Appellations: Banyuls, Cabardes,
Collioure, Corbieres, Costieres de Nimes, Coteaux du Languedoc,
Faugeres, Fitou, Limoux, Maury, Minervois, Muscat Appellations and
St. Chinian (*** several other small appellations are in Languedoc-Roussilon).
Production: 815,000 acres (330,000
ha); 290 million bottles.
Languedoc-Roussillon is the largest single wine region
in the world. Approximately 1/10 of the world's French wines comes
from this region and one out of three French wines is from this region.
Languedoc-Roussillon is mostly known for its non-appellation, table
wines. Many of the wine was either sold in returnable bottles or sent
to the European wine lake.
Today there is a change with new grape varieties
being planted in Languedoc-Roussillon. Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc,
Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Viognier and Syrah have enjoyed some success
with the best of the wines being good while many were unimpressive
lacking new world fruitiness and the traditional French complexity.
Roussilon is protected on three sides by mountains:
to the north are Les Corbieres, to the west are Le Canigou and Les
Alberes. This forms the frontier with Spain and is an area unlike
arywhere else in France with plenty of sunshine that has no problems
with ripening of grapes.
