Latest news with #OzClarke
CNA
14-05-2025
- Business
- CNA
Which airline serves the best champagne?
The golden days of flying may be long gone, but for those lucky enough to turn left when boarding there is still the prospect of champagne. And as competition for first-class customers increases – British Airways, Lufthansa and Air France have all lately unveiled new first-class suites – more airlines are now looking to sparkling wine to give their offering the edge. Singapore Airlines recently signed an exclusive deal to pour Cristal 2015 – a prestige cuvee it serves to first-class passengers on selected routes in tulip glasses by Lalique. 'That glass of champagne is pretty much the first thing that happens to you on a flight, so it's terribly important to get it right,' says SIA's wine consultant Oz Clarke. 'And with long-lived wines of this calibre, that takes real planning. The red Bordeaux we're currently serving in first class, a 2005 Pichon Lalande, for example, is one we bought 15 years ago. The wines we're buying now probably won't leave the cellar until 2035.' Qatar Airways' newly appointed master of wine, Anne Krebiehl, is a champagne specialist. She argues the case for drinking it at altitude, backed by flavour science. 'At 35,000ft, our senses are dulled due to cabin pressure and the relative dryness of the air, but our perception of umami is not affected,' she says. 'And you find a lot of umami in long-aged wines like Krug or Charles Heidsieck Brut Reserve, which contains a lot of reserve wines. The bubbles also help to carry aroma straight to your olfactory receptors and stimulate the trigeminal nerve, a super-highway of sensory perception that is not at all affected by altitude, dryness or white noise.' A gold-medal winner at the recent Cellars in the Sky Awards, Qatar Airways offers white and rose champagne in first and business. 'In first we are currently serving Krug, with its exquisite savouriness, and Bollinger La Grande Annee Rose, a pinot-led cuvee with a lush velvetiness,' says Krebiehl. 'In business it's often Heidsieck Brut Reserve, which I am a huge devotee of – it has such depth.' Air France prides itself on offering champagne to passengers in every class. The airline's new head sommelier Xavier Thuizat – who is also head sommelier at Paris's Hotel de Crillon – tells me they get through more than one million bottles of champagne a year. As part of its £7 billion (US$9.25 billion; S$12.07 billion) upgrade, British Airways has doubled down on English sparkling wine. Prestige cuvees available in first class over the coming months will include Nyetimber's 1086 rose and Gusbourne's Fifty One Degrees North, plus a new sparkler from Dermot Sugrue, a cult-ish winemaker in the South Downs. On the champagne front, BA has also reinstated the excellent Laurent-Perrier Grand Siecle. Booze has been integral to the inflight experience since the 1930s, when the first commercial airliners took to the skies. By the mid-20th century, it had become an important point of difference between competing airlines. An early incarnation of the Delta Air Lines Royal Service included free-flowing champagne and canapes; according to author and pilot Al Bridger, British Airways offered '50s customers a 'Flight Champagne Supper' featuring a Bordeaux, a Burgundy and Mumm Cordon Rouge Champagne. In these rather more abstemious times, a single glass of champagne 'may be the only thing that people drink', says Charles Metcalfe, head judge of Cellars in the Sky, so an airline needs to make that one glass count. I certainly remember being bowled over by the offer of Krug on a first-class ANA flight to Japan. It's even more impressive, though, if the cabin crew clearly know their wines as well. The Emirates training programme is one of the most rigorous. Its new three-tiered 'L'art du vin' course sees first-class staff schooled in 1855 Bordeaux classifications and top Burgundy crus; they're also versed in food and wine matching, and wines including Chateau d'Yquem, Ornellaia and Dom Perignon P2. Private jet operator Flexjet will go the extra mile and arrange sommelier-led champagne tastings for passengers in flight. And when it comes to food and wine matching, no combination is too weird. 'We have had some very specific requests for champagne pairings, including a tuna sandwich and chicken tikka masala,' says CEO Andrew Collins. Even at 35,000ft, it seems, the customer is always right.
