Events & Offers

The Oldie's wine columnist

ALL WINES RATED OUT OF 20, THUS:

20: Perfection

18/19: Gob-smackingly wonderful

17: Superb

16: Pretty damn good

15/14: Good but not earth- shattering

13: Anything below has problems, but you won’t need to bother with these lowlifes as no recommended wine will ever appear in this column which rates less than 16.

 

Malcolm Gluck
The Oldie's wine columnist reviews the 'finest wines known to humanity'...

The Oldie’s slickest discounted wine offer yet. Twenty per cent off a case of sensual wines for not £64, not even £59, but to you squire, to you madam, £49.99 delivered to your door courtesy of Marks & Spencer.
This is a wine offer which comes complete with its own food matching: a large portion of humble pie served exclusively to your wine correspondent by the haberdashercum- food-and-wine-merchant above about whom I was most rude in my column of some months past. I complained then of the bureaucracy being so tight at this retailer that it was proving difficult for me to organise a wine offer using Marks & Spencer’s wines and indeed I began to wonder if I would ever bring off such a coup. But here it is! A case of terrific M&S reds and whites, three bottles of each, at a whopping 20 per cent discount exclusively for Oldie bargain-hunters.
Normally these wines would cost you £59.88 in store, or £63.38 including delivery if purchased as a mixed case for mail-order delivery. It is exclusive to Oldie readers for the month of July, at £49.99 including delivery, and you can only buy it by logging onto www.marksandspencer.com/oldie or by telephoning 0845 60 90 200 and quoting product code 00730143.

RED
Soleado Merlot 2009. 16 points (normally £4.49). This is one of those cunning deceptions the soi-disant new world of wine loves where a gifted winemaker (in this case Chilean Adolfo Hurtado) blends grapes from a half-dozen vineyards and then bungs in another grape altogether. Thus this ‘merlot’ is 15 per cent carmenere, but who cares? The wine is gorgeously frisky, light but with good tannins, and it has a grilled plum overtone. It is very good lightly chilled and thrown at back-garden barbecues.
Los Nucos Cabernet 2008. 16.5 points (£4.99 on shelf). This is 100 per cent cabernet sauvignon from Chile’s Colchagua Valley and the product of an excellent vintage. It shows real suavity and richness, with toasted stone fruit, cherries and alert tannins (soft but entirely compliant). This is a red which can stand decanting a few hours before being poured into a large friendly jug deposited where everyone can get their hands on it.

WHITE
PX Elqui 2009. 16.5 points (£4.99 normal price). This is a wonderfully dry white wine which though crisp has a subtle toffee undertone. The PX part of the name of the wine refers to the white grape of Jerez, pedroximenez, and the Elqui bit is the well-favoured valley where it comes from in Chile.
Il Meridone Catarratto 2009. 16.5 points (usually £5.49). This is an utterly delicious spicy pear and gooseberry fruited wine of style and bite. It has a novel twist on the usual theme of inexpensive whites in that it has a haute couture elegance to it. The grape, the Sicilian catarratto, is, in my experience, quite capable of turning in a svelte high-class performance when made by a deft winemaker.


MALCOLM GLUCK’S two new books Château Lafite 1953 and Other Stories and Five Tons of Jam: The Poetry of John Orland are available from the Oldie Bookshop. To order Château Lafi te for £6.39 + p&p (RRP £7.99) and Five Tons of Jam for £5.59 + p&p (RRP £6.99) telephone 08452 419971.
The reader who provides the wittiest answer to the following questions will be wined and dined by the author with an organic English dinner at the Frontline Restaurant or an exotic Vietnamese feast at the Viet Grill (both venues situated in louche London boroughs) at a date and time to suit them and their partner.
1. What disgusting personal habit links the two poems on page 61 and on page 63 of Five Tons of Jam?
2. What chronology links the bordeaux château of the title short story to Benjamin Disraeli?
Post entries to The Oldie/Gluck, 65 Newman Street, London W1T 3EG or email oldie@superplonk.demon.co.uk by 31st December 2010.

www.theoldiebookshop.co.uk

Advertisements: