▻ Hélène Seillan
Elin McCoy in conversation with Hélène Seillan
Episode Summary:-
In our series The Next Generation, Elin McCoy talks to Hélène Seillan, the assistant winemaker at Vérité, east of Healdsburg in the foothills of the fabled Mayacamas mountains in Sonoma. Hélène is the daughter of Pierre Seillan, who left France in 1997 when Californian vintner Jess Jackson asked him to move to Sonoma to help create a wine that could stand shoulder to shoulder with the world’s best Bordeaux blends. The first vintage of the Vérité wines was 1998, based on traditional Bordeaux blends; there are three wines, each dominated by a specific grape, La Muse, La Joie and Le Désir. The grapes are sourced from dozens of micro-crus in four appellations and today are highly sought by collectors.
Hélène was born in 1987 and grew up in South-West France. She tells Elin about her first memories of wine, sitting at the dinner table when she was three or four years old, watching the conversations, full of joy and laughter, and sometimes being allowed a sip of wine watered down. Her father, Pierre, managed seven different châteaux, and she and her mother would have to drive around to find him, as there was no mobile phone to call him on. Her passion then was cooking, and originally, she wanted to go to culinary school, but in 2006 she worked her first harvest and was bitten by the wine bug.
Then, she tells Elin, her life was upended when Jess Jackson offered her father a position in California, and she and the family left France to make a new life, all the more of a challenge for Hélène, as she didn’t speak English. She arrived in California in an El Nino year and the constant rain was not what she was expecting. Jess Jackson’s children helped her settle into school and she reveals that Jess Jackson was the person who encouraged her to think she could be a winemaker. Hélène went back to Bordeaux to study viticulture and oenology. While 2013 was a difficult vintage in Bordeaux, it was one of California’s greatest, and taught Hélène how important it was to adapt and not follow theory. She believes that you need a different approach to winemaking in Bordeaux to California.
Her father advised her to follow her instincts and in 2013 left her on her own in California to make up some blends while he returned to Bordeaux. “I’ll taste them when I get back,” he told her. Hélène describes how, having worked alongside her father for six or seven years, she worked out the blends on paper, having tasted through 50 to 60 samples from the different micro-crus. Pierre returned and was extremely happy – he only changed one wine’s blend by a small percentage. “It was the only wine which Robert Parker did not give 100 points to,” she laughs.
““It took him ten years to say, ‘OK you can be my assistant.’””
Elin asks whether there is anything Hélène would change at Vérité and whether she wants to put her stamp on it. “My aim with Vérité is not to make it mine…I’m starting to think of a new project with single vineyards with micro-crus, maybe a hundred cases direct to consumer…some blocks are so delicious on their own.” She reveals they are contemplating 2021 as the first vintage of this new venture, but it is not finally decided yet. Sonoma is finally getting recognition, she says: “Sonoma has huge potential, it’s not really discovered yet. There’s nothing we can’t do in Sonoma, there is soil and terroir for all, so that makes it complicated.”
Even so, “It’s very exciting to be here now,” she says, and tells Elin how she feels at home both in France and California. She still cooks, and her favourite pastime is to entertain. She describes how the Vérité wines go well with different dishes: La Muse, pair with a fish, anything with black truffle for a special occasion, La Joie, the most powerful and expressive, a leg of lamb with nutmeg shaved on top. Le Désir is perfect with mushrooms, quail or pheasant.
The biggest challenge? “I think it’s about finding cooler climates, picking earlier.” At Vérité they have parcels planted for the next 30 to 40 years in cooler regions. There is no doubt Hélène Seillan will be rising to the challenge.
Running Order:-
-
0.00 – 32.13
“I’m not in a hurry to be the winemaker at Vérité.”
– Hélène on growing up in Bordeaux.
– Moving to Sonoma when Jess Jackson asks her father Pierre to join him.
– The first vintages of Vérité in 1998.
– Getting the wine bug after the 2006 vintage.
– Working on the 2013 vintage and Robert Parker’s 100 points.
– Different approach to winemaking in Bordeaux and California.
– The different appellations Vérité’s La Muse, La Joie and Le Désir are sourced from. -
32.14 – 47.46
“There is nothing we can’t do in Sonoma”
– Hélène’s vision for Vérité.
– The new project based on micro-crus.
– Recognition of Sonoma versus Napa.
– The new winery. -
47.47 – 55.56
“I think it is about finding cooler climates, picking earlier”
– How women winemakers are accepted in California and Bordeaux.
– Pairing recommendations with the Vérité wines.
– The biggest challenges Hélène faces in winemaking and viticulture.
RELATED POSTS
Keep up with our adventures in wine
600 years of winemaking runs through the blood of Giovanni Mazzei – we talk to him for our ‘Next Generation’ series.