What to drink this summer: rosé and red wine

To come up with these 35 recommended wines, and the 37 in last week’s selection of white wines, I picked out and then tasted what I thought were the 214 most likely recommendations from the 482 wines shown to wine writers this spring by the UK retailers listed.

It is now widely recognised that the production and transport of glass bottles make the biggest contribution to wine’s carbon emissions, and manufacturers have responded by producing much more attractive, lightweight bottles.

Tesco, Britain’s biggest supermarket, which is responsible for at least a quarter of all wine sold in the UK, has recently agreed to follow both Waitrose and The Wine Society in joining the Sustainable Wine Roundtable accord, pledging to reduce bottle weights to an average of 420g from 550g by the end of 2026. Like Waitrose, it usefully published bottle weights for each wine in its tasting booklets.

Pink wine features increasingly, even in France, at the expense of red wine. It seems extraordinary that Tesco sells a perfectly respectable claret at just £5.49. There’s an ocean of very pale Provençal rosé in clear, non-recycled glass at the moment, some at eye-opening prices. But in this list I concentrate on pink wines with character, of which The Wine Society has a particularly good range.

The reds I recommend come from 13 countries, illustrating the wealth of choice available.

Pink wines

Señorío de Sarría, Rosado Garnacha 2023 Navarra (14%)
Quite deep Grenache rosé was the traditional speciality of this northern Spanish region. This interesting dry wine has lots of strawberry character.
£7.95 The Wine Society

Bougrier 2023 Rosé d’Anjou (11%)
Perfumed with excellent lively fruit and usefully low alcohol. Very clean aperitif. The acidity nicely disguises the residual sugar.
£8.25 The Wine Society

Kintonis, G & L Rosé 2023 PGI Peloponnese (12.5%)
Blend of grapey Moschofilero with Roditis and Agiorgitiko. Fruit jumps out of the glass and then the wine has a dry, refreshing finish.
£8.95 The Wine Society

Kintonis, Agapi Greek Rosé 2023 PGI Peloponnese (12.5%)
Chock-full of strawberry fruit on the nose. Almost brazen. Lots of fun. A blend of Roditis with leafy Malagousia and Agiorgitiko with character. £12.99 Majestic

Bonny Doon, Le Cigare Orange 2023 Central Coast (11.5%)
Orange wine thanks to two weeks’ skin contact. Lots of chewiness but also fun to taste and look at. Nicely judged balance between fruit and astringency. Good price for California.
£15 Tesco

Pur Azur 2022 Côtes de Provence (13%)
Pale orange! With lots of round fruit and interest, this has aged well.
£17.50 Amathus

Red wines

Des Tourelles Claret 2022 Bordeaux (13.5%)
Ridiculously inexpensive. Impressive deep crimson. The light, fruity nose ushers in a chewy finish, so the Bordelais character has not been lost, though no oak was involved. Colour is arguably its chief attribute but if you poured this into an antique decanter, you could almost convince your guest it was a classed growth, certainly a cru bourgeois. Just a little lack of fruit on the mid-palate.
£5.49 Tesco

Shallow Bay Cabernet Sauvignon 2022 Western Cape (14%)
Made by Boland. Not much nose but some varietal character on the palate. A fairly good buy for those on a budget. Nice label.
£6.75 Tesco

Casa Santos, LB7 Red 2021 Lisboa (13.5%)
Interesting, juicy, fruity nose. Low tannin, but sufficient freshness and character. Lots of delivery for the money, as is so often the case from Portuguese wines.
£8.99 Majestic

Kleine Zalze, Reserve Shiraz 2021 Stellenbosch (14.5%)
Great value for a sweet, mulberry-flavoured wine that spent 20 months in French oak barrels (70 per cent new). How do they make money at this price, while paying for new oak?
£9.50 Tesco

Incanta Pinot Noir 2022 Romania (12.5%)
Slightly sweaty but sweet Pinot nose from Cramele Recas. Good freshness on the end with the merest hint of oak. A bargain for dedicated Pinot (but not burgundy) lovers.
£9.99 Majestic

Lentsch Zweigelt 2021 Burgenland (13%)
Exuberantly fruity, perfumed, mature wine from Austria’s most-planted dark-skinned grape. A good buy.
£9.99 Waitrose

Pringle Bay Pinot Noir South Africa 2022 Western Cape (13.5%)
Not for keeping but a lovely light-bodied Pinot from celebrated South African winemaker Duncan Savage. For every bottle sold, 25p goes to the admirable Pebbles Project for farmworkers’ children.
£9.99 Majestic

Rémy Ferbras 2022 Ventoux (14.5%)
Superior youthful, unoaked blend of the standard southern Rhône grapes, 70 per cent Grenache, 20 per cent Syrah and 10 per cent Mourvèdre, made and aged in concrete. Lots of energy and the potential to age.
£9.99 Waitrose

De Martino, Organic Cabernet Sauvignon 2021 Maipo (14%)
Mellow, well-balanced, ripe-but-not-too-ripe Chilean Cabernet. Really pure flavours. Stronger on fruit than oak, as it should be. Great value.
£10.99 Waitrose Cellar (online only)

Tomàs Cusiné, Vilosell 2021 Costers del Segre (14.5%)
Sui generis. No obvious grape variety, just a well-judged, bright-fruited Catalan blend from a fine winemaker at a great price. Needs food. Grilled meat?
£11.95 The Wine Society

