale. A woman shows an old certificate on the wall to the reporter. It tells that the Grange du Bois, small though it is, has been in production since 1727. It has remained true to the family traditions, refusing outside capital. A typical house of the area - the interior courtyard protected by stone walls which were built during the Hundred Years War, the property extends only over 19 hectares. "We are five," the woman explains. "We have our vineyard, we ferment, we distil, we bottle it ourselves and we market it. My brother Charles, my cousin Jean-Louis, an employee and myself."
There are 608 producers, covering 80,000 hectares of vines. Four big firms - Hennessy, Martell, Courvoisier, Remy Martin - control 80 per cent of the product, and 92 per cent is exported. Distillation lasts from November to the end of March. The article is by Gabriel Dvoskin, from Argentina, one of the students on the famous Journalistes en Europe course in Paris.