Foodlingo: Bocksbeutel
Food editor at large Marjan Ippel regularly introduces a new or recently reintroduced term from the food scene here, the so-called foodlingo. No foodie can do without it. After all, ‘what (not) to speak’ is at least as important in food as ‘what (not) to eat’.
This time: Bocksbeutel
Who still wants to be seen with a Bocksbeutel in hand? Thanks to Mateus rosé, you can never look at such a bottle without embarrassment again because of hazy memories of student parties that got out of hand.
And that while the traditional green wine bottle with its flat belly and short neck was once the pride of the German wine region of Franconia, where it originated. Wine routes through the area are still referred to as Bocksbeutelstrasse.
Male goat
But the youngest generation of Franconian winegrowers is struggling with the old-fashioned bottle, which, according to some, refers to the private parts of a male goat and, according to others, to the pouch bags commonly worn in earlier centuries. The leather field flask is also said to have served as a model for the green bottle that, from 1728 onward, was allowed to carry only the noblest Franconian wines.
How galling it must be for the Franconians that the only wine region outside their own area (apart from a few Bocksbeutel-Orte in Baden) where the flattened, spherical bottle may also be used under European protection law has had such a devastating effect on its reputation…
The convivial-looking bottle is such a wonderfully anti-snob statement.
For the young winemakers who can barely remember the Portuguese semi-sweet Mateus rosé at all, the main issue is that the Bocksbeutel is difficult to stack and takes up relatively much space. They are even swapping the bulky Bordeaux bottle for the tall, slim Riesling bottle, the so-called Schlegelflasche. Around 45 million wine bottles are filled in Franconia each year, of which only a third are still Bocksbeutel.
Jimi Hendrix
Still, the young wine crowd may well be wrong. In gastronomy in particular, the Bocksbeutel currently has cult status. Young somms embrace its individuality, which makes the distinctive bottle a guaranteed conversation piece at any dinner table. And they are drawn to its authentic regional character. But secretly, they mainly love the convivial-looking bottle as such a wonderfully anti-snob statement.
If that cannot win over Franconia’s young wine crowd, perhaps the new, more angular Bocksbeutel being introduced at the international wine fair Prowein in Düsseldorf in a month’s time can. And if not, then perhaps the fact that Mateus rosé—whose deep-green Bocksbeutel was once held directly to the mouth by Jimi Hendrix—is now packaged in a crystal-clear bottle.
P.S.
German wine merchant Mark van Bolhuis has been a fan for years. In his online shop, he declared February Bocksbeutel month: ‘No bottle feels better in the hand.’ Buy one, or have it expertly unscrewed by a somm at, among others, Daalder and Eénvistweevis in Amsterdam and De Leest in Vaassen.
Text: Marjan Ippel
Image: Fränkische Weinbauverband
