#supermarket

Dec 18, 2015

WINE OF THE WEEK: Mud House Pinot Noir 2014

£9.75, Tesco, £11, Sainsbury's, £9.99/£14.99, Majestic The juicy, sweet fruit and almost tannin-free suppleness of a good New Zealand Pinot Noir make it an ideal red to have on standby throughout Christmas. Avowed white wine drinkers will often drop their guard with Pinot Noir and it’s a wine that can cope with the richly flavoured turkey stuffings and trimmings which often trip up more austere, classical reds. It can equally well be served with a rib of beef or gammon and Bo

Dec 17, 2015

Festive White Wines

Whites to keep the show on the road this Christmas and New Year Wines listed in ascending order of price. I've given a UK stockist for each, but you can find other stockists in the UK and other countries on wine-searcher.com Tesco *finest Saint Mont 2014, France Mouthwatering, tangy lime and quince flavours. A brilliant, snappy fresh alternative to Sauvignon Blanc made from local grape varieties – mainly Gros Manseng – in Saint Mont, south west France. £5.50, Tesco Cimarosa M

Dec 16, 2015

Festive Red Wines

Ten red wines to serve with the Christmas feast Wines listed in ascending order of price. I've given a UK stockist (or two) for each, but you can find other stockists in the UK and other countries on wine-searcher.com Cimarosa Carmenère 2012, Colchagua, Chile Crowd-pleasing, fresh, velvet-soft Carmenère with a typical, smoky, green-pepper edge to the blackberryish fruit. A match for turkey, but not up to goose. £6.99, Lidl Domaine Mas Barrau Cabernet Franc 2014, Pays du Gard,

Dec 4, 2015

WINE OF THE WEEK: Tim Adams Clare Valley Semillon 2011

£9.75, selected Tesco and tesco.com/wine This dry Australian Semillon is an old favourite, not only for its citrus-zest freshness, lemon-curd smoothness and delicate smoky oak but because it’s a vinous flexible friend. It goes well with all sorts of fish and seafood, vegetable and salad dishes, goats’ and other cheeses. You can equally well drink it on its own – and if you have somewhere with a reasonably steady temperature below that of the average kitchen, you can lay it do

Dec 2, 2015

What does a winemaker do when he doesn't like his own wine?

Marcelo Papa, winemaker for Concha Y Toro, Chile What a difference a year makes. It’s a statement of the obvious where wine is concerned, but this is a tale of two consecutive vintages where variation is not down to sunshine levels, rainfall, hail, diurnal temperature range, or any of the other myriad weather variables that affect or dictate the quality and quantity of grapes in any season. The difference between the 2012 and the 2013 Marqués de Casa Concha Cabernet Sauvignon

Nov 20, 2015

WINE OF THE WEEK: Marisco The King’s Thorn Pinot Gris 2013

£9.99 when you buy any 6 bottles, Majestic There’s more to New Zealand white wine than Sauvignon Blanc, but the other grape varieties often struggle to make themselves heard above the Sauvignon din. One that’s starting to shout a bit louder is Pinot Gris. Sometimes it’s labeled Pinot Grigio, but as Italian Pinot Grigio is a much lighter, more neutral wine, New Zealanders mostly label theirs Gris. The King’s Thorn is typically fruity and juicy with a delicately honeyed nose, p

Nov 13, 2015

WINE OF THE WEEK: Taste the Difference Priorat 2013

£10, Sainsbury's You can pay a small fortune for a wine from the remote, hilly region of Priorat in Catalonia – home to some of Spain’s most expensive and recherché reds – and yet Sainsbury’s manages to put this one on the shelves at £10. It’s typically powerful with nutty, spicy, plum-and-cherry fruit and a slightly wild, stony edge that seems entirely in keeping with the rugged terrain. Four grape varieties go into the mix, Garnacha (aka Grenache), Cariñena (Carignan), Syra

