Albariño is currently rather fashionable, particularly when from Rias Baixas in Galicia. It’s a somewhat forgotten, often rainy inland area of North Western Spain. The salty hint to the wine makes it go particularly well with food. From Elena Adell, Campo Viejo’s talented wine maker. Tasting notes: Pale straw colour. Light-bodied. Citrus, apple and floral…
Tag: white wine
Laurent Perrier La Cuvée
Britain’s sparkling wine market is still worth £1.5bn and 140m bottles of bubbly are sold here each year. Most of the market is made up of prosecco, which has surged in popularity as a champagne alternative over the last few years. We are by quite some way the greatest consumers of champagne outside France, drinking…
La Vieille Ferme 2019
Another novelty bottle? No – this is despite it’s £7.50 price tag, pretty serious wine. It’s from the Perrin family – well-respected producers, who produce ‘Miraval’ Rose (reviewed here https://atimeforwine.blog/2020/07/27/miraval-cotes-de-provence-rose) with their celebrity partners Brad Pitt & Angelina Jolie. It’s a white Cotes du Rhone wine from one of the world’s largest wine-producing regions and…
M&S Classics Grüner Veltliner 2019
With its ‘Classics’ range M&S set out to produce wines which are the epitome of a grape, blend or region. I like this idea very much. I’m a fan of Austrian wine in general and Grüner Veltliner in particular. I hosted a live zoom wine-tasting recently and none of the participants had tried one before….
Vernaccia Di San Gimignano, Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference
The first wine of 2021 to be sent back. This was faulty. I think the agglomerate cork had failed, let in oxygen and the wine was becoming vinegar. The failure rate of this closure is less than a natural cork (7% – or approx 1 bottle per case). On returning it to Sainsbury’s, they no…
M&S Classics Picpoul de Pinet 2019
With its ‘Classics’ range M&S set out to produce wines which are the epitome of a grape, blend or region. I like this idea very much; at wine tastings – especially blind ones – I don’t really want quirky surprises. Is this wine unmistakably Picpoul de Pinet? Almost all Supermarket Picpouls come from the Costieres…
M&S Classics California Chardonnay 2019
With its ‘Classics’ range M&S set out to produce wines which are the epitome of a grape, blend or region. I like this idea very much; at wine tastings – especially blind ones – I don’t really want quirky surprises. At a blind tasting before lockdown I had several ‘atypical’ wines and got them wrong….
Le Rocher de St Victor, Picpoul de Pinet 2019 Lidl
I have written before about the ubiquitous nature of supermarket Picpoul de Pinet: ‘ubiquitous’ because they pretty much all stock the identical wine from the same co-operative producer, but with a different label. Not so Lidl; this Picpoul comes from respected producer Ormarine, rather than the large local co-operative producer and has a little more…
M&S Classics Albariño Rías Baixas 2019
With its ‘Classics’ range M&S set out to produce wines which are the epitome of a grape, blend or region. It includes repackaged wines from existing suppliers as well as new wines that buyers had to go out and hunt down. Sue Daniels set out “to find and redefine those lovely well-known regions and iconic…
M&S Classics Pinot Grigio 2019
With its ‘Classics’ range M&S set out to produce wines which are the epitome of a grape, blend or region. It includes repackaged wines from existing suppliers as well as new wines that buyers had to go out and hunt down. Sue Daniels set out “to find and redefine those lovely well-known regions and iconic…
Pouilly-Fuissé – Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference 2018
Whilst not cheap this wine is relatively good value. Pouilly-Fuisse is often confused with Pouilly-Fume. This is Chardonnay from a small area of Burgundy in the ‘Macon’ region, south of Chablis. I have had so many disappointingly ‘meh’ Chablis that I avoid buying it, unless I’m in France. This producer (Rodet) is based in Mercurey…
Dog Point Vineyard Sauvignon Blanc 2018 – Update
This update reflects the 2018 vintage. Dog Point has a characteristic ‘New World’ taste to it – and would definitely appeal to lovers of ‘The Ned’ & Cloudy Bay (one of the winemakers used to work for Cloudy Bay). I guess that the fermentation took place at relatively low temperatures. The winemakers employed the ‘reductive method’ (very…
A Time for Wine 