From supermarket bargains to star whites for poolside drinking, these are the best bottles to sip \u2013 or glug \u2013 now<\/p>\n
Summer, at last, and now that we\u2019re able to socialise perhaps you\u2019d like a few glasses of wine with your conversation? I\u2019ve picked out 30 excellent red and white (and a couple of sparkling) wines\u00a0below,\u00a0for the aperitifs, lunches, barbecues and dinners I hope we will all be sharing with friends and family this summer.<\/p>\n
They include Aldi\u2019s grassy (and bargain!) vermentino from the south of France, a delicious Argentinian malbec, a Greek white that tastes like it was made to be drunk with your feet in a paddling pool (at least) and a simply superb English sparkling wine made by Gusbourne in Kent.<\/p>\n
Speaking of English wine, a couple of weeks ago I caught a train out of London and stood in a vineyard,\u00a0Albury Estate<\/a>, for the first time since lockdown started last year. There weren\u2019t many leaves to see. \u201cSpring was so cold that we\u2019re three to four weeks behind where we\u2019d usually expect to be. Hopefully we can catch up a bit of that now that the weather has got warmer,\u201d explained Alex Valsecchi, the vineyard manager.<\/p>\n The vines might be slow but you know one thing that\u2019s moving fast for every English vineyard? Bookings.<\/p>\n At\u00a0Harrow and Hope<\/a>\u00a0in Buckinghamshire the tours are sold out for the rest of 2021. At Albury, a small family-run place in the Surrey Hills, they\u2019ve added a tour to their weekly Saturday programme because the existing dates were getting so full.<\/p>\n Speak to pretty much any British winemaker and they have the same story to tell: newly released, we are happy to be getting out and about and local (or local-ish) vineyards are high on the list of places to visit. I\u2019ve pulled out five good ones and you can find a more extensive list at\u00a0Wine GB<\/a>.<\/p>\n Finally, for the bucket list. If, like me, you\u2019re dreaming of travel I\u2019ve included a list of some of the places I wish I were going to this summer. Maybe one day.<\/p>\n30 of the best summer wines<\/h3>\n