(Forbes) - Once a source only for cheap bulk wine, Languedoc is now proving its ability to make wonderful terroir wines at very reasonable prices. The region is thriving with so many exciting wine producers you hardly know where to turn. This is a region I recommend for anyone who is looking for exciting wines with character and personality .

Not being one of France’s prestigious wine regions, Languedoc has fewer traditions to respect than, say Bordeaux and Burgundy. So the wine growers here are not afraid to experiment and innovate.

Languedoc is my own favourite wine region and it has been ever since I moved to France almost 25 years ago. Languedoc was at the time taking its first steps towards stardom. In wine bars and wine shops in Paris and of course on site, in the vineyards, I came to know the quality pioneers in this region that up until then had been known almost exclusively for simple bulk wine.

They were brave these pioneers in the 1980s and 1990s, bottling their own wines, investing, aiming at quality. The French consumers had a hard time accepting that anything but cheap junk wine could be produced in Languedoc. The brave pioneers were saved by an export market that was less prejudiced.

Today many of the famous Languedoc-names still focus on the export market. Even the Chinese have discovered that Bordeaux and Burgundy are not the only French wines out there and for affordable quality wines they are more and more turning to Languedoc. And recently a Chinese wine investment company bought a wine property in Corbières in southern Languedoc with 56 hectares of vineyards.

Languedoc is France’s biggest wine region, with a bit over 200,000 hectares (almost 500,000 acres). A quarter of the French vineyard acreage. It has a variety of climates and a matching variety of wine styles. Vines grow both along the Mediterranean and in the mountainous inland. People are often amazed, considering the warm and dry climate, that also high quality sparkling, dry white wines and even great pinot noir wines are produced here. The mountains and the winds give cooler sites enabling the talented producers to make wines with startling freshness.

The local grapes, like Carignan and Grenache, are well adapted to the climate and if you are lucky to have old vines with long roots it is even better.