Mr. Poche actually, his great grandfather is Felix Poche, who is a real famous Louisiana person during the Civil War; was like a Thomas Jefferson equivalent of Louisiana. Felix’s great grandfather was Pierre Chenet. So the Poche Company that I now own has a direct lineage to the first western person who discovered Perique and to take advantage of it.
There’s been some concern because a lot of the farmer’s have stopped growing, it’s very labor intensive. For a minimum of a year in the barrel, we physically take every leaf out of the barrel a minimum of three times, the leaf’s are reversed in order in the barrel, the pressure’s put back on. I mean, it actively ferments for the first four, five, six months. You can see the bubbles and everything and then it’s going through a malolactic fermentation, kind of like the way grapes go to wine. So that’s why you get all these complex flavors. But it’s an expensive product. You can’t rush the process. It’s got to be in the barrel a minimum of a year before I sell it.
When we took over in 2005 I know a lot of people were concerned; oh, a North Carolina boy’s going to go down there and mess it all up. But what we did when we got in and when I bought it in 05, a lot of people don’t realize this; I bought it May of 05; Mr. Poche hadn’t bought any Perique at the beginning of the year, because you buy it at the beginning of the year.