Wine of the Week

Ridgeview Bloomsbury 2010 Waitrose £22.99

Sunday, 21st April is H.M. The Queen’s birthday: the real one, not the official one, which this year will be 16th June. Tuesday 23rd is St George’s Day, and also the date on which Shakespeare was born. A call for English wine! Producers have excelled in producing sparkling wine, some of which in international blind tastings have more than held their own with champagne. This bottle is very appropriate: firstly, it carries around its neck a tribute to Christopher Merret, FRS, who first recorded experiments for the making of sparkling wine in Charles II’s reign, and, second, another Ridgeview (a Rosé fizz), was served at a State Dinner at Buckingham Palace, for President Obama. Here, our grapes, from vineyards on Sussex’s South Downs, are a blend from all three classic varieties used for champagnes, mostly Chardonnay, with Pinot Noir (27%) and Pinot Meunier (12%). Light gold in the glass, with citrus on the nose, there’s a fine mousse (those bubbles) and classic biscuit notes, leading to the expected stimulating finish. Waitrose also has a good range of English still white wines. Sainsbury’s has one English, a sparkling, in its own “Taste the Difference” range made at Denbies’ Surrey vineyard, the largest in the UK. Tesco’s still Finest English White is also made by Denbies. Graham Gendall Norton