Domaine Plageoles: Heirloom Gaillac

After a night of wine revelry with Gilles Lapalus of Sutton Grange in his home town of Cluny (Burgundy), Rob’s twitter updates fell silent on the 10th of July. It wasn’t until 18 days later that he resurfaced with the following tweet: “Getting off on Gaillac. Great wines from the Plageoles lads made with indigenous varieties most of us have never heard of. Definitely bringing these in because a: they're delicious and great value b: we’ve got no Gaillac and c: that will make two wines with 'nature' on the label!” Somewhere in those 18 days Rob had gone to ground, ventured off-piste and re surfaced amongst the hidden vineyards of South West France.

Viticultural Gaillac is a horseshoe arc of land high above the river Tarn in South West France. Though relatively close to Bordeaux, few people outside of South Western France know this region’s wines. It was the Phoenicians, then the Romans who first planted vines in the Gaillac region northeast of Toulouse. It predates Bordeaux, and like Cahors, Madiran and other wine regions in South Western France, it might have achieved the same renown had it not been for a quirk of historical fate. If only those shifty Bordelaise... read more