You know, what we've done both for the show
and just for leisure, ah, fine dining in a
few places in Baja, especially the nice places.
I've run a few times into a wine called Bichi wine.
And Bichi is like a Mexican endearing term
for someone who was naked.
founder, the owner The maker, the
of that winery is the guy right next to me. It's Noel.
How are you doing, buddy?
- Hi.
- Nice to meet you.
So, where are you from?
making wine in Baja. How'd you start
- We are from Sonora. You know, my whole family,
we are from Sonora.
- Where the cattle stayed, right?
is like a common name to say, - Exactly. In Sonora, Bichi
you know, the kid is Bichi.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- The kid is naked. So we use that because our wines,
you know, we we make them in a naked way.
- So how? Describe that. What is that?
intervene as little as possible - Ah, it's ah, we try to
when making so we don't use ah, additives.
makeup in the wine. You can say, or
- So the wine thing or whatever it's going to come out.
- Exactly.
- Is what's going to come out.
- Exactly. Most of the work, you know,
it's in the agriculture. So you'll have to work more
in the agriculture than in the, in the formula.
- The process. The fermentation.
- You can say it's very similar to, to a very good product
cooking. Super good fish, that you get for
probably wild salmon. And,
- And you don't need to mess with it.
- Exactly. You know, you don't want to,
you don't need to mess with it.
Exactly. You need to enhance the flavor of that.
So, it's more or less the same philosophy.
What we want to do our vision
of the, or what we do is ah, tell a story of the place
of the parcela.
- We want, we want, when you drink that wine
glass. So it's like ah, you see? to say the truth is in the
So, and, and.
- So, and so this parcel,
- Exactly.
- has its own story.
- Has it's own story.
- And the one that comes from these grapes.
- It's their own story.
what we want to do. - Exactly. It's
Where did you learn to make wine Noel?
Well, actually I'm a lawyer.
- What?
- Yeah.
- I'm telling you, Baja has the largest collection
of people who were engineers,
- Yeah.
- Who were lawyers, who were other things.
makes them change professions. - And this, this land just
- Exactly.
- They become chef, become wine makers,
become restaurant tours. We go, it's just like another life.
Right?
- Exactly.
So we started learning this kind of wine making,
five years ago,
- Okay.
- when we started this project.
- Did you, did you go to that ah, school that they had on
the Valle de Guadalupe?
- No, I didn't go to school there. The teachers,
teachers came to me.
- They came to you?
[Chuckle]
- Yeah. We have a french collaborator.
- No way.
like, we have like ah, - Yeah. Yeah. It's
liaison with French guys.
- Really? Oh, that's that's gotta be good.
- Yeah. Yeah.
- Those guys know their wine. I mean,
- Yeah well, some of them, they have 20 years
making making wine. others 80 years
- Are they satisfied with the final result?
- They're very happy. They're very happy.
- They are?
- Yeah. They're but they are, you know French,
you know they, they,
- They'll tell you the truth.
- They ask a lot, you know? Oh.. This is no good.
[Chuckle]
- but it is good.
[Laughter]
- Where, you know, somebody wants the Bichi wine,
where would you recommend where, where would they,
they go look it?
- The United States, especially.
- Oh really?
- We are in like, 30 plus States there.
- You're already, Oh my goodness. So...
New York, Houston, - California and
- So if, if they on your website, do you, do you
do you tell them where to find it.
- I don't have website.
- You don't have website?
[Laughter]
We sell our wine also in Mexico city. And you know,
Tulum like that. And all those places.
- Where has it been the most popular right now?
Where would you say?
- Mexico city is great.
- Really?
- We're doing great.
- They are very demanding in Mexico City too.
- Yeah and Los Angeles.
- Really?
- Los Angeles is incredible.
- Really?
- Yeah, a lot of people, they love it. And they,
because we are so close to LA.
- Yeah.
So they come and they visit us.
restaurants or at stores where - So, and I mean, in LA, at
they can buy directly.
- It's only in restaurants and in specialized wine stores.
- Specialize in wine stores.
Okay. Very nice. Well, I can't wait to try a little bit
of your stuff. I, I've tried it already with pairings,
but there's nothing wrong with trying it again,
especially with the good stuff.
