Southwest Region

The Southwest region covers a large range of wines from the departements of Aveyron, Cantal, Dordogne, Gers, Haute-Garonne, Landes, Lot, Lot-Garonne, Pyrenees-Atlantiques, Tarn and Tarn-et-Garonne. Despite the range of soils, climates and grape varieties, the wines do seem to have a recognizable style. The reds, the majority of the production, have a rich, dark color and a certain rusticity, rather hard when young but aging well.

Typical of this style are the wines of Maridian and Cahors, especially the former; very robust. Such wines are not to everyone's taste, and lighter, more quaffable wines are produced from the Gamay grape, a recent immigrant to this area.