This wine is from one of my favourite regions - the Languedoc. It is a "vin de pays" but easily performs as well as an "appellation d’origine contrôlée" wine. It is full of red fruit flavour and tastes fresh and concentrated. It is produced by the carbonic maceration technique. Although it is drinking well now its tannic structure will enable the wine to mature several years more. As the name suggests it has a hint of spices on the palate but even though the wine is 13.5% alcohol this alcoholic strength is well integrated into the fruit character of the wine. This wine is a perfect example of the the grape being matched to a hot climate. It is excellent wine and I recommend it highly.
The domaine is situated in the commune of Meze near to the Bassin de Thau which is famous for its oysters.
The wine is matured in oak barrels and would match roast beef or lamb very well but we drank it with free range chicken.
It cost about 9 pounds a bottle from Majestic and is well worth the money.I am sure many people would be prepared to pay 20 pounds plus for this wine in a restaurant and still believe that they were getting good value for money.
The following evening we drank a bottle of red burgundy at about the same price and my wife preferred this wine. I must say so did I. The red burgundy was lighter bodied and was more restrained. But is this purely a matter of taste rather quality?
I would assess the quality of both wines to be similar this will be the subject of a later post on wine tasting. As we always drink wine with food, I believe that the food we are eating affects our view of the wine; the "Les Epices" would probably taste better with lamb or beef rather than chicken.
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