Drinks of the Month

All Angels Classic Cuvée and sparkling rosé

Posted by Fiona Beckett (Google+) on June 20 2020 at 15:52

There’s so much English fizz around now it takes something special to make them stand out. These two All Angels wines, have the advantage, for a start, of coming from Berkshire, a county which is not as well known for its wines as more southerly counties such as Hampshire, Sussex and Kent.

They’re also really good. I tasted the Classic Cuvée 2014 first which was appealingly smooth and creamy with a nice touch of citrusy freshness and didn’t expect to like the sparkling rosé, also from the 2014 vintage as much, given how incredibly fruity it was - just jam-packed full of strawberry, raspberry and redcurrant summer pudding flavours. Maybe it’s more a wine to enjoy with a picnic tea than as an aperitif but it’s absolutely delicious. And surprisingly a shade drier than the classic cuvée.

That is made from chardonnay, pinot noir, pinot meunier and pinot gris and the rosé, largely from rondo along with pinot noir and pinot gris. Both are from the 2014 vintage and made by Emma Rice, the award-winning winemaker at Hattingley Valley.

All Angels, if you’re wondering, is named after the estate's local parish church, St Michael and All Angels at Enborne which apparently dates from at least the 12th century.

At £28.50 from the winery’s online shop they’re also relatively reasonably priced compared to many English sparkling wines now (quite a few prices are creeping up over the £40 mark). You can buy one of each for £57 with free delivery this week as it's English Wine Week and also from winebuyers.com.

English Wine Week has been postponed this year from May possibly in the hope we all might be able to visit vineyards by now. However there are lots of online tastings and webinars in which you can take part. Let’s hope we can actually get into the vineyards before too long.

If you’d like be able to check out all the food and wine pairings on the site you can buy a bundle of credits here to access my premium content.

And/or for regular updates on what and where I’ve been eating, drinking and travelling sign up for my weekly newsletter Eat This, Drink That, Live Well.