Polgoon raspberry Aval

Giving your mum a bottle of cider for mother’s day might seem like being a bit of a skinflint but this award-winning product from Cornwall is something entirely different.

I rediscovered it on a recent trip to Cornwall when I visited the cidery and vineyard and met Polgoon’s owners Kim and John (below).

It’s really a sparkling apple wine* flavoured with fresh raspberry juice to make an absolutely delicious fresh-tasting (7% ABV) alternative to rosé champagne and sparkling wines. You could drink it on its own but I quite fancy it with something like Eton Mess or a milk chocolate and raspberry cake like this one. Served chilled in a champagne flute.

It costs £14 direct from Polgoon which is ironically not much cheaper than champagne - and in fact some supermarket champagnes will undoubtedly be cheaper - but it is a unique product.

You can also buy it from wine merchants and good delis around Cornwall. Contact them for other stockists.

Polgoon also makes a range of English wines of which I was particularly impressed by the 2014s which should be bottled in the next month or so. The 2013 Seyval Blanc and Bacchus which is already available is very pretty too.

*Aval is the old Cornish name for apple.

Two Sainsbury’s Fairtrade wines to try

Every Fairtrade Fortnight I seem to end up bleating about the quality of Fairtrade wines so I thought this year I would give it a break. And then I found - too late for my Guardian column - a couple of better than average examples in Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference range.

I wouldn’t get over excited - they won’t blow you away - but they’re decent, more than fairly priced and some at least of the proceeds will go towards Fairtade projects.

The first is the Taste the Difference 2014 Wild Valley Fairtrade Chenin Blanc (13.5%) a smooth dry white from the Wellington region of South Africa that would make a useful after-work white and a good partner for light chicken dishes and creamy pasta sauces. And it’s only 98 calories per 125ml glass (Sainsbury’s now usefully putting calorie content on their own brand wines).

And the second Sainsbury’s TTD Fairtrade Carmenère 2013 (14%) from Chile which is typically lush, ripe and fruity - a little soft for my taste but I might well be in a minority on that. A good red to drink with a lamb curry or other spicy lamb dish. Or with sausages.

Both are £6 until March 25th which I think you’ll agree is a bit of a steal. I’d have willingly paid the full £8 for them.

The Co-op also has a large selection of Fairtrade wines of which I’ve most enjoyed the Argentinian wines in the past. The vintages are different but here are my recommendations from last year.

Domaine Labet Fleur de Savagnin ‘en chalasse’ Cotes du Jura 2012

I’ve tasted this wine before but was reminded how absolutely delicious it is when we had a bottle at lunch at Bell’s Diner in Bristol this week. (No I don’t spend my *entire* life there despite this article in the Guardian.)

It’s a blend of different types of savagnin - the Jura’s indigenous white grape which wine writer Wink Lorch, who has written an excellent book on the region, describes as tasting like a “fresh Meyer lemon”.

Given it had a couple of years maturation it wasn’t that tart but had just the right verve and attack to sail through an eclectic selection of small plates (its salinity made it particularly good with some salt cod croquetas (below) and a salad of salt cod, avocado and blood oranges). I was surprised to find it was nearly 14% (13.8%).

The estate is run organically and adheres to most of the tenets of natural winemaking - no fining or filtering and very little, if any sulphur. But the wine is beautifully clean and pure.

Infuriatingly I can’t find a retail stockist but it is imported into the UK by the excellent Vine Trail which supplies many other good restaurants including The Quality Chophouse and Texture in London so with luck you’ll run across it at some point. It costs £17.08 a bottle ex VAT

You can read Wink’s typically insightful piece about the Labet family on her website.

The Garage Project's Chateau Aro

How on earth can I pick a single wine of the week from my two week trip to New Zealand? The answer is I can’t so I’m chickening out and going for a beer

That’s not such as cop-out as it might sound as a) New Zealand has an incredible craft beer scene and b) the beer - Wellington-based Garage Project’s Chateau Aro - also has a wine connection.

It’s a lager brewed with the juice and skins from Larry McKenna’s 2014 Escarpment pinot noir so not surprisingly it’s deeply vinous but there’s also a rich dark lager character. If you come across it (and I suspect that’s only likely to be in New Zealand*) watch out - it’s strong at 8.5% ABV - a bit reminiscent of a barley wine only drier (think a pumped up Rodenbach).

It was very good on its own when I drank it with Larry and his winemaker Huw at the end of our tasting but I reckon I’d enjoy it with venison or pigeon - or a cheeseboard. It would be spot on with Stilton.

(Incidentally if you find yourself in Wellington check out Hashigo Sake, an amazing underground beer bar with over 300 beers. Perversely I ended up drinking a beer from San Francisco - the Almanac Dolores Saison.)

* If you fancy a similar beer closer to home try the Wild Beer Co’s Modus Operandi though it’s not quite as winey.