Domaine Ledogar Roug’e Clair 2023

Xavier and Mathieu Ledogar are the fourth generation at this Corbières estate in Ferrals-les-Corbières, in the Languedoc-Roussillon. They stopped selling fruit to the village cooperative to make their own wines from 22 hectares of organic-certified vineyards, all worked with minimal intervention. Roug'e Clair blends Carignan and Mourvèdre, two grapes long planted across the warm, dry hills of the Corbières, where poor limestone and schist soils and constant tramontane wind keep yields low and skins thin. The wine is made in the natural style, with native yeasts, little or no added sulphur and no oak, so the result is built on fruit and freshness rather than extraction or barrel. The colour is bright and light. The nose shows wild strawberry, red cherry and a scrubby note of thyme and wild herb that the locals call garrigue. The palate is juicy and low in tannin, with red berry fruit, a turn of black pepper and a faintly earthy, savoury edge. At 12.5 per cent it stays easy and drinkable. Serve cool, at 14 to 15 degrees, and open it young. It works with charcuterie, roast chicken and tomato-based dishes.