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The Guardian
01-05-2025
- General
- The Guardian
Why we shouldn't turn up our noses at New Zealand sauvignon blanc
Besides Provençal rosé (a column for another day), New Zealand sauvignon blanc has to be one of the most successfully marketed wines of the past century. This grape is, of course, planted around the world, and originally French, but it has become so wrapped up in the identity of New Zealand wine, and so at the forefront of our minds, that several people I know who have heard of New Zealand's take didn't know that sauvignon blanc also constitutes many appellation wines from the Loire and Bordeaux. The Guardian's journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. Learn more. It was 1973 when the first sauvignon blanc vines were planted in Marlborough, and were initially intended to be blended with müller-thurgau, which at the time was one of the region's more popular grape varieties. That's almost unthinkable now, when Marlborough is by far the most famed region for sauvignon blanc, with about 25,000 hectares of vines, low rainfall and long, sunny days, as well as free-draining soil. In other words, ideal conditions for producing wine en masse. Today, New Zealand sauvignon blanc is one of – if not the – most widely drunk white wines in the UK. It is, however, not that widely drunk within the industry itself, and some decorated wine enthusiasts can be a little snobby about it. I think that probably has something to do with the branding: a lot of New Zealand sauvignon blanc can taste rather similar, after all. But part of having a brand is that you're easily recognised by the consumer, right? It's also so often a person's first foray into the world of wine, and that initial interest should always be encouraged. Marlborough sauvignon blanc is crisp, dry and, above all, intensely aromatic. When you think NZ SB, think green (asparagus, gooseberry, pea pod) and tropical fruit (passion fruit, melon). Its lightness and acidity makes it a drinking wine, rather than a thinking wine. You also know exactly what you're getting when you open a bottle, in much the same way as you know what you're getting every time you open a can of lager or order a bargain bucket from KFC. And Marlborough is just one of several regional styles. The country's next biggest grower of sauvignon blanc is Hawke's Bay, on North Island, and although it has only 1,000 hectares, it produces a more diverse range of styles, both riper and finer, than Marlborough. Next there's Nelson, on the top of South Island, which I love for its elegant, poised chardonnay and pinot noir; its sauvignon is the same, but this is a more boutique region, so its wines tend to cost a little more than Marlborough. International Sauvignon Blanc Day is being celebrated on 2 May, apparently, and we all need something to look forward to, so why not make it a whimsical, self-imposed wine holiday? Inviniti Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc 2023 £10.50, The Wine Society, 12.5%. Classic, aromatic and limey. Exceedingly reliable. Babich Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc £13.50 Sainsburys, 13%. About as classic a supermarket New Zealand sauvignon blanc as you can get. Greenhough 'River Garden' Sauvignon Blanc £16.40 Tanners, 12.5%. From Nelson, so greener, more subtle style. Herbal notes with peach and lemon. Organic, too. Pegasus Bay Sauvignon Sémillon £23 Waitrose, 15%. From Waipara in central South Island, and blended with 30% sémillon for a twist on white bordeaux.
