Mourvèdre Rosé

Bandol rosé is the one pink wine that is routinely described as ageworthy, and Mourvèdre is the reason. The appellation, a small amphitheatre of terraced vineyards above the Mediterranean east of Marseille, requires a minimum proportion of the grape in its rosé, and the best producers use considerably more than the minimum.

Mourvèdre is a late-ripening, thick-skinned, tannic variety that needs a great deal of heat to ripen and gives a hard, reductive, unpleasant wine if it does not get it. Bandol's south-facing terraces and its sea light provide exactly that. In rosé the thick skins are an advantage: even with short maceration the wine has structure, grip and a savoury depth that thinner-skinned grapes cannot supply.

The colour is pale but the wine is not. Expect white peach and redcurrant over a base of dried herbs, crushed stone, orange peel and something faintly meaty or gamey that becomes more pronounced with age. Acidity is firm and the finish is long and dry, with a tannic edge unusual in the category.

This is the rosé that actually improves in bottle. Three to five years is normal for a serious Bandol, and older examples take on notes of dried apricot, tobacco and truffle that make the usual advice about drinking rosé young look foolish. They are priced accordingly.

Mourvèdre appears in rosé elsewhere in Provence and the Rhône, almost always as a structural minority component alongside Grenache and Cinsault. Under its Spanish name, Monastrell, it makes darker and fruitier rosados in Jumilla and Yecla.