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Domaine Vidal, Vin de Pays
Michel Vidal
Michel Vidal comes from a venerable family of Roussillon vignerons. He started by selling all his grapes to the co-operative, but always wanted to produce and bottle his own wine, so in 2002 he selected the finest parcelles of vines to produce three very small cuvées of red, which he vinified in his grandfather’s cellars, using his grandfather’s equipment, most of which would look more at home in a museum than in a current winery. The majority of his grapes still went to the co-operative, as Michel did not have the finance to produce wine on a large scale.
Michel is one of the few new vignerons in the Languedoc Roussillon who does not have a huge bank overdraft hanging over him, and we very much admire his courage in starting out in a very modest way, producing excellent hand crafted wines with a minimum of equipment. His first offerings were hand bottled, hand corked, and hand
labelled. (This took him away from his work in the vineyard for two whole weeks, so he has decided to hire a bottling machine for the next harvest.) We have been fortunate to be in time to secure small quantities of two of his
cuvées in 2002, and will have some of his excellent 2003s after bottling in
May/June. He is passionate about his wines, and is constantly experimenting to
find out what works and why - small quantities of muscat have been sun dried for
10 days, giving 19 % natural potential alcohol. He has then tried fermenting
this in two different ways: cold pre-fermentation maceration, with classic
vinification in cuve, and a part left out in the sun to "rancio" with
some oak chips added for a few days as a "teabag" affect.
Only 862 bottles were produced of the Terra Cota in 2002, a blend of mourvèdre
and Syrah, Big, spicy, peppery broad earthy ripe fruit, already delicious, and will improve further over the next couple of years.
The 2003 has a larger percentage of mourvèdre than in 2002, with broad peppery
ripe fruit, and supple tannins. The Lou Cayrou is a pure Syrah. Only 409 bottles were produced of this
wine in 2002, from two small vineyards of old vines on gravelly limestone soil. Big, powerful smoky ripe wine which will improve further with a year or two in bottle.
In 2003 the wine was aged in barrique - two barriques. Less rustic than the
2002, with fresh, smooth ripe tannins, and a very polished style.
His third cuvee, Mille Pierres, is from 33 year old Carignan, from which he has produced a total of about 250
bottles. Rich peppery spicy firm young fruit, with supple tannins. He also
produced a small amount of Muscat de Rivesaltes Terre des Anges for the
first time in 2003, which is delicious with floral grapey honeyed ripe muscat
fruit. |