Le Bon, La Brute et le Carignan

Originally from Belgium, Aline Hock has turned back time in Latour de France with Domaine des Mathouans. Employing a return to basics approach in both the vineyards and the cellar, Aline farms her old vine vineyards (some parcels are pushing 100 years old) by strict biodynamic principals, ploughing only by horse, using herbal teas, green fertilizers, and allowing sheep to graze among the vines to promote biodiversity. The wines are intended to be pure and preferably mono-varietal (Macabeu, Muscat, Grenache, Lledoner Pelut, Carignan, etc.) to let them draw their typicality on their respective terroirs (Gneiss, schist, black marls, etc.). With this in mind Aline aims to highlight the geological richness of the Agly Valley and its indigenous grape varieties.

In the cellar everything is done with the respect of the grape in mind. All grapes are hand harvested and manually sorted, crushed by foot and fermented with native yeast. The wines are aged in only neutral oak barrels and bottled unfined and unfiltered with only a small amount of Sulphur employed at bottling.

Aline believes that Natural Wines are the result of a philosophical choice aimed at rediscovering the natural expression of the terroir and for her this can be summed up with one simple phrase: “Sensations, intuition and influences of the moon, in place of the technology…”