Above all other times of year, wine drinkers go crazy for rosé in the summer months.

In Britain, nothing says ‘rosé’ like unbelievably expensive music festivals, sports where all the players wear white, and the occurrence of some form of dreadfully ‘exciting’ royalty-based palaver.

The only problem is that in Scotland, our weather means that we struggle to enjoy summer quite as much as that lot ‘down south’, and therefore find fewer excuses to glug the pink stuff. Up here, summer can most often be described as ‘cold and wet’. Happily, this last wee spell has been a touch brighter and a lot hotter than we have been used to, so I decided to write about rosé this week.

However, since the ‘heat-wave’, there have been ACTUAL THUNDERSTORMS... Undeterred, I’m going to plough on, being woefully optimistic that there might just be a few weeks of sun left this year…

Now, rosé wines are a bit of a thorny issue with me, and the only area where I will accept charges of snobbery. Regular readers will know that I love finding great wine for a tight budget, but sadly the cheaper end of the rosé market is a minefield; it has been utterly flooded with nasty, sugary pink gunk, and we keep buying it. I blame supermarkets and the national sweet-tooth.

There are still some bargains out there, but this is one area where I would strongly advise spending a few extra quid. You see, there are a few ways to produce rosé wines, and only one of them is the real deal; red grapes are pressed and the juice is left exposed to the skins for a short time, the skins and stalks are removed completely prior to fermentation. In red wine, you would include some or all of the ‘mulch’ in your ferment.

However, an awful lot of the mass market rosé you can find under the £7 mark is done another, slightly cruder way. Yup, you guessed it – adding red wine to white, invariably with a load of residual sugar to hide the fact that it isn’t the nicest vino in the world. This is, of course, the self-confessed snob in me speaking. If that kind of wine is your bag, then fair play – it’s an acquired taste (although the snob in me does note that to ‘acquire’ a taste means it clearly wasn’t pleasant to begin with…).

If like me, you want something with rich and complex dryness, and a more traditional method of production, then follow these simple rules:

1 Always pay over £7 for rosé. Nuff said.

2 Avoid big brands. I always say this, but the rosé wines from large wine labels like Gallo, Blossom Hill and Mateus are particularly nasty.

3 Avoid grape-colour oxymorons (such as ‘Pink Chardonnay’ or ‘White Zinfandel’) – this is an instant sign of a sickly-sweet blend.

4 Avoid Pinot Grigio. Interestingly, PG is actually a pink-skinned grape and can produce some beautiful (and usually quite dear) onion-skin coloured wines, but avoid if it is under £10 and marked ‘Rosé’, ‘Pink’ or ‘Blush’.

5 If options are limited, buy French, as it is illegal to use blending in rosé production over there (however, if you like it dry, avoid French rosé from Anjou).

Personally, I’m a big fan of the Provençal style - usually very delicate pale pink wines (sometimes a bit coppery looking), that burst with sweet summer fruit aromas, while remaining lip-smackingly dry. For donkey’s years, Provence has been seen as something of a home to fine rosé, and below are some wines to try if you want to find out why.

Cabaret Rosé 2012 (£9.00, Oddbins)is a great introduction to the style. It is light, fresh and pleasingly complex, but with a rustically floral nose, and a lovely, sharp fruity piquancy. For something a little more fulsome, but still super-dry, try Domaine De Bunganay Rosé 2012 (£9.99, Waitrose). A little simpler, but a heck of a lot more direct with the fruit, showing raspberry and blackberry, but still bone dry.

Finally, there’s Château Cavalier Rosé (£13.50, Spirited Wines), which has the best of both worlds. It’s a rich salmon pink, and comes over with a beautiful cherry blossom nose, followed by a palate that isn’t quite as dry as the others here, but wins over with beautifully ripe strawberries all round.

Ach, summer’s all in the mind. If you pour a glass of rosé, maybe it’ll feel like the sun is out.

 

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