The FT have a witty headline writer and this is one that appeared on Saturday above Jancis Robinson’s Wine article in the FT Weekend Magazine.
She has been a sherry fan for years and regularly boosts this under-rated and under-priced wine. “A wine that is well over ten years old, that is absolutely delicious, many-layered, dry, nutty and persistent – and retails in the UK for about £10 – surely flies off the shelves? It would if it carried any name other than sherry” she writes. She thought the proliferation of tapas bars might have made sherry more popular. A call to a tapas bar in Aberdeen to ask if it served sherry puzzled the waitress but she investigated and found they stocked three sorts.
Well I can do better than that; I have four sorts in my cellar. My staple summer sherry, served chilled, is a Manzanilla, £8.50 a bottle from the Wine Society. Here is how they describe it.
Alegria is a wonderful manzanilla, pale, aromatic and pungent yet delicate, fine and whistle-clean. Like all manzanilla, it is aged in Sanlúcar de Barrameda on the Atlantic coast where the protective flor yeast exerts a stronger influence on the wine, resulting in a pale colour and salty tang. The ideal partner for fish and shellfish, or simply an aperitif to stimulate the appetite.
When the weather is a little chilly I turn to The Society’s Exhibition Mature Medium Dry Oloroso Blend, well worth £12.50 a bottle.
An intensely flavoured dry Oloroso where years of barrel ageing have concentrated the flavour and added layers of complexity. Members who have been fans of this will notice that this new, excellent blend is slightly paler in colour (because we have removed the vino de color) but just as rich, mature and intense. The entire maturation process takes place in the presence of oxygen. The result is a wine with a distinct nutty aroma and is amber in colour, making this one of the best value wines in our range. Sánchez Romate is an independent company specialist in the Oloroso (which means fragrant) style. One of the world’s great wines.
A recent discovery at Waitrose is Williams & Humbert’s Dos Cortados rare old dry Palo Cortados aged for twenty years. Finally a half bottle of Oloroso Dry from Morrison’s supermarket.
Bursting with toffee and hazelnut flavours, this dry mahogany-coloured sherry is a treat for your tastebuds. Aged in the Lustau bodegas of Jerez in American oak casks, it moves slowly through the solera system to create a distinctive, rich sherry that’s truly one to savour. Perfect with rich, red meat like beef or venison, or great on its own after dinner.
I don’t think that I would drink it with beef or venison but then I’m not a Morrison regular. I first bought it in 2015 and wrote about it in this post: Pickwick.
Bravo for rallying to the sherry colours. I have heard that many of the sherry houses (?) are struggling. Is this an equivalent to Malt in the late 70’s early 80’s when you could pick up a distillery for next to nothing? An exploratory trip is called for. Perhaps they have local elections coming up that you could “observe” as practice.