Collioure is a very small appellation in the Roussillon region (also known as French Catalonia) in southeastern France, near the border with Spain on the Mediterranean coast, about 30 kilometers southwest of Perpignan. It produces PowerfulDry red and white wines from France's southernmost Vineyard. The appellation comprises four communes, including the one from which it takes its name, plus Cerbère, Port-Vendres and Banyuls. Collioure wines are the dry table wines of the region, while those bearing the name Banyuls are the Sweet wines produced in exactly the same vineyards.
The proportion of grapes that become Collioure or Banyuls wine in a given year depends on the particular characteristics of the Vintage. Until recently, AOC Collioure wines were exclusively red or rosé wines. Grenache, Syrah and Mourvèdre make up 60% of Collioure blends, with Carignan and Cinsaut making up the remaining 40% in varying proportions. Mourvèdre is not included in the blend of Banyuls wines, so all the Mourvèdre grapes grown here are destined for Collioure wines.
Cinsaut noir is a grape variety that originated in France (Provence). It produces a variety of grape specially used for wine making. It is rare to find this grape to eat on our tables. This variety of grape is characterized by large bunches and large grapes. Cinsaut noir can be found in several vineyards: South-West, Cognac, Bordeaux, Provence & Corsica, Rhône valley, Languedoc & Roussillon, Loire valley, Savoie & Bugey, Beaujolais, Armagnac.
wines from the region of Collioure go well with generally quite well with dishes of beef, pasta or lamb such as recipes of quick and easy monkfish tail, pasta alla norma or couscous merguez.
On the nose in the region of Collioure often reveals types of flavors of spices, earth or oak and sometimes also flavors of red fruit, black fruit or apples. In the mouth in the region of Collioure is a powerful with a nice freshness.
The Roussillon is home to a range of wine styles, at varying price points. Sweet fortified wines (vin doux naturel) used to dominate production, with still dry wines (vin sec) in the minority. In the last 30 years, however, this has completely changed, and vin sec now makes up the majority (80%) of the Roussillon’s output. The recent Wines of Roussillon tasting, held in London, not only highlighted many good quality dry wines being produced, but also cemented the idea that Roussillon whites are ...
I was with some wine students in Chablis, visiting the affable Guillaume Michel of Domaine Louis Michel. The 2018 vintage in Chablis was prolific, though Guillaume’s team pruned the vines as hard as normal. Guillaume has a little more than a half-hectare of the smallest of the grands crus, Grenouilles (8.74ha in production in 2018, most of which is controlled by the cooperative La Chablisienne): delicious in 2018. And, after a year’s pruning and vine-tending, after hand-harvesting and scrupulous ...
I’d like to say we took advantage of the lockdown and its related commotion to do a stock-take, explore new avenues, turn over intriguing stones, widen and deepen our drinking, taking careful notes as we went. Sadly, no. I won’t say we got stuck in a rut, but we did tend to stick with comfort wines – and “comfort”, in our case, means familiar. Regular readers of this quarterly column can probably guess the labels on the resulting empties. We have a wider range of comfort foods, I’m afraid, than ...
