You want to purchase French wines, but are intimidated about the wide variety of grape varieties, regions, places, styles and of course, the tongue twisting names of grapes and wines. 

The world of French wines can be confusing, not to mention, it is also a daunting process sometimes. But help is here. One single word that would really help in choosing a bottle of French wine, which will let you decide that the wine in the bottle is of good quality - Mis en bouteille 

You are holding a bottle of the Châteauneuf-du-Pape, a premium wine, and it has Mis en bouteille printed on its label. Mis en bouteille means that the producer is proclaiming that he or she has controlled the entire winemaking, maturation, and bottling of the wine at its domain or at its estate. 

So, why does this mean that the wine is of good or premium quality? Often the wine travels from one place to another before it is filled into the bottle and reaches the end consumer. Sometimes merchants buy lots of wines or grapes, the wines get made and they eventually get matured somewhere else and could possibly even be bottled someplace else. In this entire process, the wine sometimes ends up traveling or blending many different plots, so as a consumer, one can never be fully sure of what you are getting. 

But when a producer puts the word Mis en bouteille on a bottle of wine, rest assured that it has been made, matured and bottled at a single site, which is at the wine producer’s estate, which in turn means the producer has full control over the entire winemaking and bottling process, which automatically translates into higher or premium quality. 

So, next time, do not feel intimidated when buying a wine from France.