Telegraph
23-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
The Proms turns patriotic: ‘We need to celebrate everything that's good about this country'
Around the turn of the millennium, celebrity oenophile Oz Clarke was on stage at the Royal Albert Hall for a Proms interval feature in which he suggested wine pairings for pieces of classical music. One of those working behind the scenes was 19-year-old Sam Jackson, who was dispatched to the nearest Waitrose with 'an envelope of used fivers' to select a few choice vintages for the segment. Jackson, who had never been to the Proms before, also knew nothing about wine. 'I stood there thinking, 'how do I tell people that I don't know what I'm doing here?' I think pints of Carling were about the limit of my alcoholic palette,' Jackson recalls. 'Obviously I picked some wine and came back, and that was that. And then I thought, 'How am I fortunate enough to be doing work experience at the Proms and be allowed in?' ' Now, more than two decades later, the 41-year-old controller of BBC Radio 3 is not just allowed into the Proms but, as of this year, he runs it; today, following the departure of Proms controller David Pickard last year, Jackson launches his first season in charge of the world's biggest classical music festival. 'Good grief, 19-year-old me would look and just find the whole thing, frankly, bemusing,' he says. 'The idea that this is what I would be doing today.' Alas, there is to be no return for Clarke and his wine pairings. 'I mean, it sounds tenuous now, it was tenuous then,' says Jackson. 'I'm sure it was a fun interval feature, though.' Sequestered in a small, windowless meeting room at BBC Broadcasting House, Jackson gives me a cheerful greeting — 'Welcome to the cupboard!' — and a cup of tea. Jackson joined the Corporation in 2023, so has had involvement in previous Proms programming, but this is the first time it is 'his' season. As well as excitement, there are nerves. 'You just don't want to break it. There's that kind of 'Ming vase' mentality, because this is a festival that's been going for well over 100 years,' Jackson says. 'At the same time, I'm not paid simply to tread water with the Proms. We need bold new ideas.' Among the eye-catching Proms he has programmed are a performance of Shostakovich's epic opera, Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, only the second time it has been staged at the festival; the first all-night concert at the Albert Hall (running from 11pm-7am) since 1983; and a Prom with music inspired by The Traitors — complete with the BBC Singers (threatened with the axe two years ago) wearing cloaks. Some 70 artists are making their Proms debuts this year, including Japanese superstar pianist Hayato Sumino, Joe Hisaishi, the Japanese composer, and indie darling St Vincent. Returning Proms stars include the likes of conductor Simon Rattle, pianist András Schiff and Louise Alder, the soprano. There are 21 international ensembles slated to perform — including the Vienna Philharmonic and the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra — but, notably, none from America. Jackson says the cost of bringing orchestras across the Atlantic for a single concert is not 'a good use of licence fee payers' money', but hints that there may be 'a slightly more American tinge' next year, as the country marks the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Jackson says he is determined to not just settle for the status quo. 'Because on one level, you could programme a season that was very inoffensive, very middle of the road — nobody would dislike it. But actually, we're here to take risks.' It was a desire to do something different in 2020 that plunged the Proms into one of its biggest recent crises. It was leaked that the BBC planned to drop the lyrics from two staples of the Last Night — Rule, Britannia! and Land of Hope and Glory — apparently because of their colonial overtones. Following a swift outcry, including an intervention from then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson and thousands of complaints, the BBC was forced to backtrack. The songs have been part of the Last Night ever since and that remains the same under Jackson. Did it take him long to decide whether to keep the usual fixtures of the Last Night in the programme. 'No, and I'm not in any way trying to duck your question, but I think that's above my pay grade. In the end, if the BBC decided to not have Rule Britannia! in, it wouldn't be a unilateral decision by anybody in a job like mine,' he says. 'I'm really mindful that the Last Night of the Proms, for many people, is their only experience of classical music in a year. We have, what, three-and-a-half million people watching it on BBC One, and it stands for something for a lot of people. 'The world's a scary place at the moment, and there's an awful lot of change going on around us, and I know that for a lot of people, it's really important to be able to to celebrate everything that is good in this country,' he adds. 