English sparkling wine to celebrate the Jubilee

With the Platinum Jubilee around the corner, it feels ridiculous to reach for Champagne when we have properly world class fizz on our doorsteps. English sparkling wine has come of age with even the most ‘basic’ bottles now really packing a punch in terms of flavour and complexity. This is thanks partly to more and more stocks of ‘reserve’ wines, which is wine from previous vintages held back deliberately to add to more recent, non-vintage blends. These older, reserve wines tend to add the toasty, brioche and apple pie crust notes to sparkling wine that we have come to love in the traditional method of sparkling wine. Here are some top English sparkling wine picks that should be on your radar.

Hampshire

Hattingley Valley, Classic Reserve

Hattingley Valley winery is found in rural Hampshire where the first vines were planted in 2008 and the first wines released in 2013. Made by multiple award-winning female winemaker Emma Rice with 53% Chardonnay, 31% Pinot Noir and 16% Pinot Meunier grapes, the Classic Reserve is Hattingley’s most widely available and most loved wine. A non-vintage sparkler based on the somewhat challenging 2015 vintage, this is the wine that gives you a true flavour of the Hattingley house style: Golden with fine bubbles, elegant notes of brioche, nougat and a touch of oak with a characteristic hedgerow note on the finish.

Find it at Waitrose for £30 a bottle.

Hambledon Classic Cuvée

Established in 1952 by Major-General Sir Guy Salisbury-Jones, Hambledon is England’s oldest vineyard and can be found nestled in the home of Cricket at Hambledon in Hampshire. Their Classic Cuvée is again, a blend of all three traditional grapes, (56% Chardonnay, 27% Pinot Noir, 17% Pinot Meunier). Grapes are handpicked on the estate and this cuvée uses the 2017 harvest as a base with 20% reserve wines added, giving it the characteristic toasty richness that Hambledon has become famous for. Hambledon also does fantastic tours, tastings and events. 

Find it at Majestic for £34.99 (or £23.99 as part of a mixed 6 case)

Sussex

Rathfinny Estate Blanc de Noirs 2018

Rathfinny has an enviable position on the sunny, south-facing slopes of England’s South Downs in Alfriston, Sussex. It has quickly made a name for itself as one of England’s finest wine producers. Blanc de Noirs is a sparkling wine made only from black /red grapes which in this case are Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier and these wine grapes came from just one single harvest in 2018, which has been dubbed the vintage of the decade. Rathfinny has a style that is rich but precise with a fantastic, lean, mineral character. Seriously elegant and will keep for a while. Rathfinny is another great place for a vineyard picnic too!

Find it at Lea & Sandeman for £38.95 (or £36.95 when in a case of six) 

Kent

Balfour Brut Rosé 2018

A renowned winery located on the Hush Heath Estate in Kent, the Balfour sparkling brut rosé was the first ever English wine to win a gold medal and the Trophy at the International Wine Challenge. This 2018 vintage wine is only ever made in tiny quantities from a single vineyard and it has a special story. The estate has belonged to the Balfour-Lynn family for three generations, but it was Richard and Leslie’s idea to plant vines at Hush Heath in 2002, with a view to making a pink sparkling wine like their favourite ever Champagne: Billecart Salmon Rosé. Their thinking was “If we can’t sell it, we’ll drink it”. But they did sell it and the rest is history. It’s a great place for lunch and a tasting with a lovely walk around the vines and the apple trees too. 

Find it at Waitrose for £39.99

See what else Helena has been tasting with talkTV here.

What are the key styles of Malbec?

It’s World Malbec Day on the 17th April! As if we needed an excuse to open a bottle of this chocolatey, velvety wine. To celebrate, let’s get up close and personal with some of the keys styles of Malbec, from France to Argentina. 

While Malbec may be the flagship red wine grape of Argentina these days, its heritage is actually French. It hails from the small French appellation of Cahors in France, which lies inland from Bordeaux on the river Lot. Malbec here is better known as Côt or even Auxerrois in some places and will be found in bottles labelled ‘Cahors’ (remember, in France, wines are very often named after place rather than grapes). When from Cahors, Malbec is darker; more inky, tannic and intense than in its fruitier, Argentinian guise. 

It was only in the 1780s that the grape was planted in Bordeaux by a Monsieur Malbeck and the name for this ‘new’ Bordelais blending grape stuck. It flourished here for a while but gradually got replaced with Merlot as it was a hardier grape for the weather. Its real moment came in the 1880s when French immigrants arrived in Argentina, bringing with them vine cuttings from Bordeaux. Malbec, who had not exactly shone in Bordeaux with the cool weather, flourished here in the sunny dry conditions and the rest is history!

Here’s a Cahors and three Malbec wines from Argentina’s three key provinces: Patagonia, Mendoza and Salta.

Cahors, France

Malbec from its homeland in Cahors is full-bodied and inky black with notes of dark, mulberry spice and a flash of baked red fruit. This is an approachable starter Cahors. The more you go up the price scale, the more intense and heavy they become. Try with hard nutty cheese and braised meats!

Cahors, M&S

Find this one for £8 at M&S

Patagonia, Argentina

Cooler than the more famous region of Mendoza, Patagonian Malbec from the south of the country tends to have a little more elegance, silkiness and freshness with crunchy raspberry and black cherry notes. Think of frozen raspberries dipped in dark chocolate! This one has a bit of age on it too so enjoy those secondary aromas of spice and leather. 

Vinalba Patagonia Malbec

Find it for £10 at Morrisons

Mendoza, Argentina

Mendoza is the best known wine region in Argentina and for good reason. Its warm, dry climate and fabulous light give Malbecs that are ripe and velvety, packed with baked blueberry and milk chocolate notes. Seek out higher altitudes such as this one and you’ll be rewarded with more concentration and complexity. It’s a Fairtrade Malbec made sustainably from grapes grown in the Finca Altamira vineyard in the premium sub region of Uco Valley, 1,100 metres above sea level. It’s aromatic and vibrant red wine with notes of red fruits, herbs, and a great mineral character.

Argento Altamira Single Vineyard Organic Malbec

Find it for £13.50-£13.99 from urbangrapes.co.uk and allaboutwine.com.

Salta, Argentina

Way up in the north of Argentina with extraordinarily high altitude vineyards (think 1700 ml ASL and above!) and exquisitely pure sunlight, is the province of Salta. Within Salta, sits the town and region of Cafayate, which is surrounded by the dramatic, red rock and desert Calchaquí Valleys. Wines from Salta have their own personality. As the light is so strong here and the attitudes bring huge diurnal temperature swings, the malbec grapes develop a thicker skin here (like their own sun protection), which gives the wines a darker colour and more tannic structure together with a cool elegance. Think sea salted dark chocolate with mint at that’s the style. Yum!

Cafayate Estate Malbec

Find this one for £11 at Sainsbury’s 

See more of what we have tasting on the Thursday Club with Mike Graham on talkRADIO TV here!