The Producer
The Amistat estate was born from the meeting of two winemakers, Julien Ditté and Olivier Cazenave, united by a friendship and a shared passion for the historic grape varieties of Roussillon, particularly Grenache. Their project came to life around 2010-2011 with the idea of producing authentic wines, far from the standardization of taste, by valuing a Mediterranean vineyard that is sometimes threatened with uprooting due to lack of profitability. Their production remains deliberately confidential, in order to preserve an artisanal and peasant approach to the winemaking profession.
The estate is located in Roussillon, south of Perpignan, in the Aspres area, near the Spanish border. The vines, primarily planted with Grenache, Macabeu, and Carignan, grow on soils of brown schist mixed with clay, quartz, and pebbles, characteristic of this Catalan landscape. The vineyard covers about 3.5 hectares, allowing for entirely manual work and special attention to each plot. The vines are managed without chemical herbicides, with natural ground cover and a search for balance between vigor and deep rooting.
Today, Amistat produces a range of natural wines made with spontaneous fermentations using indigenous yeasts, without filtration and with very few sulfites. The cuvées – red, white, or maceration wines – reflect the Mediterranean grape varieties of the estate, particularly Grenache in various forms as well as Macabeu. The wines are aged and bottled with minimal intervention, in order to preserve the expression of the vintage, the terroir, and the fruit, with the idea of offering lively, sincere wines that are deeply connected to their origin.
The Wine
Grenache Noir, harvested at full maturity, vinified in a traditional way. The extraction is gentle and slow. This structure will accompany the wine during aging. The wine is then aged in Slavonian oak barrels for 12 months until the tannins are perfectly integrated.
The wine is racked by eye for resting in stainless steel tanks before bottling.
The wine is neither fined nor filtered. Its decantation during winter allows it to achieve clarity without filtration.
Tasting
Amistat red is a wine whose aromatic profile highlights minerality, flint.
The slightly tart black cherry appears next. The attack is precise, clear, and rich. The wine's amplitude grows after a slight aeration of a few minutes, evolving at the finish towards a tight and compact tannic structure, then onto notes of cedar, cigar box, and balsamic.