'Now, people's definitions of what that is vary greatly. And what I really wish, is that when we have this conversation, it could just be done with respect. It's okay that people feel differently.' Ultimately, he says that making everybody happy with the Last Night is 'a need that can never quite be met because of the all-embracing nature of who we're trying to reach'. But there will be additions to it, not least because Jackson says the 'final section has been exactly the same for a very long time'. Rachel Portman, the Brit who was the first woman to win a Best Original Score Oscar, has been commissioned to write a new piece, Gatherings, to be played before the usual favourites. Though it is a thorny issue, always sure to inflame one side or another in the culture wars, Jackson relishes the debate. 'The moment that stops is the moment people stop caring. And we need people to care about what we do. We need people to pay their licence fee. As we head towards the end of our current Royal Charter, we need people to say, without the BBC we wouldn't have the Proms.' If anything, Jackson appears to be doubling down on the patriotism of the Proms. This year, for the first time, the will be a 'Great British classical' concert, celebrating Elgar's Enigma Variations and The Lark Ascending by Ralph Vaughan Williams, as well as lesser-known works by Brits such as Avril Coleridge-Taylor (daughter of Samuel) and William Matthias, plus a new commission from John Rutter. It seems almost tailor-made for lots of flag waving. 'I think people should feel free to respond to any Prom in the way that they want. And I think if people end up coming along waving flags, so long as they fit within the Royal Albert Hall rules about how big your flag is, I would say brilliant, because that's people responding to the music.' Some 72 of the 86 concerts take place at the Hall — with the others in Bradford, Bristol, Belfast, Gateshead and Sunderland — but most people will experience them at home. Each Prom will be broadcast on Radio 3, with 25 to be shown on television — including nine on BBC One and Two, the highest for 'a very, very long time'. Jackson prioritised trying to get more concerts on the mainstream channels because 'if we get it right, that's a million more people who will see that and will experience the Proms for themselves'. As for the concert based on The Traitors which will see the hit-show's host, Claudia Winkleman, make her Proms debut, Jackson acknowledges that he could be accused of gimmickry. 'There is always a certain section of the commentariat who will immediately jump on something like that and say that it's not what we should be doing'. But he is unapologetic. 'I'm certainly not in defensive mode over it, because I don't think there's anything to defend. I think this is about taking a TV programme, the final of which has been seen by 10 million people and counting, a theme which fits classical music like a glove,' he says. 'It's about treachery and betrayal: that's Puccini operas, that's Romeo and Juliet by Prokofiev, that's all manner of different classical works, and that we know works brilliantly for telly and is a route into orchestral music for people… That all feels very 'Proms' to me, because we're not diluting what the Proms is.' Jackson grew up in Milford, Surrey, and credits a 'really bohemian piano teacher' with getting him into music. He went on to read music at York University before joining Classic FM, rising all the way up to managing editor, before a stint at Universal Music Group's classical division. The Radio 3 controller, who is paid a salary of up to £194,999, has faced accusations from some quarters that he is 'dumbing down' the station. Does it annoy him when critics say that? 'Oh of course I get annoyed! I just think it's such a lazy assertion,' he says. 'That does not stand up to scrutiny.' Over the Easter weekend, he points out, Radio 3 broadcast Rattle conducting the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in Bach's St Matthew Passion, live music from the island of Iona and choral evensong from Newcastle Cathedral. Plus, there is a 40-part series on modernism and a celebration of 30 years of Private Passions. 'I look at all of that, and I think, 'Well, Classic FM wouldn't do any of that.' And I'm not criticising them for it. That's not what they do. That's what we should be doing,' he says. 'Now, I would also say those people, who when they make those comments, are inferring that somehow it's wrong for Radio 3 to play music that people might like, I would also challenge that assertion. We are allowed to play Mozart and Bach. Nobody has the exclusive on that.'
Telegraph
01-03-2025
- Business
- Telegraph
Bordeaux is in crisis – but it's not all bad news for drinkers
