Today’s post continues the examination of lesser-known grape varieties.
Two factors, I sense, are driving their newly found place in the limelight:
- The resulting wines – being unfamiliar – will probably be less expensive and, hence, better value.
- Drifts away from heavier, tannic reds push lighter fruitier options to the fore, many involving grapes below the conventional radar.
However, there is a potential downside – it can be a lottery knowing which unknown grapes are good and which are less so.
Immodestly, I would claim that is where MidWeek Wines comes in.
All the wines recommended here have been tasted and given the nod – a useful indicator because 70% of the wines being considered fail the very first of those tests.
That does not guarantee everything will hit your taste buds in the same way, but it does drastically shift the odds in your favour.
Thus, today, I commend a red, well known where it is grown, but not elsewhere.
Its partner, however, is a grape that only accounts for a tiny proportion of the vines in its native Italian region.
I hope you get a chance to enjoy both wines.
As is normal here, pictures and hyperlinks are provided where possible to guide you straight to the right wine on shelf or web page.
First up is the red
2024 Wine Atlas Bonarda (£6.50 at Asda and 13.5% abv):
Asda’s Wine Atlas range triumphs again with this excellent expression of Argentina’s second most widely grown black grape, bonarda.
Medium bodied and juicy, this example features soft damson, blackcurrant and cherry flavours.
These are skilfully coupled with good acidity, firm tannin and suggestions of mint and pine nut within a largely savoury finish.
And now, a rosé
2023 Found Susumaniello Rosé (£9 at M&S or Ocado and 12.5%):
Italy’s Puglia region is not an obvious source of rosé but this version, from a little-known grape variety, works brilliantly.
Pale coloured with a lovely floral perfume, it is centred around bright crab apple, orange and cranberry flavours.
Support for that backbone comes from nippy, enlivening grapefruit acidity given contrast by a gentle edge of sweetness.
After today’s focus on the less expensive end of the wine world, take a step up on Thursday to my quest for great options for Christmas – with the focus then on red wine
29 responses
Thanks for the heads up on these Brian I will give them both a go. Although I generally prefer full bodied reds which will be more expensive from February due to the increase in duty I might need to try a few less alcoholic versions. Love Puglian reds and look forward to trying this Rosé.
On another subject you introduced us to a German Sauvignon Blanc from Waitrose a few weeks ago that I loved and I noticed when visiting Lidl yesterday that they have one on there standard selection shelves -Wien Aus Deutschland Sauvignon Blanc Trocken 2022, I wondered if you have tried it. They also have there Deluxe NZ Premium Sauvignon Blanc at £2 off at £6.29 with Lidl plus but be quick it ends on Wednesday.
Not tried that Lidl offering yet but can vouch for the Premium sauvignon – excellent option (an view Eddie seems to share)
Asda have a “25% off when you buy 6 or more” offer, which is running until December 15th. That brings the Bonarda down to a very tempting £4.87
Good news – thanks Dave
Yay. I love lesser-known grape varieties which are an endless source of fascination in the world of wine. It’s possibly one of the few advantages of being a wine drinker in the UK where wine buyers have to show great resourcefulness in trying to outwit every-increasing alcohol duty!
I’ve been a bit slow off the mark with Argentina’s Bonarda though as it was only recently that I tried the one in the M&S Expressions series. But I’m an established fan of Susumaniello. If you put Susumaniello into the MWW ‘Search All Reviews’ function the 2nd option includes a Talent Scout Report from me at the end where I described a first encounter with this Puglian speciality on holiday in Southern Italy a couple of years ago. (In short, it was a welcome break from Primitivo and Negroamaro after a few days in the region). At the time Brian sourced a rare bottle to recommend in the UK.
It’s interesting to see though how the high street retailers here have gone for the rosé. In addition to the M&S rosé Brian recommends today Waitrose have a Susumaniello rosato in their Loved & Found series. But if anyone wants to try a red Susumaniello and has a Wine Society account I strongly recommend their Susumaniello Salento Rosso, Vallone 2021 for £9.50
I love a Susie! I’ll make sure I nip in to M&S to pick one up..when I return from a very wine filled holiday in sunny South Africa!
Thanks for these suggestions Brian. Good to see Asda continue to up its game on unusual wines, and they’re so competitively priced. It’s clear that rosé has well and truly established itself as not just a summer wine and rightly so, look forward to trying this Puglian example.
