If you are curious as to why the wines of Provence seem to be popping up everywhere these days you need look no further than husband and wife winemaking team, Gilles Pons and Pascale Massenot.

Wine, especially rosé, has always been an integral part of Provencal life but they have, until recently at least, enjoyed a less than stellar reputation, and that’s putting it kindly.

Wine was introduced to the region by the Greeks, more than 2000 years ago. Through most of the intervening history though it was just another agricultural commodity, produced by a peasant farmer who might also own a peach orchard, grow some melons, and hunt wild boar in the fall.

For the most part he didn’t even bottle the wine himself, instead he sold his grapes to the local co-operative and, as they paid him by the kilo, he produced as much as he could, and as cheaply as he could, with no regard for quality.

Pascale Massenot & Gilles Pons

These days though the wine world has changed and no one wants this rough peasant plonk anymore. Happily, though, there is a growing market for quality wine, and the formerly sleepy and conservative world of Provencal winemaking is now alive with dynamic change. It is largely being driven by people from outside the region who are well educated, well capitalized and extremely conscious of the world wine market.

Meet Pons and Massenot. In their former lives they owned a Parisian graphics design business and, after a period of rehabilitation studying viniculture and oenology, bought some old vineyards overlooking the Mediterranean between St Tropez and Toulon. Their purchase had two advantages – there was no winery so they were able to start from scratch and build one to their own specifications, and it had some extremely old vines.

Now old vines are a problem if you are making bulk wine because they deliver low yields, but are a treasure-trove for a quality producer because the few, very small grapes they do produce contain intensely flavored juice. So, while the former owners sold their fruit to the local co-op and bemoaned their poor returns, Les Valentines are using the best modern winemaking techniques to turn these same grapes into superb wines.

One of their best is their lovely Chateau Les Valentines, Cote de Provence Rosé 2008 ($25). Yes, it’s expensive for a rosé but wait till you taste it! It’s a delicate pale salmon color with a subtle intensity of flavor, feminine charm and an earthy minerality packed with rich, mouth-filling flavor but all elegant restraint at the same time. That is, it’s the perfect wine with which to toast ones valentine!

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To find this wine near you try www.wine-searcher.com