Wine of the week: the finest rosé this season

2022 Château d’Esclans, Les Clans Rosé, Côtes de Provence, France

£69.95, finewinedirect.co.uk

Rosé season has well and truly kicked off, and here is a selection of the very finest so far this year. The 2023 L’Exuberance Rosé du Clos Cantenac (£19.75, privatecellar.co.uk) is a delicate flower with an enchanting cranberry, rose petal and sourcherry nose and vice-like freshness and verve on the finish. The 2022 Ninfalia Rosato La Fiorita Tuscany (£63.42, stannary wine.com), a magnum no less, is a scintillatingly beautiful sangiovese from Montalcino that will cause keen rosé lovers to go weak at the knees with its aromatic complexity, effortless restraint and enchanting wistfulness. Provence is, not surprisingly, well served with a handful of epic new 2023 releases, with 2023 Minuty Cuvée Prestige Rosé (£24.95, finewinedirect.co.uk) seeping into one’s senses with its creamily textured watermelon and pink grapefruit-smooched fruit, while 2023 Château La Mascaronne Rosé (£24.90, noblegreen wines.co.uk) builds on its stratospheric reputation with its silkiest and most alluring wine to date.

Flamboyant followers of fashion will be able to relax in the knowledge that 2023 Whispering Angel Rosé (£19.95, finewine direct.co.uk) is a thriller in 2023, but the prize for the finest release this season goes to Whippie’s big brother – 2022 Les Clans. This is a spectacular work of art with swaggering charm and heroic depth of flavour. The finish alone takes you into next week, and it does all this with freshness, bounce and epic integrity.

Matthew Jukes is a winner of the International Wine & Spirit Competition’s Communicator of the Year (MatthewJukes.com).