If you didn’t know, you might be hard-pushed to say where this Pinot Noir comes from – the upper Aude Valley is not the best known of wine regions – but you would be having a bad day if you didn’t recognise the grape variety. It’s Pinot Noir to a T, with glistening cherry fruit and silky palate.

Georgian wine is having a moment – as is the country’s food, conveniently. One of the main reasons is that however the wines are produced, especially the reds made from the indigenous Saperavi grape, they never lose their distinctive Georgian identity – their authenticity

I took a bottle of Wynns Coonawarra Estate John Riddoch Limited Release Cabernet Sauvignon out of the rack with a couple of other wines a few weeks ago, thinking that at 30 years old (the bottles not me) it was a good time to open them. If nothing else, I really couldn’t expect the corks to hold out any longer. On the cellar tag, I had written, long ago, 1996. It was only when I came to open the bottle that I saw 'Vintage 1986'. So, not 30 but 40 years old

Chianti is a wine I can drink anytime. The best of times, the worst of times, high days, holidays and down days, count me in. This Vignamaggio Terre di Prenzano Chianti Classico 2022 is softly spicy and fragrant with open, sweet, cherry-ish fruit, a wisp of vanilla, and supple background tannins

This polished, oak-matured Côtes de Bourg shows what good value and sheer drinkability there is to be found in some of the less well known, less glamorous appellations of Bordeaux – especially in an outstanding vintage like 2022. Wth its appealing crimson-purple colour, whiff of violets and vanilla, generous plum and black fruit, its calm tannins, cool freshness and notes of oak-spice, cedar and graphite, Château de Thau 2022 would surely persuade anyone.

What I like about Château Haute-Borie is that it's textbook Malbec from the Cahors region. If you like Argentine Malbec, you’ll like this, but Cahors has a distinctive, more mineral style, together with ripe blackberry fruit and bay-leaf spicy freshness. There’s succulent, ripe blackberry fruit wrapped around the graphite minerality here, with bay-leaf spicy freshness and a hint of cocoa, all quietly underpinned by satin-smooth tannins and herbal length.

There are still three weeks to go but, if you’re beginning to think about Easter lunch, this could be your red wine. It’s Rioja, so it’s a comfortably traditional choice, but it’s not wholly traditional Rioja, so it falls into the something-a-bit-different category too

I was torn about which one of the trio of Greek wines under the new Three Bowls label to choose. In the end, I put aside – for now – the pale, dry rosé and the white Assyrtiko in favour of the red Xinomavro from Naoussa, the heartland of this distinguished and distinctive Greek grape variety.

If you like elegantly juicy, lithe, pure-fruited red wines with wild strawberry fruit, subtle spice and sappy, herbal notes, you’ll love Avamposti Cerchi Slarina 2022, an Italian red wine that's also very versatile with food

This is a wonderfully welcoming, approachable red wine, but characterful and distinctive, too: dry, rich and mouth-filling with ripe cherry and dried-cherry fruit. And, along with everything else going for it, Cerasuolo di Vittoria, and especially Santa Tresa’s, is very food-friendly.

This is a Cahors for fans of Argentinian Malbec just as much as it is for dyed-in-the-the wool devotees of Cahors. It’s a generous, plush style with dark fruit – think sun-warmed blackberries and ripe black plums – woven with classic liquorice, spice and mineral graphite notes

Kicking off with a very reasonably priced Australian Pinot Noir has to be a good way to start any new year. It should also be a welcome one if you want a lighter red after the heavyweight festivities, or if you want to hunker down in the northern hemisphere, but with thoughts of summer rather than winter

Made from 55-year-old vines at the historic Château de Pizay estate in an outstanding vintage for Beaujolais, this 2023 Régnié is beautifully expressive, with a lustrous deep ruby-red colour and succulent cassis and strawberry fruit. It could be on the table on Christmas day and would make a great red wine for Boxing Day.

This Rioja Reserva has already featured in my Festive Red Wine Guide 2025, but it’s so good, so appropriate for Christmas and also relatively widely available that I’m revisiting it here

Welcome to my round-up of 58 red wines for the 2025 festive season. It's designed to cover all occasions, eventualities and tastes, ranging freely through styles and grape varieties, from classic to contemporary, old to young, and across continents and regions to far-flung corners

This typically dark and inky looking Georgian Saperavi has deep, briary blackberry and damson fruit, peppery, meaty undertones, a whisper of violets and salty tannins softened to just the right degree by brief oak ageing

This is a wonderful old-vine red wine made in a traditional way by accomplished oenologists, husband and wine Jorge Serôdio Borges and Sandra Tavares de Silva, at the tiny estate around an old port warehouse that they bought in the Pinhão Valley in the Douro in 2003.

Red Burgundy is never going to be cheap but, if you know where to look, it can be good value, especially from less famous appellations. Domaine Machard de Gramont Hautes-Côtes de Beaune 2023 makes the case eloquently.

Wines made from Cabernet Franc often feature as good reds for summer because they can be lightly chilled, but that doesn’t mean they have to be served from the fridge or only in the summer. Finca Lalande The Land Cabernet Franc is a delight when lightly chilled, but it’s a fuller bodied example than many and works well at this time of year and through the winter served at around 17ºC

If summer comes back this year, Tenuta Cappellina Chianti Classico will be just the wine to greet it. If autumn sets in, it will still be just the red to have in your glass.