Tasting with Catharina Sadde of Les Horées
get your Burgundy glass ready... something delicious is happening
On a hot summer night there was an intense aligoté tasting in Beaune.
Sunday in Beaune is tough for eating and drinking. But all is possible at The Publican. Fresh from a book event, I walked in thirsty and found my date, Matt McClune at a high top, waiting along with a few winemaking friends. There were four bottles in socks standing upright. A blind aligoté tasting was about to commence, among them were some favorite producers from the difficult and low-yielding 2021 vintage. In the end, there was one clear winner. Les Horées, Catharina Sadde.
German born Sadde segued from her chef’s journey to wine in a somewhat circuitous fashion. After a cooking stint in the North Sea—not far from Denmark—she decided to pursue nutrition. “Not my cup of tea,” she said. While in school she worked in a local wine shop—arranged for a short stint for working harvest in the Nahe and that was it. She swapped nutrition for oenology and viticulture at the University of Geisenheim and Montpellier. And she met her husband, an auctioneer named Guilhem, in 2010 when they crossed paths at an internship at Pablo Chevrot in Maranges.