Domaine de Vallière, La Combe de Vallière 2022 Minervois (13.5%)
Good to see Languedoc value recognised. Warm, appetising nose with emphatic Grenache sweetness underneath and still a bit of tannin for future development. Lots of country pleasure.
£11.99 Majestic

D’Arenberg, The Innocent Weed Organic Grenache/Shiraz/Mourvèdre 2021 McLaren Vale (14.5%)
This South Australian family has for years made some of the country’s most reliable bargains. Handmade, French barrique-aged dry wine with freshness and potential.
£12.50 Tesco

Domaine des Coteaux de Font Curé 2022 Brouilly (13%)
Good Beaujolais is the perfect summer red that can be enjoyed with or without food and at virtually any temperature. This is that wine. And it should still be delicious for a few years to come.
£12.95 The Wine Society

Peter Lehmann, Portrait Cabernet Sauvignon 2021 Barossa (14%)
American oak-aged smooth South Australian red that’s slightly minty with cassis fruit and an admirably long finish.
£14 Tesco

Zuccardi, Serie A Malbec 2023 Uco Valley (14.5%)
Grown at 900-1,100m and made at Sebastián Zuccardi’s new winery high in the Andes. Bone dry and youthfully tense. Mineral finish is presumably due to his beloved concrete and no bad thing.
£14 Tesco

Domaine Pardon, Cuvée Tim 2023 Régnié (13.5%)
Full of fruit and very vibrant. Pure Gamay! This superior Beaujolais is really singing.
£14.99 Waitrose

Mayu, Titon Vineyard Syrah Gran Reserva 2018 Elqui (14.5%)
A sturdy, fully mature leathery example of a grape that Chile does rather well, from a northern desert-like wine region.
£14.99 Majestic

Marqués de Riscal, Reserva 2019 Rioja (14.5%)
Still very deep crimson considering its 21 months in American oak. Pure, soaring, vanilla nose and already approachable, but with lots of potential for further complexity. I wish I’d tasted this before writing my Iberian cellar article.
£15 Tesco

Castello Colle Massari, Riserva 2019 Montecucco (14.5%)
Sister property to the famous Grattamacco of Bolgheri. Satisfying certified organic blend of Tuscany’s Sangiovese with a little Cabernet Sauvignon and Ciliegiolo. Ideally it should be drunk with food but you could, at a pinch, sip it without. It also has a future.
£9.99 Waitrose

The Smuggler’s Boot Pinot Noir 2022 Elgin (13%)
Master of Wine Richard Kershaw has forged quite a reputation for his cool-climate Pinot on South Africa’s southern coast. Lots of cool south Atlantic-influenced freshness in this wine, which was made specially for Majestic. Verging on lean but with lots of fruit. For every bottle sold, 25p goes to the Pebbles Project.
£17.99 Majestic

Bonny Doon, Le Cigare Volant 2021 Central Coast (14.5%)
Famous California answer to the southern Rhône, picked as late as November 3, more than two months later than in France. No oak but lees ageing for 10 months. Engaging, smooth, with attractive herbal notes and a fairly complex palate.
£19 Tesco

La Magia 2021 Rosso di Montalcino (15%)
A baby Brunello from the estate’s younger vines. The wine spent nine months in old oak and fashionable (and local) terracotta amphorae. A tangy Tuscan that’s a bit lighter than a Brunello would be and none the worse for it.
£19.95 Berry Bros & Rudd

Hans Rebholz, Bodensee Bohlinger vom Vulkan Spätburgunder 2020 Baden (13%)
Southern Germany’s well-priced answer to red burgundy. The oak is a little too prominent on the nose for me, but it’s certainly a good-value alternative with excellent Pinot fruit.
£23 The Wine Society

Franz Künstler, Assmannshäuser Rotschiefer Spätburgunder 2020 Rheingau (13.5%)
Purer fruit than The Wine Society’s other German Pinot. Should age well too.
£24 The Wine Society

Catena, Angelica Zapata Malbec 2018 Mendoza (13.5%)
From a leading Argentine producer. Ripe, macerated blackberry flavours. Impressive persistence.
£29 Tesco

Penfolds, Bin 28 Shiraz 2021 South Australia (14.5%)
The oldest of Penfolds’ Bin wines with a medicinal hint of the most famous, Grange, minus the need to wait for it to mature. Though this one will continue to evolve for many a year. Aged for a year in American oak.
£31 Tesco

Alma de Cattleya Pinot Noir 2021 Sonoma County (14%)
Made with a delicate hand in northern California by Colombian Bibiana González. No excess sweetness, nor obvious oak and a little bit of fine tannin, too. For California, this is brilliantly priced.
£32 The Wine Society

Kelly Washington Syrah 2022 Waiheke Island (14%)
Excellent answer to the northern Rhône from New Zealand’s popular holiday island. Really beautiful winemaking. So appetising, with a dry finish. Drink with a good meal.
£35 The Wine Society

Joel Gott Cabernet Sauvignon 2017 Napa Valley (14.5%)
How come the 2017 is still available? Because Tesco has listed it for two years but as its most expensive wine, it doesn’t sell fast. Whereas in a Napa Cab context, and this really does taste as glamorous as a fully ripe but not overdone example, it’s an absolute steal.
£37 Tesco

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