Telegraph
29-03-2025
- Business
- Telegraph
The best pink crémant for spring
When Darren Ball, group head of wine for Caprice Holdings, was putting together the wine list for the Manchester branch of the restaurant Sexy Fish, which opened in autumn 2023, he had an important conundrum to solve: what sparkling wine would he put in the entry-level 'by the glass' slot? He contemplated prosecco. 'But to champion a prosecco we feel is good-quality, worth selling by the glass… [it would go on the list at about] £60 a bottle… A small percentage [of customers] will appreciate you've found them a great prosecco, the majority will think you're ripping them off.' Going 'super-cheap' but low quality would have been an option, but that's not Ball's vibe. So he decided to go with crémant. But not just any crémant – a high-quality rosé crémant. This pink fizz has been wildly popular, even among those customers who haven't been following the crémant trend. 'You tick two boxes: [customers think] 'Great, I get to drink rosé and it's got bubbles.' And there's no price expectation,' says Ball. Quite so. If you're a long-time reader of this column then you will have known about crémant for years. The gloss, for anyone who has missed it: crémant is sparkling wine made in France using the same method as they do in Champagne. Sales have been climbing for ages but two things made me realise we had reached a tipping point. First, crémant has moved beyond the realm of 'good-value alternative to cheap Champagne'. The word now has cachet and luxe associations of its own. Second, my mum called to ask about 'something called crémant' that someone in her West Yorkshire Pilates group really likes, and was annoyed not to find on the drinks list when she went out recently. Rosé crémant is not as widely available as the white version we have come to know and love, but it is made in the same places, which include Limoux (in the foothills of the Pyrenees in southern France), Alsace, Loire and Bordeaux. And, similarly, it varies a lot in style, not just because different grapes are permitted in different regions; as ever with rosé, it also comes in a range of shades and flavour intensities. Some rosé crémant is so pale and similar to its white counterpart that I am not sure I'd call it for a rosé if I were tasting with my eyes shut. Others are quite intensely fruity or floral with flavours of wild strawberries or redcurrants overlying a biscuity richness. The quality range of the wines I tasted to make these recommendations made things a little tricky. On tasting the first (and largest) batch, I wasn't sure I wanted to recommend any of the cheaper or mid-priced supermarket bottles because one from The Wine Society (at £15.50) and one from Yapp Brothers (at £18.75) were so vastly better than those priced at a similar level and a few pounds below. Then, fortunately, I opened a second tranche of wines and found a couple of value supermarket options. Of those higher-end bottles, my mum's favourite was the Antech Crémant de Limoux Rosé Emotion from The Wine Society (see Wines of the Week). I agree it is delicious, but for me the winner of the entire tasting was Domaine Collin Cuvée Prestige Rosé Brut NV, France (12.5%, Yapp Brothers, £18.75), which is sophisticated, dry and delicate with a gentle fragrance of red berries with subtle florals. I really loved it and felt it more than delivered for the extra cost. Either way, with these rosé sparkling wines all we need is a little spring sunshine. Wines of the week
Telegraph
28-03-2025
- Lifestyle
- Telegraph
Does this new glass tax mean we'll be drinking claret out of cardboard?
I approach with trepidation stemming, admittedly, in no small part from snobbery. The bottle is tall and flat – it fits through my letterbox. It takes up minimal fridge space, and doesn't roll if recumbent. But when I open it there's no satisfying popping of a cork, nor the clink of a metallic screw cap, even though it houses the very same thing: wine. It is a plastic container and, despite the connotations – that it's cheap, unsophisticated, will end up ensnaring a poor sea creature, or possibly in their gut – it's perfectly good wine at that. My girlfriend takes a little convincing. She tries some, pausing to ponder. 'I don't know. It's nice, but all I can think about is the packaging. It makes me think it looks cheap.' Yet I'm a fan: fresh, zingy, with a hint of hazelnut, it's a thoroughly decent white Burgundy, and no worse than I'd expect for £11.70. Could this be the future? It's possible, and The Wine Society certainly thinks so. This is one of four wines in a new format introduced permanently by the member-owned cooperative last year, following a trial. There is also a chardonnay, a pinot noir and a Beaujolais-Villages, all French, in the catchily named recycled polyethylene terephthalate (rPET) range. It represents less than one per cent of The Wine Society's collection, but is not the only alternative packaging it has introduced, with bag-in-box also trialled in 2023. 'Both were really successful, particularly bag-in-box; we couldn't cope with demand,' says director of wine Pierre Mansour. This year bag-in-box is expected to hit seven per cent of overall sales, up from virtually zero two years ago. The rPET is taking longer to take off, yet The Wine Society is persisting, if on a small scale, as it scores surprisingly highly environmentally, says Dom de Ville, director of sustainability and social impact. The cooperative has also reduced its average glass bottle weight by 29 grams over the past year – by using thinner bottles made with less glass – as part of the Bottle Weight Accord, signed by several retailers including Lidl, Waitrose and Berry Bros & Rudd. 