The Winery Clos de Tabaguet of Côtes de Provence of Provence

Many wine styles can seem perplexing at first: imagine the first bottle of Barolo if you only know Barossa Shiraz, or the first bottle of Jura Savagnin if you were brought up on California Chardonnay. With time, thought and repeated tasting, though, comes understanding. You learn each wine’s syntax and lexicon, its hints and inferences. You grasp the ways in which each style communicates. Its beauty dawns, then grows. Rosé wine sales grew 23% worldwide between 2002 and 2019. Its fuel has come fr ...

After years of rumour that Moët-Hennessy, part of the LVMH luxury goods group, was buying Château Minuty – and years of denial – the sale was officially announced on the final day of Wine Paris on Wednesday 15 February, creating a ripple of gossip, speculation and discussion around the fair. Throughout France, and even globally, Minuty has long been seen as the ultimate expression of Provence rosé. It’s thanks to Minuty’s success that many producers outside of Provence have emulated its style. C ...

Disconcerting: I couldn’t forget this bottle for days afterwards. Still can’t. Back in August, wine critic Lin Liu MW (together with her partner Philippe Lejeune of Château de Chambert in Cahors) came to dinner, en route to a short holiday in Provence. One of the bottles Lin brought for us to try together was the 2018 Les Rocheuses, Parcelles No 5 et 6, from Château Le Rey in Castillon Côtes de Bordeaux. It came in a slope-shouldered bottle, not a classic Bordeaux bottle. We tried it with some R ...