Chateau Calissanne Rose Coteaux d’Aix-en-Provence 2006
It’s the season of pink wines, and here is an ideal introduction to the world of fine rose.
This example comes from the southern region of France, in the storybook area of Provence. Surely you’d recognize the bright, rich colors associated with the area, or know by smell the herbs d’Provence (such as lavender), or heard stories of the rich and famous on their jaunts in Provence and to nearby Nice and Monaco. Well now you can add pink wine to your “book” on the region, as it is one of the most prolific producers of rose.
Chateau Calissanne consistently produces a clean, flavorful rose, and their 2006 bottling is in line with what many have come to expect from the winery. The wine shows a bright, dark pink color, with magenta highlights, and the nose offers ripe strawberry, watermelon candy, and raspberry. It’s very smooth on the palate — smooth as glass — with flavors of ripe red raspberry, white cherry, fresh pomegranate, some juicy jolly rancher watermelon candy. The acidity is medium, in good balance with the fruit and appropriately high for food matching. Tannins are mild. It’s just a touch hot on the finish, but not overbearing, and also has strawberry flavor before disappearing from the palate. A good match for leaner meats, such as chicken, fish, pork, or with vegetarian dishes (I enjoyed it with chicken, avocado, bacon, and tomato on 12-grain bread), and a good barbecue wine, as it will match nicely with grilled veggies, shish kebabs, bbq spare ribs, grilled chicken . Heck, it’s even a fine match for many Asian-inspired preparations (i.e., teriyaki, mild curries).
Get it while it’s fresh and expressing peak fruitiness — at about twelve bucks it is a good value and a no-brainer for food matching.
a-7 t-7 b-8 fc-10 v-8 ~ 90 Points
Importer: Petit Pois Corp. T/A Sussex Wine Merchants, Moorestown, NJ
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