Muscat de Mireval - Domaine du Moulinas, Mireval. Languédoc - £9.21 per bottle
This is a Vin Doux Naturel, wonderfully aromatic and grapey on the nose with hints of honey. Vin Doux Naturel wines are made from intensely ripe grapes which are rich in natural grape sugars. The Muscat grape, in this case the Muscat variety of Petits Grains, always produces wines which smell pungently of the essence of grapes. The fermentation of Vin Doux Naturel wines is halted at a precise moment (when the alcohol level reaches a specific point) by the addition of grape spirit - this process is called 'mutage'. This leaves a wine full of unctuous sweetness but with a fullness of body derived from the additional alcohol. A dessert wine par excellence.
Domaine de Mireval is owned and run by the Aymes brothers whose family have been making this regions famous dessert wines for generations.
Half-Bottles Vendange Tardive, Cuvée l'Ermentine, 2005 - Château d'Oupia, Languédoc - £15.87 per half
A wine made in tiny quantities - literally by the small barrel full and only when certain late autumnal weather conditions prevail and the grapes can become effected by botrytis cinerea (noble rot) as in Sauternes. André Iché makes this wine out of passion and of a desire to make something out of the ordinary. It is not recognised as a wine within the local Appellation Controllée laws and is hence sold as Vin de Table yet the contents of those few bottles belies its humble labelling. Would that more wines were made this way.
Made from Grenache Blanc which is left on the vines until late into the autumn this late harvested gem is full of honeyed intensity and is envleoped in a creamy texture bursting with pineapple and lychee fruitiness. The aftertaste seems to linger for ever.
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