In the heart of Birmingham’s Jewellery Quarter, beneath a charcoal ceiling pulsing with Black Sabbath and Joy Division, something luminous took shape. The Wilderness – part restaurant, part subcultural shrine – became the stage for an immersive exploration of the terroirs and typicities of Roussillon. At the helm: the modest, yet formidable Stefan Neumann MS, joined by the indefatigable Sonal Clare, wine director and sommelier of the host venue.
Clare, known for delivering hard wine knowledge in Technicolor, opened with the restaurant’s origin story. ‘We were originally called Nomad,’ he explained. ‘Then the hotel group with a few more lawyers objected. So we ran a Twitter poll to choose a new name. The Wilderness was added just to make up the numbers – and won with 70% of the vote. And here we are…’
That wry, DIY spirit runs through the restaurant, from its chef-patron Alex Claridge – who bypassed culinary school for Deloitte – to the black napkins and industrial mise-en-scene. ‘I would have been a sexy accountant,’ Claridge noted, dryly. His decision to cook, he revealed, stemmed from a deeply personal place: a resolve, while at university, to overcome anorexia.
The mood shifted as Neumann took the floor. A Master Sommelier of rare precision, he is not only one of the trade’s most exacting palates, but also one of its most thoughtful, witty, and watchable educators.
Together, Neumann and Clare charted a course through Roussillon – a region as geologically fractured as it is vinously diverse. Tucked into the sun-bleached Pyrénées-Orientales, its climate edging toward desert, Roussillon forms a viticultural amphitheatre ringed by Corbières, the Pyrenees, and the Mediterranean. Though it accounts for just 1% of France’s wine output, it produces 80% of the country’s Vins Doux Naturels – a statistic hinting at its stylistic range and technical intrigue.
Mapping the Mosaic
Neumann began by dismantling the notion that appellation alone defines a wine. In Roussillon, it is soil and site which command the foreground. The region’s geological palette includes black schist, granite, limestone, gneiss, marl, and clay – often within walking distance of each other. This diversity, he argued, allows producers to sculpt wine styles with extraordinary fidelity to terroir.
Wines were chosen not just to show grape variety or ageing, but to articulate place. From Domaine Gardiés’ Les Glacières 2021 – a blend of Grenache Blanc, Roussanne and Macabeu grown on clay-limestone in Vingrau – came saline tension, citrus oils, and almond blossom, amplified by ageing in demi-muids. Medium acidity, yet a wine of considerable textural appeal – a friend for beurre blanc-pepped grilled turbot, teased Neumann.
Terres Plurielles’ Silex 2018, from schist and black marl in Tautavel, had gravitas. A collage of Grenache, Syrah, and Carignan, it showed deep fruit and spice tempered with structure and restraint. Clare pointed out its eucalyptus lift, adding that this was proof a cooperative can produce excellent wine.
Then to Aspres – a shift in soils and feel. Domaine Nadal Hainaut’s La Centenaire 2019, made entirely from Carignan first planted in 1900 to mark a family marriage, wore its 14% alcohol lightly. These old vines grow on chalky clay and river pebbles in Le Soler, farmed organically and harvested by hand yielding a wine at once crunchy, vibrant, and brimming with energy. It commanded, advised Neumann, a pork chop cooked over uprooted vine stocks. The estate also happens to have a rather elegant gîte replete with jacuzzi, tucked among the vineyards.
Laurinya 2016 from Château Lauriga took things further, with a long fermentation in so-called truncated conical wooden tanks. Carbonic maceration is part of the region’s history, and crucial to this wine’s character. ‘Long before Beaujolais did carbonic, they did it here,’ noted Neumann. This was weighty, but not clumsy – a wine with lift despite its 15.5%, touched with balsam and pepper.
Domaine du Château de l’Ou’s Secret de Schistes 2020 – one of three Syrahs from three distinct soils – was perhaps the most striking of the dry reds. From pure black schist and fermented in open-top barrels with luddite-like manual punchdowns, it came from vineyards stretching across four plots. Neumann admired the artisanal precision of the method. The estate, named for an egg-shaped pond (l’ou), also features a resident dog the size of Sonal – ‘the first thing to greet guests.’ Clare loved the spice. It invited roast meat – or roast ceps.
Then Mas Amiel’s Légende 2020 – from the enclosed valley of Maury, a blend of Grenache and Carignan with a silken texture and gentle warmth. The estate, founded in 1816, lies so far inland its vineyards brush against a near-continental climate. Long synonymous with fortified wine, Maury here revealed another face – dry, elegant, and dusky, like a red poured at twilight. A thrilling surprise from a place better known for its sugar. Its owner, Olivier Decelle, is also behind Château Jean Faure in Saint-Émilion and Domaine Decelle & Fils in Burgundy.
