Domaine de l'Anglore Vin de France Le Ruisseau 2023

Le Ruisseau — "the brook" — is one of the newest and most unusual additions to Éric Pfifferling's ever-expanding range: a rare, varietal Mourvèdre from a cooler, stream-side parcel of young vines, planted on predominantly clay-limestone soil with sandy structures and scattered stones. Mourvèdre handled this way — picked light and vinified gently — is genuinely uncommon in the southern Rhône, where the grape usually shows up in dense, structured, Bandol-style bottlings. Hand-harvested into small crates and fermented as 100% whole clusters through carbonic maceration, with no additives and no added sulphur, it's made with the same uncompromising natural philosophy as the rest of the estate — though its future remains genuinely uncertain, with several retailers noting it may not be produced in every vintage going forward.

The result is a wine of real contradiction, in the best way: on opening, it shows powerful black fruit, black olive, a faint iron note, and something savoury and almost animal — classic Mourvèdre signals — but given an hour or two of air, that gives way entirely to crushed strawberry, a fine volatile freshness, and Pfifferling's signature gourmand style reasserting itself underneath. The tannins are famously soft rather than the "virile, structured" grip you'd expect from the variety, finishing on pure freshness rather than grip. It's a wine built to drink with real ease, though critics have called it the most structurally serious of L'Anglore's Vin de France reds.