- Right? Okay.
- It's Crossing South folks.
Don't go anywhere.
We're here with Noel and we're going to go all Bichi.
Not literally Bichi, but wine Bichi.
[Chuckle]
- Wine Bichi.
- This is the Piti Jour Natural.
So it's Little sparkles, little bubbles.
How it is.
Ah.
Oh man. It's delicious.
This is delicious.
Yeah. I'll take a bottle. Take a bottle of this one.
These are fruity, flowery, citrousy.
Ah. I can already smell how it's going to taste.
This would actually pair amazing with the
Blue Fin Tuna Credo.
Look at that. Look at it. Look at how the viscosity,
look at how it, how it just, what do you call these?
legs? What do they call them? Are they tears? Are the
- Yeah.
- Look at this. Look at that. Look at that.
- Every time I had it, it was a very good experience
but this is just reminding me.
Wow, this is really good wine.
It's one of those ones where, I can give you folks
a recommendation right now.
If you, if you try them, you're going to have a very
good experience.
- Technically it's a white wine,
but because it's a longer masqueraded wine,
- Ah huh.
- they get this color and you can see.
- Yeah, it almost looks like, like a honey, Ya know.
- Exactly, a nice honey color.
- Stringent.
- Yeah.
be the right term? - So would that
- Yeah.
- Yeah. So was a little bit more stringent.
I like it very much too.
I like the other one. My favorite right now
is still the, the rosé.
good wine as well. But this is a very
This is very Egyptian. So it seems like middle Eastern.
- Ah uh.
- Ancient times, right?
like the, the jars of It's almost like,
of the wine cellar for Nebuchadnezzar. Ya know.
- Yeah, exactly. Nebuchadnezzar.
- It's resting.
- It's resting for the winter. So.
- Ah, does it continue aging and these types of barrels?
- Yeah.
- It does.
- Okay.
- It is ah, concrete, eh, Tina power umbra.
- Okay.
- So, we can open a barrel so that you can taste.
- Oh yes, yes. I want that.
- All right. We have here Malbec Cabernet Nebiolo,
- Oh, I love Nebiolo.
- Yes.
- Probably one of my favorites,
- It's ah, young, in the sense
of it's being here on the floor for a month in the barrel.
- It is so good. Wow.
You've done a good thing my friend.
- In a younger style barrel you taste a lot of the fruit.
- Which you normally don't.
Because they're filtered out.
- Or because the style sometimes, you know
California, or here in Baja, here in Guadalupe Valley
especially, you know, ah, people is very proud
of their French barrels.
- Yeah.
- So, and the taste...
- We brought the wood.
- Yeah, they told us.
- But you know, the same thing is happening,
you know, with the coffee thing.
Ah huh, ah huh.
- So a lot of these youngsters, the barista making coffees
that their toast, they're roasting
- Ah huh.
- It's not very strong.
It's like they want the coffee to express.
thing here, it's like, So it's the same
you want to express more of the fruit.
- Soft is a good word. Because if I had to describe this,
you just gave me, this blend that
I would use the word pleasant. It is very pleasant.
- When fermentation is going on, then you listen.
- You're kidding.
- No.
- Really?
- well because it's, it's like boiling.
- Oh really?
- Yeah.
- So is it a particular sound?
- Oh yes.
[Gurgling]
Then you know, it's working, you know.
- Could there be a situation where you don't hear that?
- Then that's a problem.
[Laughter]
- So then you do have to listen.
- Yes, you have to listen, you have to, to,
to see also when when we work with open fermentation's.
You see an also, you see bubbles or you see,
and you see the we're looking also for defects or,
or something, which is strange. Smell is very important
something, which, oh my gosh, because he's used smell
this is not ah, working. So, so then you had to do
say to do something quick. it's like a little kid
- So what would you do if you smell something funky
- Ah, then what you do is you take it out of the tank.
- You take it out.
- Yeah. Normally, yeah. Normally it's at the bottom.
Something happened, depending, you know?
- So Beachy wine, beachy meaning naked.
Does that mean your wine makers are all like
naked making it just with like,
- Sometimes you had to get into the tanks.
At least happy.