A reader upbraided me gently the other day saying he felt I was overly effusive about the wines I feature in these pages. He hinted that I must be in the pay of the merchants in order to endorse quite so heartily whatever six random wines they care to offload on me.
Well, I promise I’m not in anyone’s pocket. Just to be clear, the offers work like this: I chat to whichever merchant we’re featuring and between us we try to come up with a pertinent/interesting theme, region, country or producer. The merchant sends me – or we taste together – anything up to a couple of dozen wines that we think might work, out of which I choose my favourite six. These we then offer to you at as keen a price as I can bully the merchant into. Plenty of wines fall by the wayside, either because I don’t like them (or think you won’t) or because they’re too pricey (or too cheap).
As regular readers know, Mrs Ray is never slow to offer her help or her pithy opinions (often too fruity to be repeated) and our many neighbours remain selflessly on alert to help choose and, invariably, drain the bottles. If nothing else it means we can divvy up the recycling.
The wines of the Rhône Valley are so tasty and so varied – and such good value compared with Bord ’n’ Burg
This week, thanks to the close contacts enjoyed by our partner Mr Wheeler, we’re focusing on the Rhône royalty that is Vidal-Fleury, the oldest continuously operating producer in the region, founded in 1781 and owned by the mighty Guigal family.
The 2020 Vidal-Fleury Côtes du Rhône Blanc (1) is a tasty blend of Viognier, Grenache Blanc and Clairette.
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