Morning Brian … all …
Good to see that the Asda Wine Atlas Bonarda is actually on the shelf now. Last time I was in to try and have it all the WA usual suspects were there, racked-up together, but not the two, promised, new reds, this one included! As already reported by Brummie Dave with a buy 6 deal currently on this comes in at an astonishing £4.87.
Respectfully contend that almost all of these less common grape varieties are doing well because of inclusion in the WA Series and support from yourself Brian and other professional reviewers in the national press as to the provenance of the majority of the range and most certainly the value for money.
Your correspondent here Barry Hulme mentions the Awatere NZ-SB that sits in the Lidl Deluxe range and is currently £6.29, with that £2 discount. Terrific value. You wrote this one up on October 26th Brian, so it’s in the really useful archive here to look up. I think it’s terrific wine of its type especially at that money. Very New Zealand for those who like their minerality that sits beside exotic citric fruit.
Another bottle in the same range, 2022 South African Chenin Blanc I can’t speak more highly of. I had it a few weeks back at £5.79, a £1 discount, and it could have some money off again in some locations. I went back and got more at the reduced price.
What I do know is, these whites mentioned at the money being asked are the real deal by comparison with the Sainsbury’s House Soave at £4.75 that Decanter was recommending as an Everyday bottle. Please be warned … I really wouldn’t bother. Get the Lidl whites, or buy 6 offer at Asda instead and add bottles of the Sicilian Carricante and the Greek Roditis-SB as well along with that Bonarda and folks will be quids in! Good drinking doesn’t have to be expensive … though I must admit to pushing the boat out a bit with TWS this weekend gone!!
I’ve only fairly recently re-discovered Asda wines – their store is further away than the other major supermarkets. I noticed that in Jane MacQuitty’s “50 Great Whites” & “50 Great Reds” in the past two Saturday Times, Asda wines featured 7 and 5 wines respectively, which is pretty good.
Out of curiosity I tried their Nice Drop Pinotage 2023, 11%, at £4.25! I know Pinotage is a marmite wine, I have tasted some real horrors, but also some, which albeit distinctive, have been quite elegant in a lighter weight style. Probably not to everyone’s taste, but, to me, had typicity and I rather liked it. And at this price, if it doesn’t suit, demote to cooking wine! (I suspect it won’t be included in the 25% deal)
On a more mainstream note, their 2022 Chablis Premier Cru Famille Brocard, which I much enjoyed, apparently will be on special offer from December 15th – Jan 1st, reduced from £23 to £15.
“Le Chouchou”.
No,I am not writing about a French version of Thomas the Tank Engine.It is slang for “Darling” or “Sweetheart”.Indeed some French menfolk use a term of endearment for their girlfriends and call them “Petit Chou” which literally means little cabbage.Not sure about a culture cross over.
Le Chouchou Gérard Bertrand Light Red Blend 2023 11% Waitrose £12.99
Brian mentioned above the trend to move away from heavy, high tannin and high alcohol reds and this is bang on trend.Not as pale as a rosé,but not far off,with strawberry and cherry flavours- fruity, but not OTT.Light,low tannins,organic, but with a hint of spice.
Carefully crafted from Grenache, Syrah and Cinsault. It seems to me, not a cynical exercise in alcohol duty reduction, but an attempt by a very reliable winemaker to make reds appeal to a bigger audience.
Would I recommend it ?
Only to those who predominately like white and rosé wines.Die hard Bordeaux folks would turn in their Graves!
I found it refreshing, fun, and had a certain amount of Gallic charm.On offer it would be an “ interesting” choice.
I haven’t tried the Bonarda yet, but if it’s even half as good as Asda’s Cotes du Rousillon red, also new this Autumn, it’ll be an absolute corker. I’m glad they’ve brought back the Wine Atlas range as credit to Asda, they’ve got some real winners. Can’t really go wrong with the M&S ‘Found’ range either, and although the rose isn’t for me, the reds and whites I’ve tried so far have been excellent. Waitrose too have got some good ones in their ‘Loved and Found’ range, Piedirosso was gorgeous! Cheers all.
I also rate that Roussillon, Rhiannon, but have held back on recommending it here for fear of being seen as a Wine Atlas Fifth Column. It is well up to the standard of the other parts of the range however.