'The biggest impact to The Wine Society's carbon footprint is glass,' explains Mansour, describing a 'journey' to reduce glass-bottle waste. Why does this matter? On 1 April, drinks manufacturers will be hit with what many are calling a 'bottle tax' or 'glass tax', which is set to upend the industry. A wedge of lime in a bottle of Corona, the classic Coke that tastes better out of frosty, curvy glass, or the clink as a mixer of Fever-Tree tonic gets poured into your gin. Could they all be under threat? The policy, called extended producer responsibility (EPR), was announced six years ago by the May government, and after multiple delays is finally being introduced. It is seen as a net-zero levy, intended to simplify how we pay for recycling by transferring the cost from taxpayers to the businesses responsible for packaging. Only businesses with a turnover of more than £2 million that supply or import more than 50 tonnes of packaging will have to pay. The revenue, the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) says, will be given to local authorities to improve recycling management, including household collection. (Businesses already pay for recycling; The Wine Society expects EPR to add £1 million to its costs, up from £400,000 now.) The ultimate purpose is to encourage businesses to reduce waste and CO2 emissions, and Defra expects about 80 per cent of the costs of EPR to be passed on to consumers, meaning yearly household expenditure could increase by £56. While plastic and aluminium are also impacted, glass has been hit hardest, as fees are based on weight. 'The principle of EPR is to collect, sort and recycle more waste and more glass, so we essentially support the principle,' says Nick Kirk, technical director at British Glass. But when the illustrative fees were announced, 'we were surprised how high they were for glass'. And while many business leaders agree companies should pay for the waste they produce, the implementation of the new policy has been questioned, as has the timing. Along with employer National Insurance contributions and the minimum wage rising next month, alcohol duty having increased in February and continued inflation, EPR could add £1 to a bottle of wine, says Miles Beale, chief executive of the Wine and Spirit Trade Association (WSTA), with 12p directly from EPR. 'It's not going to be less than that, and it could well be more within a year,' although for beer, which is usually held in smaller containers, the rise will be lower – an estimated 5-7p. Beale says delays to the deposit return scheme – which will see a refundable deposit paid on certain containers – until October 2027 (which will affect aluminium, steel and PET packaging) should be matched by postponing EPR. 'The EPR is a tax on consumers, as all taxes ultimately are,' says Maxwell Marlow, director of public affairs at the Adam Smith Institute. 'This is just another wheeze for the Government to make more money. We will see supermarket prices rise higher than normal to cover the scheme's expenses, and it is also a massive blow to the hospitality sector, which relies on glass to serve drinks.' It has left many in the industry reeling, from breweries to importers, soft-drink producers to pub companies. Andrew Opie, director of food and sustainability at the British Retail Consortium, believes it will cost retailers an additional £2 billion. Some companies have hinted they'll look to sell more overseas, while others believe consumers will be left with less choice. 'We think beer bottles will die off in the long term,' Mark Kelly of Sambrook's Brewery in London told The Telegraph. The drinks industry has 'had a lot to worry about in the last 12 months, and this is now absolutely at the top', says Beale. He is 'perfectly comfortable' with the principle of producers paying for recycling, but, as we speak in March, the final costs are still unknown, and are estimated at £240 a tonne for glass, up from the previously predicted £110-215. 'We support the outcome EPR is meant to deliver, who wouldn't? Improved environmental outcomes, great.' But it could result in a move to plastics and other materials seen by many as environmentally inferior. 'We know glass is quite carbon-intensive to produce, but we also know it's infinitely recyclable and does not have some issues of plastic, such as microplastics. Oddly the Government simply by the design of these schemes seems to be pushing in the direction of less environmentally friendly packaging.' A Defra spokesperson said: 'We are committed to cracking down on waste and boosting recycling. Extended producer responsibility for packaging is a vital first step for our packaging reforms. Together our reforms will create 21,000 jobs and help stimulate more than £10 billion investment in recycling over the next decade. It means taxpayers won't foot the bill for managing waste. We continue to work closely with businesses, including in the glass industry, on this programme.' Wine is perhaps the drink most inherently linked to glass. We get through plenty of beer bottles, but far more