Reporting from the frontline of gastronomy, the wine guru Oz Clarke posted on social media recently about a Michelin-starred restaurant whose wine list takes in, '200 champagnes; 206 wines from Burgundy and four Bordeaux. FOUR! Bordeaux really has dug a hole for itself. How is it going to dig itself out?' The anecdote neatly illustrates the crumbling power of the world's largest, and most famous, fine wine region. Bordeaux is in crisis. The venerated land around the Gironde estuary on France's Atlantic coast is home to fabled names such as Margaux, Petrus and Lafite. Yet, for many wine estates beyond this magic circle – and there are thousands of them – life is currently very difficult. Bad enough that three of the past four years were beset by rain and mildew, giving growers stress and extra work in the vineyard, then below-average yields, meaning less wine to sell. The bigger issue, though, is that bordeaux wines have fallen so far from favour that selling them is hard. In the words of one grower: 'There's a lot of gloom about.' In 2023, exports fell 12 per cent by volume, to 17.3 million cases, and 5.6 per cent by value, to €2.23 billion (around £1.65 billion), according to a report in Decanter magazine. Last year they dropped again, this time 8 per cent by value and 4 per cent by volume. The Bordeaux wine bureau, the CIVB, quite rightly points out that part of this fall can be attributed to 'a backdrop of persistent international tensions, economic slowdown and inflation. China alone accounts for more than half of the export volumes lost since 2017.' A global shift towards moderation and a move away from red wine, in particular, has also hurt a region in which the majority (80.5 per cent) of production is red. But the problems go beyond that. Huge, and complex, Bordeaux finds itself in the eye of a perfect storm. To grasp the picture, it's helpful to consider that there are really two Bordeauxs. The first, the Bordeaux of wealth and status, comprises a few dozen châteaux whose wines sell for dizzying prices. Even for this gilded set, the market is currently, some privately concede, 'difficult'. The consensus among the merchants who sell expensive bordeaux is that prices have ratcheted too high. 'For me, 2021 was the opportunity to reset the en primeur system [when new wines are sold while still in barrel],' says one seller, who asked to speak anonymously. 'That was a vintage that was not great and prices should have been lower.' For the rest of Bordeaux, those growing grapes for mid-priced and cheap wine, times are exceptionally tough. In supermarkets, claret in the key £6.50 to £9 price bracket has lost ground to bold, fruity Argentinian malbec, anything red from Chile or Portugal and Italian primitivo. Morrisons now sells more primitivo in one quarter than it does of Bordeaux Supérieur across the year, according to its wine sourcing manager Charles Paterson. More generally, Bordeaux has not successfully appealed to a new generation of drinkers or to wine nerds who instead explore high-altitude grenache, German pinot noir and so on. 'For many under 40s, bordeaux is not sexy. It's considered a bit leatherback chair, a bit gentleman's club,' says Tim Sykes, who has just completed a 12-year stint as Bordeaux buyer for The Wine Society. This slowdown in interest has led many Bordeaux property owners to go into administration or sell up. Sykes, 'got calls quite regularly from people who were stopping – grubbing up the vines, selling to a property developer, whatever [and had stock to sell]'. The CIVB is aware of these problems. Two years ago it confirmed a deal with the French government aimed at reducing oversupply, offering financial support to growers who ripped out vineyards. As the available grubbing-up budget has not been used, applications for a second wave are still open. Even so, Bordeaux's overall vineyard area today is smaller than it has been since 1985, shrinking from 108,000 hectares in 2022 to 94,600 hectares in 2024. Most vines approved for pulling up under the government scheme are in the areas of Blaye, Bourg and Entre-Deux-Mers, where a lot of cheaper wines are made, explains Gavin Quinney, a cheerful and energetic Englishman who owns a Bordeaux property, Château Bauduc. Quinney feels the grubbing-up needs to go further. 'We probably need to lose another 30 per cent of the 94,600 hectares,' he says. For drinkers, of course, there is a flip side to the doom: the upper echelons might still cost a fortune but mid-priced and inexpensive bordeaux has never been so cheap. I would go further and argue that it is one of the best value wines in the world. 'Bordeaux in the doldrums means there are deals to be done,' says Siobhán Astbury, of merchant Haynes, Hanson & Clark. 'The last five years we've come back from our annual January range-refresh trip rubbing our hands together. 'Each year the opportunities get bigger and bigger,' she continues. 'This year we're shipping 2015 Haut-Médocs – they'll be here in about three weeks – which we will sell at around £15 a bottle, as part of a case. It's incredible to be able to offer fully mature, really delicious wines at this price.' Drinkers are beginning to catch on. Sykes says Wine Society members – a relatively switched-on crowd – 'go nuts' when some parcels of wine drop: 'My successor in the Bordeaux role bought 1,000 cases of Diane de Belgrave 2016 and they sold out inside three hours.' Ultimately, of course, Bordeaux needs to be sustainable for its growers, not just drinkers who benefit from distress sales. So what is the answer? The CIVB says: 'Bordeaux has reinvented itself, and that's what we want to demonstrate and prove.' Clarke, meanwhile, thinks the region needs to remind people that red bordeaux 'is a mealtime classic' and win back the taste makers. 