Despite drinking a lot of it over the years, I know very little about wine. But, when faced with a wall of the stuff at Auchan or LeClerc, I thought I had evolved a really foolproof way of choosing it.
Obviously, a nice looking label is important. Ditto, a cork rather than a screw top. But key to my strategy was to choose a wine that had won an award. If the bottle bore a little badge saying 'médaille d'or' 'médaille d'argent' I knew I was on to a winner. An official judging panel couldn't be wrong.
But suddenly this ploy no longer works. Wine producers have realised that many of us are suckers for a gold or silver medal. And so these medals have proliferated to the point that now nearly every wine in the supermarket seems to have won an award - in some cases, awarded by themselves.
So I have been forced to refine my strategy, with seven key rules:
1 Always go for the wine that has fewer bottles left on the shelf (it's obviously popular if there aren't many left).
2 Avoid anything that doesn't have a date on it.
3 Avoid any label featuring primary colours or looks too modern (I'm not sure why this is but such wines never taste good.) In my experience, wines that come with old fashioned looking labels are best.
4 For red Bordeaux, 2003 and 2006 where exceptional years; 2007 was mediocre (I think).
5 If you're looking for a decent white you can rarely go wrong with a white burgundy such as Chablis.
6 Avoid anything 'éleve en futes de chene' – though that's just my personal taste as I don't like wines that taste of oak barrels.
7 There is nothing wrong with a Cotes de Rhone.
Two years ago I hung up my high heels, put the Prada handbags into storage and left behind my fashionable West London life to renovate an old village house in rural France. Et voila. This blog is about what happened next....
Quite agree if you want a decent wine it's a bit of a minefield, however If in a romantic frame of mind I'll often forgo the quality and go for the bottle with the picture of the little french or spanish shuttered window thinking It will look good later on with a candle in it! Personally I'm rather pleased screw tops are now plentiful, many's the day when away from home and there was no bottle opener to hand I've searched the Late Shops frantically for an acceptable bottle of red with a screw top. Rather partial to a Cotes de Rhone by the way.