Hello Brian,Just been into my local Asda and it is like an Aladdin’s cave of wine price and quality.
Just one example,I previously recommended a very good Arc du Soleil Rosé.Normally £10.Price drop to £8 and then to £6;with 25% off six deal That is a whooping 40% discount.Exceptional value,except exceptional is not the right word, as I spotted at least six other wines offering similar quality/price.
Asda rules!
Surely then this confirms the 2 points I was making in comments 2 weeks ago? – “So, given the vast area of ‘Buy X get 25% off’ offers at so many supermarkets yet again this year in the run up to Christmas perhaps wine is actually not that much more expensive than in other countries after all? Ii would also dare to suggest the range here is far greater than many wine-producing countries elsewhere in Europe and beyond.”
Hello Keith,
It reminds me of that old Bing Crosby number “ We’ll Make Hay While the Sun Shines”.
The next line in the song is the rather racy “ We’ll Make Love When it Rains”.
It rains a lot in Wales!
Is that why the Welsh rugby team is having such an energy lacking season?
Hi!
Having only recently discovered MWW, I wanted to say a huge thank you for creating such an interesting and accessible resource.
In fact I find your tasting notes so evocative, that last week I bought my first bottle of white wine in many years. The Müller-Thurgau was greatly enjoyed by my friend and I!
Lastly, does anyone have an opinion on 2019 French burgundy? Asda has their Extra Special 2019 Côte De Beaune Villages (13%) on offer for £14.50, and I’m thinking of getting my brother a bottle. I can still remember where I was, and what I was eating, when I had my first bottle – 30 years ago! Can anyone tell me if it’s worth wrapping, or should I just drink it?!
Welcome aboard Gillian (or it Gill?) and thank you for contributing to the comments section. I am flattered by your kind words and pleased that the Italian white hit the spot.
Doubtless, the MWW community who give it so much support here will have someone with experience of that Burgundy and I will let them share it. Nevertheless, prices have shot up since your initiation into Beaune and, frankly, I would be a little wary of discounting to that level without trying it first. That said, Asda buyers are on a roll at the moment so maybe they have hit upon a parcel that ticks the modest price box.
Thanks Brian, you’re very kind.
Ohhhhhhhhhhh! And I answer to both.
Hi Gillian, I tasted their Extra Special 2019 Côte De Beaune Villages last month. My notes were: “Good PN nose, fruit & touch of spice, lean style but balanced”. Which in normal English means that I thought it a decent example. A good buy at £14.50. Of course if you found 5 other bottles then looks like this would be further reduced by 25%?
And thank you Richard!
Brilliant to get your opinion – though the word “lean” has put me off slightly, since his (& my) preference is more on the jammy side.
“his (& my) preference is more on the jammy side”.
Ah …
I wouldn’t put the Beaune as “Challenging” but it was a touch “savoury” rather than overtly “warm fruit”. I think personal preference is a question of style not “quality”. I tend to note “lean” as I like that style.
When I did a tasting of Pinot Noirs recently, some preferred the lean/earthy style of the Burgundian example, some preferred the warm ripe fruits of the Californian example, and some preferred the purer fruit style of the NZ example. The “best” is likely to be the style that you like most!
Looking through my notes of the Asda Tasting:
The Extra Special New Zealand Pinot Noir 2020, might hit the spot. It was quite pale, good nose, cherry and well integrated oak. Smooth and drinking well. VG value @ £11.25
The Extra Special Fleurie. 2023, is another candidate. But I am biased as am a huge fan of cru Beaujolais. This was fresh, good red fruits and just a touch of tannin. Great value at £11.
Extra Special Amarone 2021 @ £20. Not my go-to style, but this example I quite liked, and with 5.9g/l residual sugar, should satisfy the tending towards jammy style!
As a side issue on this, there was a great example of styles in the Asda Portuguese reds …
The Extra Special Dao 2021 @ £7.50
vs
The Extra Special Douro 2022 @ £7.50
The Dao was 13% with residual Sugar at 6g/l, and the Douro was 13% at 0.6g/l.
The Dao was lovely sweet fruit, a great crowd please. The Douro was dark fruit, savoury and lean.
So if one bought those two and tasted them side by side, the clear contrast in styles is very apparent. Some time back I remember recommending a Douro to Brian, instead of a Dao. Brian thought the Dao was better quality (and likely to be more popular). As always, he was dead right – but I still preferred the Douro because it was more my style.
