£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

£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

£13.95, The Wine Society, thewinesociety.com This wine is a great match for cashew nuts. You might think that anybody worrying about which wine to drink with cashews has too much time on their hands, but think of all the delicious dishes, especially Indian, Chinese and Thai-style, that include cashews. I rest my case, and not least because it also goes very well with chicken, prawns, pork, pumpkin and aubergine (perhaps that should be eggplant as the wine is American). It’s v

£10.50, Oddbins, oddbins.com Love the retro label, love the wine - a full-on, spicy, cherry-scented red that will go down a treat (as they say) on Halloween or bonfire night and equally well on a more formal occasion. It's made from vines grown without chemical pesticides or fertilizers, hence both the name Zensa, the Italian pronunciation of sensa, the word for 'without', and the liberal sprinkling of organico, vino biologico and agricultura biologica across the label. Nero

Oozing with flavour: Fromagerie Caseus, the excellent cheese shop in Montreuil, Pas de Calais, France Let’s cut to the chase: wine and cheese don’t make the perfect couple most of us would like them to be. There are one or two famously good matches – Sauternes and Roquefort, Port and Stilton – but most wines don’t take cheese in their stride, which isn’t so surprising when you think what cheese brings to the party: strong, even pungent, flavours; saltiness; acidity, sometimes

Marine algae sprays, anti-hail nets, a secret vineyard… I was in Burgundy in June and some fascinating things emerged at visits to Louis Latour, a company whose tendrils reach unusual places. As well as being a domaine producer with 27ha of Grands Crus and a négociant with an outpost in the Ardèche, it owns Simonnet-Febvre in Chablis, Henri Fessy in Beaujolais and, rare in Europe, it has its own cooperage (I’ll revisit the latter in a future post). Back to sprays, nets and se

£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

£7.99, cellarandkitchen.adnams.co.uk and Adnams stores Hear this: Portuguese wines are some of the most overlooked and underrated and you don’t have to go very far to find them. There are lots of warming, velvety reds around, from Dão, the Douro and Alentejo, but we can’t drink wall-to-wall reds from here until next spring, so here’s a wonderfully zippy white. Light in body but not on flavour, it has a delicately honeyed, citrus and quince taste with a hint of baked apple and

£10.75, Berry Bros & Rudd Côtes du Rhône can be simple and quaffable or a bit rough around the edges or it can come with smart credentials. This is one with all-singing all-dancing credentials: Berry Bros have it made for them by the Perrin family who own the famous Châteauneuf-du-Pape estate Château de Beaucastel. It's full and generous but not remotely heavy, has a perfume of violets and raspberries and supple, spicy, peppery fruit. It would go down a treat with slow-roast

£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

£9.74, Majestic Wine Let's extend a warm welcome to a sophisticated, Burgundy-style Chardonnay at a non-Burgundy price. In fact, this wine was supposed to be a white Burgundy, but the buyer tasked with sourcing it for Majestic's new Definition range (its promising, inaugural foray into own-label) went off-piste. Heading south into Languedoc, he came back with this: a subtly oaked, nutty Chardonnay with almond blossom, beeswax, peach and citrus flavours and a fresh, oystershel

​ It was drinking an Anjou Blanc with English asparagus a couple of months ago – Château de Fesles La Chapelle 2011, since you ask – that reminded me what an underrated grape variety Chenin Blanc is. It’s not that people haven’t heard of it. South African Chenin is out there providing an unchallenging, cheap white wine option in supermarkets, pubs and bars the length and breadth of the UK, maybe partly encouraged by the fact that it's pronounceable, which is more than you can

£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

£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

£12.50, Yapp Brothers Recommending a Crémant de Limoux, rather than a Prosecco, makes me feel a bit like King Canute. There seems to be no holding back the tidal wave of Prosecco flowing into the nation's bars, trolleys, fridges and glasses, but if you sometimes (or always) crave something less sweet and frothy, here is a French sparkling wine that's more like Champagne. It's made in the same way as Champagne, using the same grape varieties, and has a similar, enticing, biscu

£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

£12.49, Noel Young Wines; £12, WoodWinters A sumptuous but dazzlingly crisp, zesty dry white, with rich tropical and citrus fruit, a hint of ginger and pepper and a sea-spray freshness to finish. While you're trying it with seared scallops, dressed crab, griddled prawns, a flavoursome risotto or herby, lemony chicken, tell someone its story: the Chenin Blanc vines are 70-years-old (the label says 40, but that's another story) and share a rocky slope with rooibos tea plants -

£14.75, Oddbins A wine for opera lovers, Puccini fans, incurable romantics and anyone who likes full, generously fruity, soft-textured reds: this has raspberry and blackberry compote flavours, a hint of liquorice and a freshness that comes from the Gamay grape (better known for Beaujolais). What's in the name? Dame Nellie Melba, an incomparable Mimi in La Bohème, was from the Yarra Valley. Versatile with food, so what about wild boar chops, Italian sausages, or lasagne? La Bo

£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

£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