Voilà vé is a Marseillais interjection which means “look right here.” Look – and style, Victor Million-Rousseau and his companion Alix Huguet would possibly add. They’re the homeowners of the Camas neighborhood’s natural wine bar Voilà Vé, which opened its doorways simply six months earlier than the primary Covid-19 lockdown and the following rocketing upsurge within the natural market with new concern for nature and well being in the course of the pandemic. The bar has survived the final couple of tumultuous years, sustained by the standard of its choice and its democratic method to wine-tasting.
Following a heatwave and chilly beer summer season, the sumptuous autumn climate on this capital of Provence invitations new adventures in wine. At Voilà Vé, we will do that with out ever leaving Marseille. This new wine bar is simply off the colourful sq. of La Plaine – a neighborhood that has diversified with the assistance of its out of doors market now opening twice every week (it had been closed for a number of years whereas the sq. was gutted and transformed, amidst protests and fees that the neighborhood can be taken from its unique inhabitants). The reopening of the market brings each sort of particular person again into the neighborhood, not less than for the day, and a few keep to wander via the realm and uncover its new choices. An reasonably priced wine bar like Voila Vé is a welcome different to the boisterous nightly scene of Cours Julien (the following neighborhood over).
The weird coloration palette of this wine bar, first encountered from the road, is to be additional examined by stepping inside. Exterior, turquoise predominates, and the charcoal inside partitions are additionally seen. Each night, Victor and Alix cling two vibrant sea work in yellows, blues, and oranges – a present from an artist pal in Lyon – in protected vitrines on both aspect of the ground to ceiling home windows of the facade. The ensemble of colours is exclusive and solicits consideration and appreciation – as does, it happens to us, the expertise of tasting Voilà Vé’s wine. Contained in the bar are snug vintage armchairs and sofas from the ‘60s and ‘70s, in plush cranberry, gentle inexperienced, crimson, orange, yellow, and tan, and a horny picket bar counter, low ceiling lamps and garlands of lights. In direction of the again is a big canvas (a present from one other artist pal), with hidden Marseille and regional references, like a langoustine. The wine bar’s décor is impressed by Victor’s mother and father – each are antiques collectors, and Victor grew up surrounded by work. He labored for quite a few years in treasured stones, and discovered to “disassociate,” or break-up, typical coloration combos in ingenious methods. Victor and Alix additionally host artwork reveals on the partitions of Voilà Vé.
When it’s heat out, individuals have a tendency to sit down both within the intimate courtyard out again, or on the terrasse out entrance, with trams flowing proper subsequent to the tables. The commuters are so shut we may nearly go them a ballon of wine had been it not for the protecting clear dividers. The environment is serene, with teams of associates arriving straight from work. Once we took a seat within the courtyard out again, two tables of associates had been quietly discussing how you can deal with a specific life problem. The elegant minimalism of the service and tranquil setting within the courtyard appears to encourage intimate dialog.
Voilà Vé is fastidiously designed to welcome connoisseurs and novices alike, however Victor and Alix cater notably to curious visitors who’ve little or no information of wine. This method appears becoming for the more and more various city area that’s Marseille. The home philosophy and method are to democratize the wine expertise with out compromising selection and high quality. As Victor factors out, many eating places in Marseille supply the identical quick collection of regional natural and pure wines from Cassis and Bandol which might be, in his view, effectively, boff (a flexible French expression with angle, right here which means not nice, banal). Limiting himself to pure wine that’s regional (a essential catchword lately), he explains, would decidedly slim visitors’ wine-tasting adventures. Voilà Vé provides all pure and natural wines, principally French, because the selection is huge and thrilling, with occasional choices from Spain or Italy.
The menu is certainly brilliantly democratic; accessible. It divides wines into white, a small collection of orange wines, and crimson, and once more into three principal classes: les appetisants, les gourmands, and les exceptionelles, in a crescendo from gentle and refined to robust and wealthy, relying on the season, the meals accompaniment, the temper. There’s a separate listing of high-end bottles (and for this, restauranteurs from the neighborhood and past frequent Voila Vé). There aren’t any meals right here. It’s actually a spot to cease by for un verre, however they do supply home-made tapas, like colourful vegetable chips, hummus, titzika, panisse all revisités, a truffle chèvre, in addition to a cautious collection of cheeses and charcouterie (exhausting sausages and cured meats). As a result of the tapas are designed to accompany the wine choice, all are tasty, nothing overpowering. The principle course right here is the wine itself.
We sampled a white chardonnay known as L’optimiste, a sublime demi-sec (half-dry) from Laura David Vigneronne within the Loire; an orange wine with character, Les Volants, additionally from la Loire (orange wine is a hybrid, on this case half white chardonnay, and half made like crimson, macéré—a step in wine-making the place the juice is left with the stable components of the grape to retain their completely different taste and ferment); and a deep, all-merlot crimson, Marius, from the Domaines les Blanquières close to Saint Rémy in Provence. Victor described every in short, permitting us to inquire additional if we need. He instructed we transfer from gentle to darkish as a robust crimson will render lighter wines indistinguishable. He has a lightweight contact in his instruction, a pleasure to obtain, and Alix, who served the tapas, has an equally straightforward method.
That is Victor’s first wine enterprise, parti de rien (“ranging from nothing”). With a robust need to discover pure, natural ingesting and consuming, Victor and Alix selected wine as a result of they adore it, and for the sort of open-ended exploration of pure wines that’s doable in France. Wherever the couple travels, they go to vineyards, style, deliver again bottles. Alix is from the north, Victor from the south, so between visiting household and associates they cowl quite a lot of floor. They’re additionally now well-connected within the wine world, knowledgeable by a gentle stream of suggestions from a choose few who know what they like.
Victor’s second motivation was to deliver wine out of its elite, inaccessible custom in France, the place one has to know the area, cépages (grape), the domaine (winery) – and that’s just the start. “However you don’t really have to know these particulars to take pleasure in and experiment with wine,” he says. He mischievously generally provides restauranteur associates, who categorically reject a sure cépage, a style of what they reject – they usually find yourself liking it, he says, with out understanding what it’s. And the bio and biodynamic (natural and pure) from Voila Vé’s choice are inclined to have playful names, like Les Anglaises (English ladies), L’éffronte (the affront), L’insolente; or extra mysterious ones, like Le sot de l’ange (a play on phrases referring without delay to an athletic bounce “saut” whereas spreading the arms, and the ‘imbecility of angels’), and even Les Obus 2018 (“artillery shells”).
The standard expertise of wine ingesting, maybe, is that we initially discover if the wine is tasty, after which we go on having fun with it with our meals, However Voila Vé’s choice solicits our consideration till the final drop, usually in several components of the mouth, evolving as we drink – an actual wine expertise! They take dangers right here, and every wine we tasted appeared to say “voila vé!,” scrumptious, but in addition fascinating. We left feeling like we must always return quickly for an additional new journey.
Revealed on December 01, 2022
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