Oct 23, 2015

WINE OF THE WEEK: The Lot Series Apalta Colchagua Carmenère 2012

£7.99, Aldi Maybe you already buy wine at Aldi. If you don't, maybe you'll want to reconsider… At a tenner, the red I've chosen is one of the most expensive, part of the limited-edition 'Lot Series', but I can recommend a red at £3.79 if all you need is a simple, soft, party wine (Toro Loco 2014 from Spain - and don't bother trading up to the more expensive Reserva version). The sophisticated Lot Series Carmenère is a true expression of the grape variety that Chile has adopte

Oct 1, 2015

WINE OF THE WEEK: Bolney Estate Pinot Noir 2013

£15.99, Waitrose There are going to be plenty of opportunities to hunker down with big, beefy reds in the months to come, so here, for the optimists hoping for some last rays of summer sun, is summer in a glass: a beautifully fragrant, light red - all English roses, cherries and a delicate veneer of polished oak. The only thing it hasn't got is a suntan, but that's because Pinot Noir, the thoroughbred better known for producing great red Burgundy, is a red grape variety that

Sep 17, 2015

WINE OF THE WEEK: Masi Campofiorin Rosso del Veronese 2011

£9.99, Waitrose Think of this as an alternative to a goose-down duvet, a red to snuggle up with as the evenings get chillier: a soft, soothing, Valpolicella-type wine, but super-charged with deep, velvety, dried-cherry fruit, coffee-bean, nutmeg, vanilla and dark chocolate flavours. There are no chewy tannins, so although it'll take a beef casserole in its stride it won't overpower lighter food and is especially good with in-season game birds such as mallard, partridge and pi

Sep 10, 2015

WINES OF THE WEEK: Asda's Wine Atlas range

£4.97, Asda Wine Atlas Bobal A mouthful of juicy, dark cherries with a hint of bakewell tart and peppery, liquoricey chewiness make this a good wine for red meat - a casserole if the barbie has been put into winter storage. Bobal is the grape variety and it's big in acreage in Spain, but for some reason they keep the name largely under wraps. This wine has an impressive pedigree in that the award-winning, ex-Ritz sommelier Bruno Murciano had a big hand in creating it. Wine At

Aug 27, 2015

WINE OF THE WEEK: Pasico Bush Vine Monastrell Shiraz 2014

£6.50, Sainsbury's A young Spanish red made without any ageing in oak so that the bright, bold flavours are all about fruit and spice - ripe berries, juicy plums, sweet red peppers and crushed black peppercorns. For the fact file: the winemaking is modern, but the vines (aka Mourvèdre and Syrah) are old and are left to grow as bushes. Cries out for meaty sausages, red meat - on the barbie if it's still fired up - or melt-in-the-mouth slow-roast pork. Pasico Bush Vine Monastre

Aug 6, 2015

WINE OF THE WEEK: Domaine Saint Prix Saint-Bris 2014

£8.99, Lidl Wine writers get everywhere these days… even to Lidl. This Saint-Bris is from a new collection, headlined The French Session, which comes in on 3 September and stays only as long as stocks last. If you like Sauvignon Blanc, you'll love this - it's brimful of fresh, crunchy, ripe gooseberry flavours. Pair it with Vietnamese and Thai food, white fish with lemon, tomatoes and red peppers or goats' cheese. Anorak fact: Saint-Bris is the only area of Burgundy where Sau

Jul 30, 2015

WINE OF THE WEEK: Primo di Conti Côtes de Bergerac 2012

£11, Marks & Spencer If this dark, handsome, cassis and cedar-scented red was from Bordeaux, it would be more expensive, but the wines of nearby Bergerac don't command the same prices. Lucky us. It's a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, matured in French oak barrels for extra depth and a vanilla-edged smokiness. As stocks may have run dry by December, I'm flagging up now that it would be a lovely wine to give or to receive, especially as you could lay it down for a coupl

Sep 5, 2014

Wine and food matching: promiscuity rules

With a nod to nostalgia I thought about starting this editorial: Once upon time there was a supermarket chain called Safeway. I decided not to because a) originality can be so unsettling, b) this is not about Safeway, c) it’s not even about supermarkets. You’re welcome to breathe a sigh of relief at c), especially as I’m about to go off at a complete tangent before I’ve even started – that’s the luxury of a blog. Tangent: one of my favourite, as far as I know unrehearsed, sup