An afternoon of tasting top-notch wine for free in Paris

Tipsy Pilgrim recently attended the Salon des Vins des Vignerons Indépendants — The Independent Winemakers' Expo in Paris. This cannot be more highly recommended. 

First, it's free, or pretty much free. Officially, it will run you €6 (worth it), and that goes down to €3 for students or if you arrive in a group of ten. But really, free invites seem to rain down on friends and friends of friends (those with connetions to restaurants or winemakers, or those who have bought wine at the expo in previous years).

At the entrance, you're handed a tasting glass, which serves as your ticket. You then go around to the stands and "sample" wines and brandies from all over France. If you want to stay sober, you can use the spit buckets at your feet at every stand. 

It helps to go in with an objective, as you'll never have time to visit even a tiny fraction of the stands. Do you want to learn about Burgundy reds? Cognacs? Alsacian whites? Picking one area and trying everything you can find from that region or type can be a wonderful education, and the proprietors are only too eager to explain their wares and their methods.

This is also, of course, a great opportunity to stock up on wine directly from producers, and to carefully taste your way through it, rather than relying on fickle reviewers, wine store recommendations, or more limited tastings. Fine wine is an elaborate fiction — there's an enormous variety out there, sure, but finding what you personally like has nothing to do with price or with the fashionability of the terroir or producer. And rather than taking a ridiculous and expensive wine tour of France, attending this expo allows producers from all over the country to come market their wares to you, in one expo hall, in one afternoon.

Check back with the Salon's website for their next event in Paris or the provinces, or check out this elaborate listing of wine expos all over the country (both sites are in French — use Google translate if necessary).

How do the French avoid hangovers?

Photo: Jean-Alain Le Borgne Sure, there's medically sanctioned advice for avoiding hangovers (it's boring and obvious; drink less). Wouldn't you rather go on folk wisdom, especially if it rhymes?

Recall that in English we have:

Beer before liquor,
never been sicker;
liquor before beer,
you’re in the clear.

The corresponding, very common French maxim of course presumes that we're drinking wine.

Blanc sur rouge,
rien ne bouge.
Rouge sur blanc,
tout fout le camp.*

White after red,
you're in luck.
Red after white,
everything's fucked. 

Like most folk wisdom, it's bullshit. There is some scientific backing for the idea that darker liquors, darker beers, and red wine can cause stronger hangovers than the lighter versions of these drinks (due to congeners). But there is no evidence that the order of drinks matters.

Like many, many other cultures, the French also revere the adage "il faut pas mélanger" — don't mix types of drinks. It's almost a mantra. And, it's false, but of course that doesn't matter. We don't spread folk wisdom because it's wise; we need these arbitrary, preferably rhyming lies to keep civilization running smoothly.

Without edicts on what order to drink our wines, and from which vessels, what fun would drinking be? Rules give us something to complain about, an excuse to denounce others' behavior, and the amusing opportunity to transgress ourselves. That's also why we have table manners, driver's education, and proscriptions on adultery.

Gather around, darlings. Let's wax on the importance of starting with the Chablis, and toast to the hope that tomorrow will treat us reasonably.

Got your own favorite rules for avoiding hangovers, in France or elsewhere? Let me know in the comments.

*   The snobby drunks over at Hachette Guides claim that the "correct" expression is: Blanc puis rouge, rien ne bouge, rouge puis blanc, tout fout le camp. But nobody ever says that.

Brazilian wine is awful. Should I attempt to drink it anyway?

Wine, as egregiously served to Tipsy Pilgrim in a boteco (dive bar) in Rio.No.

And if you're in the country, you can't even drink the stuff imported from proper wine countries like Chile or Argentina; upon crossing the Brazilian border it undergoes a mysterious process wherein it is rendered undrinkable (presumably, customs procedure involves leaving the bottles out to bake for a few years in the sun).

Opt instead for Brazilian beer (also awful, but thirst-quenching) or caipirinhas (excellent).

How can we all get sloshed from the same pitcher without getting cooties?

The porró, Catalonia's solution for shared wine drinking. Photo credit.Welcome to the porró, the traditional Catalan wine carafe that gives you all of the pleasure and convenience of drinking from a squirt gun.

A porró is a little like a glass watering can; there’s an opening in the top where it is filled, and a long snout that tapers to a small opening — when you tip the carafe the wine shoots out. Your goal is to tilt the porró with a quick, sure movement, and to have your mouth pre-positioned exactly at the receiving end the stream of wine. Beginners frequently have difficulty starting and stopping the flow without spilling wine everywhere, which in and of itself makes the porró a delight to trot out at a party. Gentler hosts sometimes offer newbies a bib.

Here are some tips for successful porró use: 

• If you’re a novice, start and stop drinking with the tip of the spout as close to your mouth as possible.
• Open your mouth very wide.
• To stop the flow of wine, bring the porró back to level with a quick, sure movement. And (this should seem obvious, but is often strangely problematic) then close your mouth and swallow the wine.

Catalans have a number of other traditional tools for shared consumption: 

• If you want to share water instead of wine, you should reach for a càntir (the traditional Catalan water jug).
• While Spaniards have enthusiastically adopted the porró (they call it a porrón), they also have their own traditional device for shared wine drinking: the leather squirt-sack known as the bota. In Catalonia, it is called a bot, and is sometimes used for olive oil as well as wine.
• If you mistakenly ask for the porro instead of the porró (that is, if you stress the first syllable instead of the last), you will be handed a marijuana joint.

TO START DRINKING LIKE A CATALAN: Check out www.tienda.com, a specialist in all sorts of goods from the Iberian peninsula, including reasonably priced porrós (search for “porrón”).