cans, and draught makes up 93.7 per cent of beer in pubs, bars and restaurants. Soft drinks bottled in glass emit an air of sophistication, but cans and plastic bottles are commonplace. Spirits are mostly sold in heavy bottles, but are purchased less frequently. But wine is a weekly occurrence for many, and the vast majority comes in glass. The receptacle is part of the appeal; from an elegant, slender bottle of riesling to an aged claret in thick glass, it can connote class and quality. Some sparkling wine requires a heavy glass bottle for its secondary fermentation, to prevent the bottle from exploding. Yet glass is more energy-intensive to create than aluminium or plastic, and heavier to transport, requiring more fuel. It is also energy-intensive to recycle, though it can be recycled in perpetuity, unlike plastic. EPR will spur innovation, experts say. Aldi now sells wine in paper bottles, made using recycled paperboard lined with a plastic pouch, which it says will vastly reduce its carbon footprint. At a tasting in 2024, Telegraph wine expert Victoria Moore said about five per cent of Aldi's wines were packaged in alternative materials, including 'eco-flat' plastic similar to The Wine Society's. Those bottles can be packed into crates much more efficiently, allowing more to be shipped per container. Waitrose's bag-in-box range has grown by 39 per cent over the past year, and its cans are up too. 'Where it is more convenient, customers seem very happy to switch to alternative packaging,' says the supermarket's wine buyer, Emma Penman. 'We'd expect to see heavyweight glass disappear at lower price points, in itself no bad thing,' says Andrew Stead, wine director at Laithwaites, where bag-in-box, Tetra Pak and paperboard Frugalpac bottles now represent two per cent of sales. 'While they look to be cheaper under the new EPR rules, there's understandable customer concern about plastic and specifically nanoplastics in food and drinks, so we're not forecasting a rise.' Perhaps the greatest hurdle is psychological. Wine is a ritualistic pursuit: opening the bottle, the pour, placing the bottle in the middle of the table or in a cooler. Bottles suggest quality, in many cases with reason. Some wines last decades in glass, even improve. The restaurateur, wine expert and author Dan Keeling, whose Noble Rot stable is famous for its creative wine list, agrees with the philosophical superiority of glass. 'Wine by the keg has been a thing in restaurants for some time now. But while there are benefits to the environment, there's something a bit less satisfying about ordering wine by the glass rather than sharing a bottle with a friend. The anticipation, act and jeopardy of pulling the cork from an old bottle of Chablis are all part of a unique experience.' And, perhaps giving himself away as someone whose first career was in the music industry, Keeling adds, 'Doing away with glass bottles will do for fine wine what MP3 did for music – lessen a ritual that at its best is magical. Sure, cork taint ruins some bottles, even the best crus. But it's not just the sound waves or liquid that matters, and I'd rather risk a scratch across a favourite vinyl album, crackles and all, than a dumbed down experience.' Cans are not associated with quality or the dinner table. 'We are working on genuine paper bottles which would be compostable or recycled with standard paper and card,' says Andrew Stead. 'Wine customers like the ceremony of opening a glass bottle, many still prefer cork, and arguably as you push it into other formats it loses a key visual marker that it is, indeed, wine. There is a strong element of the traditional to the enjoyment of food and wine, which glass plays into.' There's another issue: appellations with exacting conventions. Picpoul de Pinet is sold in a tall green bottle, for example. Burgundy and claret have distinct shapes too – allowing you to tell the difference if the label rots off in the cellar. Getting producers to agree to sell their wine in plastic or cans is a challenge, but possible: see The Wine Society's Burgundy and Beaujolais. What about beer and cider? Nick Kirk says many large companies are privately telling him they're planning to shift away from glass. The producer of Rattler cider announced a move to cans to offset £700,000 in expected EPR fees. Barry Watts of the Society of Independent Brewers and Associates (Siba) says 90 per cent of its members are exempt from EPR payments – in theory. In practice, fees will be passed on by companies that aren't, such as bottle producers or bottling facilities. An estimated 7p on a 500ml bottle doesn't sound like much, but many smaller breweries only make 2p profit on a bottle. 'It completely wipes out those margins,' says Watts. One worried brewer is Mark Anderson of Maxim Brewery, which produces Double Maxim, a north-east brown ale first launched in 1901 – making it older than Newcastle Brown – and beloved in its 500ml format. 'The tradition of bottles of Double Maxim could be lost in the future, through these strange taxes which to me just seem a money-making scheme, as opposed to doing something positive about waste.' Once EPR is added to rising duty, wages and National Insurance contributions, the bottles will cost 15p more to produce – with a greater increase in pubs as they generally need to retain a 50 per cent margin, says Anderson – 'which is disastrous. It's one of the worst pieces of legislation to come across in 40 years in the industry.' Though his brewery is officially exempt, the ale is bottled at Robinsons Brewery in Stockport, which isn't. 