The question of Style vs Quality is an interesting topic!
.
Thanks for picking up on Gillian’s question, Richard.
Hello Gillian …
Some time back I had an associate from Manchester, in the music biz, (Joy Division/Factory Records), sadly passed away now who put his hard-earned money into a partnership for a restaurant that eventually failed. Hardest thing he’d ever done he said to try and make it work doing things honestly and with commitment. He was a Francophile and went to his friends in Burgundy to source proper wine he wanted to share with anyone who would buy it from him. He said to me when I declared my own interest too in his passion that it came to pass almost impossible to find good, cheap Burgundy any more! It was finished!
I remember years back travelling through Burgundy on a regular basis heading south, we had a regular stopover at a campsite in Gigny-sur-Saône with an excellent, unpretentious family run restaurant that did authentic Boeuf Bourguignon made with shin of beef. Impecunious as we were we’d still go for a half bottle of their Cóte de Beaune to accompany that I recall was around €12 then 25 years ago.
Try as we might we struggle now to be able, still, to afford proper, decent Burgundy. The good stuff costs, for us, too much and substitutes are what we use. Just a little further south than Burgundy proper Pinot Noir has given way to carefully choosing Gamay Noir instead to find lighter-end, delicate reds with some class. Beaujolais is fast becoming go-to once again for all the right reasons as producers have got the message they can’t survive on a name alone. Mâcconais actually in southern Burgundy is not just about Chardonnay but their Gamay reds too we really enjoy and find affordable.
I think the Asda bottle you mention was in one of their Wine Club review cases last year that I tried. To me OK , but couldn’t really be excited to buy it even at a discount.
What I did discover as the best substitute almost exactly in all its character for Burgundian style Pinot Noir was The Wine Society’s Spätburgunder Bio Ruppertsberg 2021at £9.95. It was to me sensational but it sold out pdq! The current vintage 2022 they offer to me is ok, BUT a shadow of the 2021. So I can’t now suggest it could satisfy expectations of something akin to a Côte d’Or or Beaune. If we could still find some 2021 at under a tenner then for me it’s buy-buy-buy!
Thank you, too, for dealing with Gillian’s question – and for adding some of those personal experiences. They are always good to read.
Wow!!
I’m absolutely blown away by the time spent replying to my post. Astonishing! And so very kind.
I’ll be digesting your comments and suggestions (and Richard’s) later, but had to extend my thanks immediately.
Also wanted to tell my story…
Around 1993, my boyfriend and I went to our favourite Turkish restaurant in Aberdeen. They’d run out of (our usual) Chateauneuf de Pape, and suggested Côte de Beaune Villages (to go with our Lamb Tagine). I was amazed – as was my (Guinness-favouring) boyfriend!
Desperate to relive the experience of “drinking liquid velvet”, I phoned every wine shop in the yellow pages – remember those?!! – in the hope of finding a bottle. Eventually I found one, but sadly paid no attention to the vintage, so paid £11 for a ’91. And was sooo disappointed!!
As you can see, my confidence that the MidWeekers Tribe would respond was right on the money. Well done Eddie and Richard.
Thanks, Gillian, for sharing your story. Stumbling upon certain wines (and loving them) is a familiar theme and, I rather hope, also applies to folk stumbling upon this website.
But, Richard’s (later) point is an important one. Taste buds create such a personal set of preferences that it is difficult to be hard and fast about wine absolutely everyone will enjoy. Makes the journey of discovery very interesting though.
Richard!
Goodness gracious me! Again thank you so very much for your time and consideration.
I’m kinda speechless!
And, as my reply to Eddie says, I shall take my time to digest your post(s).
But “Fleurie” kinda stopped me in my tracks, especially at that price, because I had a great bottle of that a few years ago…
Can’t get over everyone’s generosity. Truly amazing.
Thank you.
Richard!
Goodness gracious me! Again thank you so very much for your time and consideration.
I’m kinda speechless!
And, as my reply to Eddie says, I shall take my time to digest your post(s).
But “Fleurie” kinda stopped me in my tracks, especially at that price, because I had a great bottle of that a few years ago…
Can’t get over everyone’s generosity. Truly amazing.
Thank you.
Sorry for repeating my post, forgot to press “reply”!