Shopping | ES Best Home | Food & Drink | Wine and spirits | White wine The Evening Standard's journalism is supported by our readers. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. I would like to be emailed about offers, event and updates from Evening Standard.
Read our privacy notice . If you were playing a word association game, and heard the word ‘wine’, what would your first response be? Outside of ‘red’, ‘white’ and ‘now please’, there is a high chance that your choice would be ‘France’ – and for very good reason. France is one of the largest exporters of wine on Earth.
Its relationship with the stuff stretches back to the earliest days of Roman rule. Millennia of vinicultural experimentation and tradition-building have led to a supremely exciting spread of luminary wines, across 11 main regions which themselves contain multitudes. Each region and subregion has its specialisms, born of the grapes cultivated there and the unique properties of the lands in which they are grown (known as terroir).
Some of these specialisms are special enough to define their region, and even inherit its name – the perfect example being, of course, Champagne . This geographical honour relates to France’s appellation d'origine contrôlée (AOC) certification, which legally enshrines production processes and ingredient sources for notable regional produce – and crucially, ensures that no foreign produce may bear the name of the r.