'There'll be a move away from glass bottles,' he predicts, with cans an option in the future. Robinsons, which owns about 250 pubs and hotels, is committed to glass, seeing it as the most recyclable option. 'I've been on umpteen webinars with Defra, and every time they're challenged on the cost of it, they are absolutely open, saying we expect you to pass this on to the customer,' says bottling operations manager Rick Fisher. Not everyone is against EPR. 'From a reporting aspect, especially at first, it's going to be a bit burdensome,' says Adam Herriott, senior specialist at Wrap, an environmental NGO. 'But on the whole, as a piece of legislation, it's proven to be effective [in other countries], and I don't see why it can't be effective in the UK. Brands can control what they place on to the market, consumers can't. EPR is designed to incentivise them to make that change.' Does Herriott expect big changes, then? 'If you're a very high-end whisky, you're probably not going to sell to your customer in plastic bottles; it doesn't meet the brand.' Yet, he says, showing me a paperboard Aldi wine bottle, 'being a bit of a circular-economy evangelist, for me marketing is not an excuse.' Is the glass bottle on borrowed time? At the lower end there will be innovation: lighter glass bottles, PET and paper bottles, and more wine – and beer – sold in cans. At the higher end, change will be less visible. But while alternative packaging may eat into glass's dominance, we're a long way from retiring the corkscrew. Wine bottles will be with us for a long time to come. Need help choosing a bottle?
Telegraph
27-03-2025
- Business
- Telegraph
The key to making the most of independent wine shops
Dickens would probably have approved of a wine merchant called Philglas & Swiggot, a name that looks genteel but becomes rakish when said out loud. The first Philglas & Swiggot shop opened in Battersea in the early '90s. Two more, also in the capital, followed, but last month, the merchant, now owned by the Irish family business O'Briens Wine, announced its closure: 'challenging trading conditions and the added complexities of Brexit have made it impossible for us to continue'. The majority of drinkers do most, if not all, their wine shopping at the supermarket, with a chunk of custom also going to The Wine Society, Majestic and online retailers like Laithwaites, Virgin and Naked. But the country's 1,000 or so independent shops, run by about 750 operators, add important filaments of wisdom and variety to the tapestry and deserve a bit of light shining in their direction. I don't come at this from a dogmatic 'small is good, big is bad' perspective. Speaking personally, I've had poor (as well as good) experiences in small wine shops: wines that were distinctly average considering the price and service, that bordered on a sneer, when I mentioned my budget or a desire for a certain type of wine. 'Yes,' I have felt like saying, 'I do appreciate your enthusiasm for flor-aged Jura white and it's not that I don't want to 'try something different', it's that I am buying a present for someone who really loves the sharp freshness of sauvignon blanc.' But, hey, everyone has a bad day. Far more often, I've been greeted with incredible courtesy and made to feel welcome however long I procrastinated over picking one, single, inexpensive bottle. It is a real joy to browse a small shop in the amiable presence of someone who knows what flavours dance inside each bottle, who can share stories and insights, and guide me towards the wines that might suit my own taste. Most people in wine shops are there because they really love it, and are desperate to share their expertise, and send you away with a wine you will love. The key to making the most of independent wine merchants lies in understanding what exactly each has to offer and heading for that with precision. A few generalisations: it's now pretty hard for independents to compete with supermarkets under £10, though there are occasional but magnificent exceptions. The advantage a smaller merchant does have, though, is not being tied to higher-volume producers: they can truffle out wines from smaller outfits. They can also buy parcels of wine they know will suit their customers. A good example of this is Haynes, Hanson & Clark who are brilliant at good-value clarets that cost £15 to £28. For example, Visintini Pinot Grigio Ramato 2023, Friuli Colli Orientali, Italy (13.5%, Lea & Sandeman, £17.95), is a dry rosé, essentially, made from Pinot Grigio, that tastes of nectarine, prickly pear and galangal. More specifically, different merchants specialise in different places, or price ranges, or styles: Lea & Sandeman has an unmatched range of grower/small producer Champagne; The Good Wine Shop has a strong South African range. Some buyers will have a taste that is aligned with yours: find that shop and you find an unending source of good wine. The country's independents are disproportionately clustered in London – home to about one quarter of the total. Still, as Graham Holter, editor and publisher of The Wine Merchant magazine, points out, with an offer that is often, 'eclectic and adventurous… really they should be seen as a national treasure'.
