2022 Domaine de l'Ostal Rose Pays D'Oc IGP 750 ml

The market is flush with affordable rosé—but getting your hands on the 2022 L’Ostal Rosé is like finding the proverbial needle in the haystack. Backed by 100-point pedigree and shaped by the finest terroir in southern France’s Minervois region, it’s a KNOCKOUT value.

The Cazes family, who produced this bottling, is the same one that owns and operates one of the superstar estates of Pauillac: Grand Cru Classé property Chateau Lynch-Bages, where a bottle costs around $150.

Daniel Llose—who, for over 40 years, has helmed winemaking at Lynch-Bages and also oversees Château Pichon Baron—here turns his hand to grapes raised on the coolest-climate terroirs of the domaine, as well from the Pays d’Oc region.

A 50-50 blend of Syrah and Grenache, the wine is a warm-weather thirst-quencher made by the technical brilliance of an off-the-charts talent. 

For Jean-Michel Cazes, owner of Château Lynch-Bages, finding a property like Domaine de L’Ostal was a personal quest.

A careful student of terroir, he traveled widely through the Languedoc region for years, searching for the perfect site to launch a new venture. He found it in La Livinière, described as the “best-kept secret” of Minervois in The Guardian.

After purchasing the 370-acre property, his team uprooted vineyards en masse, drained the soils, and planted new vines—primarily Syrah, Grenache, Mourvèdre, and Carignan—in order to produce grapes with a renewed energy and vivacity.

In 2022, a mild, warm vintage benefited from rains that replenished the soil’s water reserves. Grapes came off the vines bursting with red-berry intensity and superbly complex aromatics. 

Domaine de L’Ostal put out a tour de force rosé—and a terrific bargain to boot.