CASSIS

Cassis is a fishing and port town on the western side of the Côte d’Azur. Home to the Cap Canaille, the highest sea cliff in Europe (it peaks at 394m), it’s a place where Virginia Woolf spent several summers, praising its “heat and light and colour and real sea and real sky and real food.” In wine terms it is a peculiarity: a tiny appellation of just 12 producers who, amidst a Provençal sea of rosé make mostly white wine (about two-thirds of the Cassis output is white). The Clos Ste Magdeleine white is an aromatic beauty but we are here to celebrate rosé and the Clos Ste Magdeleine Cassis Rosé has such an effortless magic to it that last time I poured a glass for neighbours who would never spend this money on a bottle of wine they went straight home and bought half a case. What makes it so special? We are in impossible descriptor territory but you have a bottle so you will see. The grapes are grenache, cinsault and mourvèdre and they are grown on the family estate, which is based within walking distance of the port, overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. I’m thinking now of shellfish: a plate of langoustines would be perfect here. Victoria Moore, The Daily Telegraph (May 2021)