Telegraph
28-02-2025
- Telegraph
Brilliant wines from Australia's Margaret River
There are a few famous exceptions but it's now more common to explore wine by grape before getting to know it by region. If I were to make a shortlist of wine regions worth knowing a bit about, though, Margaret River would definitely be on there. A paradise of wild surf and lofty karri trees on the south-western tip of Australia, Margaret River has one of the longest unbroken continuous human occupations in the world; the Wadandi (saltwater) people have been here for 60,000 years. And while a recent upgrade of the local Busselton airport brought Margaret River a little closer to the always-on of the globalised world with a handful of weekly flights from Sydney and Melbourne, there's still a sense of seclusion. Most non-working visitors arrive slowly, on the long road south from Perth, a three-hour drive with the expanse of the Indian Ocean somewhere to your right and the warm sun bringing the scent of bushland into the car. Once you're there, Margaret River is, for Australia, green and lush: 46 per cent is native forest. The wine scene blossomed in the 1960s. It was pioneered by ultra-can-do types like Dr Tom Cullity, a cardiologist who, intent on making fine wine, founded Vasse Felix; and Kevin and Di Cullen, who somehow planted their eponymous wine estate while also running a 2,000-acre sheep and cattle farm, raising six children and keeping Kevin's GP career on track. Today, this is a boutique region that encompasses around 200 producers and represents less than two per cent of Australia's average annual crush. If you're buying a bottle in the UK, you're likely to be spending around £13 or more (it was £12 but everything has gone up since the duty changes on Feb 1). On the upside, it's rare to happen on a disappointing bottle. Grape-variety-wise? For reds, we're looking at shiraz (about 14.5 per cent of Margaret River's production) that often smells of damsons and mulberries. Also cabernet sauvignon (19.5 per cent) that marries a sense of restraint with pure yet earthy fruit: one good example is South by South West Vagabondo 2022 Margaret River, Australia (13.5%, The Wine Society, £14.95), which is a Bordeaux-like blend of 50/50 cabernet-merlot that marries easy-going drinkability with subtle oak and notes of cassis and tobacco. In white wines, there's chardonnay (17.3 per cent) characterised by fuller flavours licked into shape with a refreshing twang of acidity; also (a favourite style for me) blends of semillon (16.5 per cent) and sauvignon blanc (18.2 per cent) that taste like lemongrass sorbet with a hint of lychee and a riffle of sea air and are really good with prawn brioche rolls or fish and mango tortillas. Among Margaret River wine producers there is a perpetual and very notable drive for higher and higher quality. Of all the wine regions I've visited, this one stands out for the attention it pays to every detail, using its isolation to make itself a beacon rather than a backwater. For instance, Cullen Wines hosts an annual Chardonnay Tasting – now in its 40th year – in which the local wines are benchmarked against the best from elsewhere in the world. In terms of food and wine, a trip to Margaret River is one of the finest gourmet vineyard experiences you can have. While producers are also on the front line when it comes to sustainability; the Margaret River Wine Association has just launched a new glass lightweighting initiative that aims to reduce carbon emissions by more than 20 per cent by moving to sleeker, lighter bottles. Margaret River's are pristine wines that reflect the region's immaculate landscape. Drink them.
