Terre d’Ardoise Carignan Vieilles Vignes 2007.  Pity the humble carignan grape.  Frequently blended, jugged, boxed, and overlooked.  As recently as 1998, it was the most widely planted variety in France and valued for the immense productivity of each hectare.   In the late 1990’s carignan was blamed for the over production of vin ordinaire — the infamous “wine lake” of France.  By 2000 an EU vine pulling effort reduced the acreage by nearly half, and merlot supplanted carignan as the most widely planted variety.

But in the Catalan regions of France and Spain, there are small vignerons who produce straight carignan wine with devotion.  In Languedoc-Rousillion where the Pyrenées mountains fall into the Mediterranean, two cousins make a pure carignan from old vines under the name “Terre d’Ardoise” — land of slate.  This is a country wine — uncomplicated in its appeal, fragrant with dust and smoke, and just a little bitter.  The wine is concentrated by leaf pulling and discarding a portion of the unripe harvest.  The vines are very old and stand upright in sparse soil of black slate.   Such hardship could produce a wine of formidable acid and structure.  The cousins are clever in their wine-making, however, and the result is surprisingly soft and open.  This wine welcomes food, especially pork and bread.

Carignan is an interesting taste –earth, bracken, and hard fruit — and one we should know when we drink Rhône wines which often include a measure of carignan for color and spine.  You will find this one at Dedalus for $12.75

Tuta 7/20/09