Le Soula 2019 stood apart. A high-altitude blend led by Sauvignon Blanc, Vermentino, and Grenache Blanc, with threads of Marsanne, Roussanne, and Macabeu, grown on granite and gneiss in the rugged Fenouillèdes. No chemical sprays have touched these vines in over thirty years – the estate has been a pioneer of biodynamic farming since its founding in 2001 by Gérard Gauby and UK importer, Roy Richards. Today, Le Soula is owned and managed by Mark Walford, with South African winemaker, Wendy Wilson at the helm since 2016. Honeysuckle, mountain herbs, and a flinty coolness came through, shaped by long ageing in foudres and Austrian oak. Textural yet tense, angular but generous – a wine with its own orbit.
M. Chapoutier’s RI (Rectificando Invenies) 2018, from Domaine Bila-Haut in the granitic plateau of Lesquerde, closed the dry sequence with intensity. A Syrah-led blend seasoned with Grenache and Carignan, it was fermented in small concrete vats with gentle extraction – light pumpovers, long maceration – and aged partly in demi-muids before returning to concrete to refine. The result: taut but ripe, with a stony backbone and notes of blood orange, black olive, and wild herbs. Michel Chapoutier began the Bila-Haut project in the early 1990s, drawn by Lesquerde’s high, windswept altitudes and fractured granite. It was not a polished expansion but a conviction-led pursuit: tough soils, tough choices, and wines of deliberate, elemental clarity.
The Fortified Chapter: Roussillon’s Timeless Signature
Roussillon’s Vins Doux Naturels are its intellectual legacy – wines crafted by arresting fermentation through mutage to preserve natural grape sugar. The technique is often linked to Arnau de Vilanova, said Neumann – a medieval physician who pioneered the use of alcohol in medicine, though his role in winemaking remains more legend than record. Unlike Port, which is fortified with around 20% spirit by volume (typically in a 1:4 ratio of spirit to wine), VDNs use significantly less – just 5 to 10% of the must, said Neumann – resulting in a lighter, more nuanced balance between sugar, structure, and place.
First came Maury Grenat 2021 from Domaine Fontanel. A style which must be made from at least 75% Grenache Noir and aged reductively to preserve fruit, Grenat is the most youthful expression of Maury’s fortified wines. This one yielded lush chocolate, ripe berries, and a structure which, as Neumann put it, ‘opened like a triangle – wide to a point.’ He suggested venison with rowan berries and chocolate sauce as a match, while Clare favoured duck.
Then Muscat de Rivesaltes 2022 from Cazes – a blend of Muscat d’Alexandrie and Muscat à Petits Grains. Peaches led the charge, headlong and sun-warmed. A small glass of this would make a more interesting aperitif than most cocktails bolstered with anonymous cane sugar, said Neumann. (Not to be confused with Château Cazes of Lynch-Bages fame; this is Maison Cazes, a historic Roussillon estate founded in 1895 and now a benchmark for biodynamic farming in the region).
Then back in time: Rivesaltes Ambré Grande Réserve 1989 from Dom Brial. A blend of Macabeu and Grenache Blanc, oxidatively aged in barrel for twenty years until it turned the colour of old, burnished brass. Chestnut, dried citrus, walnut shell. ‘From the year the World Wide Web was invented,’ Neumann noted – a reminder of how long this wine has been thinking. Clare dubbed it a perfect wine for ‘drunken chicken’, while Neumann craved aged Comté or even Mont Blanc. Best served cool.
Finally, Rancio Sec 2011 from Domaine de Rancy – a wild, oxidative wine made from late-harvested Macabeu, fermented on native yeasts in concrete. It was then left to age untopped in century-old demi-muids for a decade, slowly concentrating and oxidising under the veil of time. The result was savoury, saline, and fiercely distinctive – a wine of confit orange, old wood and dry air. ‘If Manzanilla had a child with Amontillado,’ said Neumann, who likened its intensity to Turkish coffee – ‘the kind that sets you up for the day.’
Reach for Roussillon
What this tasting underscored was the seriousness of Roussillon. It is a place of microclimates, relentless sun, and high-altitude plantings. One of the few corners of France where Mourvèdre ripens fully. A region of 1,961 grower families – yet 75% of wine production comes from just 24 cooperatives.
Officially, 32% of vineyards are organic or biodynamic – unofficially, it’s likely closer to half, hinted Neumann. Some producers simply don’t fill in the knotty forms. There is wind. There is cover crop density thick enough to lose your boots in. There are wines of structure, salinity, sapidity – and soul.
Explained with such care by Neumann and Clare in this haven in the Jewellery Quarter, this region – long in the shadow of its neighbours – emerged as a jewel itself, ‘entre ciel et mer’. A place shaped not only by stone and sunlight, but by people who think deeply about what they grow.
Thanks to Stefan Neumann’s precision and Sonal Clare’s verve, this was a survey of intent – a testament to a landscape defying the odds, and demanding to be understood on its own, exacting terms.