'It's almost as though some sommeliers have a personal vendetta against bordeaux, though the way the pricing of the top châteaux has gone since 2009 it's not surprising,' he notes. Quinney, whose own wines are listed in Rick Stein's restaurants, sees 'shards of light' in unexpected areas. One of them is white wine: 'No one's pulling white grapevines out.' Another is crémant – yes, the sparkling white wine. 'Bordeaux made 4.5 million bottles of crémant in 2021 and over 15 million in 2024. We're making it too and it's going well,' says Quinney. Perhaps it's a case of: bordeaux is dead! Long live bordeaux? How to buy bordeaux Tip number 1 On the high street, look in the Co-op, which has a brilliant range of red bordeaux. Château Beau-Site 2016 Saint Estèphe, Bordeaux, France 13.5%, £25, Co-op From a beautiful vintage, and now with a bit of maturity, this is a wine very true to its appellation, in that it's based on cabernet sauvignon, polished (but not too polished) and with notes of dark fruit and cedar. Tip number 2 Look to the Saint-Emilion 'satellites' (they have Saint-Emilion in the name but they're not Saint-Emilion itself) and to the 'Côtes' in particular, Castillon (which neighbours Saint-Emilion) and Francs. Château Jamard Belcour 2019 Lussac Saint-Emilion, Bordeaux, France 13.5%, £14.50, The Wine Society Pliant and not too heavy, a wine made almost entirely from merlot, but with a 10 per cent dollop of cabernet franc bringing an attractive perfume. There's no oak. Tip number 3 Find a merchant whose taste is aligned to yours and keep going back. I find a lot to like at Haynes, Hanson & Clark, which veers towards wines with a fresher, more finely delineated feel. Château Ferran 2019 Pessac-Léognan, France 14%, £26.25, Haynes, Hanson & Clark 'I'm often surprised this estate isn't better known,' writes Jane Anson, in her bible, Inside Bordeaux. This vintage is drinking perfectly right now. Tip number 4 Don't write off the very cheap wines. I taste a lot of wine under £6 and bordeaux actually performs very well against the competition. Chevaliers St Martin 2022 Bordeaux, France
Yahoo
01-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Bordeaux is in crisis – but it's not all bad news for drinkers
Reporting from the frontline of gastronomy, the wine guru Oz Clarke posted on social media recently about a Michelin-starred restaurant whose wine list takes in, '200 champagnes; 206 wines from Burgundy and four Bordeaux. FOUR! Bordeaux really has dug a hole for itself. How is it going to dig itself out?' The anecdote neatly illustrates the crumbling power of the world's largest, and most famous, fine wine region. Bordeaux is in crisis. The venerated land around the Gironde estuary on France's Atlantic coast is home to fabled names such as Margaux, Petrus and Lafite. Yet, for many wine estates beyond this magic circle – and there are thousands of them – life is currently very difficult. Bad enough that three of the past four years were beset by rain and mildew, giving growers stress and extra work in the vineyard, then below-average yields, meaning less wine to sell. The bigger issue, though, is that bordeaux wines have fallen so far from favour that selling them is hard. In the words of one grower: 'There's a lot of gloom about.' In 2023, exports fell 12 per cent by volume, to 17.3 million cases, and 5.6 per cent by value, to €2.23 billion (around £1.65 billion), according to a report in Decanter magazine. Last year they dropped again, this time 8 per cent by value and 4 per cent by volume. The Bordeaux wine bureau, the CIVB, quite rightly points out that part of this fall can be attributed to 'a backdrop of persistent international tensions, economic slowdown and inflation. China alone accounts for more than half of the export volumes lost since 2017.' A global shift towards moderation and a move away from red wine, in particular, has also hurt a region in which the majority (80.5 per cent) of production is red. But the problems go beyond that. Huge, and complex, Bordeaux finds itself in the eye of a perfect storm. To grasp the picture, it's helpful to consider that there are really two Bordeauxs. The first, the Bordeaux of wealth and status, comprises a few dozen châteaux whose wines sell for dizzying prices. Even for this gilded set, the market is currently, some privately concede, 'difficult'. The consensus among the merchants who sell expensive bordeaux is that prices have ratcheted too high. 'For me, 2021 was the opportunity to reset the en primeur system [when new wines are sold while still in barrel],' says one seller, who asked to speak anonymously. 