Saint Julien AOC

Jules Verne har i flere tekster gitt tilkjenne at han hadde sans for bordets gleder. Ikke minst kommer dette frem i dagbokteksten fra Norges-reisen og i romanen «En Loddseddel», der handlingen blant annet utspiller seg ved et gjestgiveri i Telemark (Dale ved Rjukan). På Vernes reise gjennom Buskerud og Telemark i 1861 noterte han flere ganger ned hva han ble servert underveis. På Hotel Scandinavie i Drammen stod fjordfanget fisk fylt med duftende urter på menyen. Vel framme på Dale i Vestfjorddalen kan det se ut til at forfatteren har fått servert fransk vin. I romanteksten fra 1886 Un Billet de Loterie, omtaler han nemlig gjestgiveriets gamle flasker Saint Julien fra Frankrike.
Denne vinen kommer fra Médoc distriktet i Bordeaux.
Her er et avsnitt fra fortellingen oversatt fra den franske originalteksten:
—
«I madame Hansens etablisement derimot, hadde man en meget god kjeller og en velfylt lagerholdning.
Hva mer kunne den forventningsfulle reisende ønske seg?
– enn laks, enten saltet eller røkt – fersk laks som aldri hadde smakt forurenset vann, fisk fra de reneste Telemarksvassdrag, viltfugl, hverken for fete eller for magre, egg tilberdet på alle vis, godt flattbrød og byggkaker, frukt, spesielt jordbær – bakverk som er det også er her, og av beste kvalitet—øl, og noen meget gamle flasker av selveste Saint Julien som har bidratt å utbre berømmelsen til franske vingårder – helt opp hit til dette fjerne landet? Og siden det forholder seg slik, er det ikke rart at gjestgiveriet på Dal [Rjukan] er velkjent og har godt rykte i landene i Nord-Europa»
[ov. PJMoe]

Druer: Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Carménère, Merlot, Malbec og Petit Verdot
.

Orig. fransk boktekst (1886):
«Chez dame Hansen, au contraire, la cave et l’office sont convenablement garnies. Que faut-il de plus aux touristes même exigeants ? Saumon cuit, salé ou fumé, « hores », saumons des lacs qui n’ont jamais connu les eaux amères, poissons des cours d’eau du Telemark, volailles ni trop dures ni trop maigres, œufs à toutes sauces, fines galettes de seigle et d’orge, fruits, et plus particulièrement des fraises, pain bis, mais d’excellente qualité, bière et vieilles bouteilles de ce vin de Saint-Julien qui propage jusqu’en ces contrées lointaines la renommée des crus de France. Aussi, réputation faite, dans tous les pays du nord de l’Europe, pour l’auberge de Dal.
On peut le voir, d’ailleurs, en feuilletant le livre aux feuilles jaunâtres sur lesquelles les voyageurs signent volontiers de leur nom quelque compliment à l’adresse de dame Hansen. Pour la plupart, ce sont des Suédois, des Norvégiens, venus de tous les points de la Scandinavie. Cependant, les Anglais y sont en grand nombre, et l’un d’eux, pour avoir attendu une heure que le sommet du Gousta se dégageât de ses vapeurs matinales, a britanniquement écrit sur une des pages : Patientia omnia vincit»

—-
For å gi mer av konteksten, her er lengre utdrag av engelsk oversettelse:

Can one imagine a more charming posada in Italy, or a more seductive fonda in Spain? No. And the crowd of English tourists have not yet raised the scale of prices as in Switzerland—at least, they had not at the time of which I write. In Dal, the current coin is not the pound sterling, the sovereign of which the travelers’ purse is soon emptied. It is a silver coin, worth about five francs, and its subdivisions are the mark, equal in value to about a franc, and the skilling, which must not be confounded with the English shilling, as it is only equivalent to a French sou.

Nor will the tourist have any opportunity to use or abuse the pretentious bank-note in the Telemark. One-mark notes are white; five-mark notes are blue; ten-mark notes are yellow; fifty-mark notes, green; one hundred mark notes, red. Two more, and we should have all the colors of the rainbow.

Besides—and this is a point of very considerable importance—the food one obtains at the Dal inn is excellent; a very unusual thing at houses of public entertainment in this [pg 17]locality, for the Telemark deserves only too well its surname of the Buttermilk Country. At Tiness, Listhus, Tinoset, and many other places, no bread is to be had, or if there be, it is of such poor quality as to be uneatable. One finds there only an oaten cake, known as flat brod, dry, black, and hard as pasteboard, or a coarse loaf composed of a mixture of birch-bark, lichens, and chopped straw. Eggs are a luxury, and a most stale and unprofitable one; but there is any quantity of poor beer to be had, a profusion of buttermilk, either sweet or sour, and sometimes a little coffee, so thick and muddy that it is much more like distilled soot than the products of Mocha or Rio Nunez.

In Dame Hansen’s establishment, on the contrary, cellar and larder were alike well-stored. What more could the most exacting tourist ask than salmon, either salt or smoked—fresh salmon that have never tasted tainted waters, fish from the pure streams of the Telemark, fowls, neither too fat nor too lean, eggs in every style, crisp oaten and barley cakes, fruits, more especially strawberries, bread—unleavened bread, it is here, but of the very best quality—beer, and some old bottles of that Saint Julien that have spread the fame of French vineyards even to this distant land?

And this being the case, it is not strange that the inn at Dal is well and favorably known in all the countries of Northern Europe.

One can see this, too, by glancing over the register in which many travelers have not only recorded their names, but paid glowing tributes to Dame Hansen’s merits as an inn-keeper. The names are principally those of Swedes and Norwegians from every part of Scandinavia; but the English make a very respectable showing; and one of them, who had waited at least an hour for the summit of Gousta to emerge from the morning mist that enveloped it, wrote upon one of the pages: