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Sunday 26 April 2015

This week’s wine: Picpoul de Pinet


The announcement of a merger between Naked Wines and Majestic Wines sounds promising. Both are interesting outfits, the former a Norfolk-based supplier concentrating on new young wine producers. These include Benjamin Darnault of the Languedoc, whose latest (2014) vintage of the whimsically-named Picpoul de Pinet tastes like his best yet.

Though Languedoc wines are nowadays ten a penny, they are generally reliable and Picpoul continues to have a deserved rarity value. Darnault’s version of this dry, nicely prickly southern French white is thoroughly characteristic, and an excellent aperitif which is fine with seafood. The bottle comes with a personal message from the trophy-winning producer on the label along with a pretty line-drawing.  Darnault can be seen introducing  his wine on You Tube, followed by a convivial regional wine tasting, complete with singing and dancing.

If Majestic, a long-established wine seller who have a good track record and a way of finding inviting premises, including a former garage designed by Sir Basil Spence in Edinburgh, start stocking it, it will be well worth buying there, and the Majestic insistence that you buy their wines in bulk - minimally six or twelve bottles at a time - should seem no hardship. But Naked Wines themselves are prompt deliverers and the 2014 Picpoul is attractively priced at £8.25 a bottle.
26 April 2015

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