'That was a vintage that was not great and prices should have been lower.' For the rest of Bordeaux, those growing grapes for mid-priced and cheap wine, times are exceptionally tough. In supermarkets, claret in the key £6.50 to £9 price bracket has lost ground to bold, fruity Argentinian malbec, anything red from Chile or Portugal and Italian primitivo. Morrisons now sells more primitivo in one quarter than it does of Bordeaux Supérieur across the year, according to its wine sourcing manager Charles Paterson. More generally, Bordeaux has not successfully appealed to a new generation of drinkers or to wine nerds who instead explore high-altitude grenache, German pinot noir and so on. 'For many under 40s, bordeaux is not sexy. It's considered a bit leatherback chair, a bit gentleman's club,' says Tim Sykes, who has just completed a 12-year stint as Bordeaux buyer for The Wine Society. This slowdown in interest has led many Bordeaux property owners to go into administration or sell up. Sykes, 'got calls quite regularly from people who were stopping – grubbing up the vines, selling to a property developer, whatever [and had stock to sell]'. The CIVB is aware of these problems. Two years ago it confirmed a deal with the French government aimed at reducing oversupply, offering financial support to growers who ripped out vineyards. As the available grubbing-up budget has not been used, applications for a second wave are still open. Even so, Bordeaux's overall vineyard area today is smaller than it has been since 1985, shrinking from 108,000 hectares in 2022 to 94,600 hectares in 2024. Most vines approved for pulling up under the government scheme are in the areas of Blaye, Bourg and Entre-Deux-Mers, where a lot of cheaper wines are made, explains Gavin Quinney, a cheerful and energetic Englishman who owns a Bordeaux property, Château Bauduc. Quinney feels the grubbing-up needs to go further. 'We probably need to lose another 30 per cent of the 94,600 hectares,' he says. For drinkers, of course, there is a flip side to the doom: the upper echelons might still cost a fortune but mid-priced and inexpensive bordeaux has never been so cheap. I would go further and argue that it is one of the best value wines in the world. 'Bordeaux in the doldrums means there are deals to be done,' says Siobhán Astbury, of merchant Haynes, Hanson & Clark. 'The last five years we've come back from our annual January range-refresh trip rubbing our hands together. 'Each year the opportunities get bigger and bigger,' she continues. 'This year we're shipping 2015 Haut-Médocs – they'll be here in about three weeks – which we will sell at around £15 a bottle, as part of a case. It's incredible to be able to offer fully mature, really delicious wines at this price.' Drinkers are beginning to catch on. Sykes says Wine Society members – a relatively switched-on crowd – 'go nuts' when some parcels of wine drop: 'My successor in the Bordeaux role bought 1,000 cases of Diane de Belgrave 2016 and they sold out inside three hours.' Ultimately, of course, Bordeaux needs to be sustainable for its growers, not just drinkers who benefit from distress sales. So what is the answer? The CIVB says: 'Bordeaux has reinvented itself, and that's what we want to demonstrate and prove.' Clarke, meanwhile, thinks the region needs to remind people that red bordeaux 'is a mealtime classic' and win back the taste makers. 'It's almost as though some sommeliers have a personal vendetta against bordeaux, though the way the pricing of the top châteaux has gone since 2009 it's not surprising,' he notes. Quinney, whose own wines are listed in Rick Stein's restaurants, sees 'shards of light' in unexpected areas. One of them is white wine: 'No one's pulling white grapevines out.' Another is crémant – yes, the sparkling white wine. 'Bordeaux made 4.5 million bottles of crémant in 2021 and over 15 million in 2024. We're making it too and it's going well,' says Quinney. Perhaps it's a case of: bordeaux is dead! Long live bordeaux? On the high street, look in the Co-op, which has a brilliant range of red bordeaux. 13.5%, £25, Co-op From a beautiful vintage, and now with a bit of maturity, this is a wine very true to its appellation, in that it's based on cabernet sauvignon, polished (but not too polished) and with notes of dark fruit and cedar. Look to the Saint-Emilion 'satellites' (they have Saint-Emilion in the name but they're not Saint-Emilion itself) and to the 'Côtes' in particular, Castillon (which neighbours Saint-Emilion) and Francs. 13.5%, £14.50, The Wine Society Pliant and not too heavy, a wine made almost entirely from merlot, but with a 10 per cent dollop of cabernet franc bringing an attractive perfume. There's no oak. Find a merchant whose taste is aligned to yours and keep going back. I find a lot to like at Haynes, Hanson & Clark, which veers towards wines with a fresher, more finely delineated feel. 14%, £26.25, Haynes, Hanson & Clark 'I'm often surprised this estate isn't better known,' writes Jane Anson, in her bible, Inside Bordeaux. This vintage is drinking perfectly right now. Don't write off the very cheap wines. I taste a lot of wine under £6 and bordeaux actually performs very well against the competition. 14%, £5.85, Morrisons This wine has done so well for Morrisons that the supermarket is actually growing sales of bordeaux. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
