Wine: There’s more choice than ever before for those who think pink

By ROSE MURRAY BROWN
Published on 13/02/2012 00:00

IF YOU are celebrating Valentine’s Day at home this year with your loved one and need a suitable wine to impress, you might be encouraged to hear that there are now more rosés to choose from than ever before.

Not so long ago, rosé was just an afterthought for winemakers more interested in making white or red wines. However, warm summers and an increasing demand for quaffing all things pink, have focused wineries to rethink – so we now have a greater choice of rosés than ever before.

For still wines, there is a wide variety of styles from pale and delicate, to deep, dark fruity rosés. Choose from very light pinot noir-based rosés from Sancerre in France’s Loire, or for a little more weight of fruit head for the syrah/grenache-based rosés of Provence. If you like lots of ripe fruit try Rioja, Navarra or Campo de Borja’s garnacha-based rosés from Spain. In the New World, cooler microclimates in San Antonio in Chile or Marlborough in New Zealand tend to make the sleekest styles, whilst Argentina’s Mendoza offers full mouthfilling malbec rosés.

For sparkling rosé at a decent price, avoid champagne. So many of my favourite champagne rosés are now over-priced. If you are on a budget this Valentine’s Day, try a bottle of the improving New World pink fizz instead. Chile is not a well-known destination for sparkling wine, but Undurraga rosé fizz is exceptionally good value and very drinkable. South Africa might not be your first choice, but the new Pongracz is a very clean elegant quaffer at half the price of champagne, with very stylish packaging which should impress.

Or why not buy British? This week my star buy comes from Watership Down country in Hampshire. The superb Coates & Seely rosé fizz shows just what is possible with our cool climate right here in the UK.