The best festive fizz
From supermarket fizz, low-alcohol sparkle, to luxury bubbles. Our expert shares the best sparkling wines and champagnes for Christmas.
Image credit: Alun Callender
From supermarket fizz, low-alcohol sparkle, to luxury bubbles. Our expert shares the best sparkling wines and champagnes for Christmas.
(11%, £8, Morrisons)
Worth half as much again, this is a serious prosecco with fresh, zesty fruit from its hillside vineyards.
That perky character makes it a rare food-friendly prosecco with crunchy orchard fruit and subtle floral notes. A bargain.
(11.5%, £5.79, Aldi)
Buy lots and keep this for your New Year’s Eve celebrations. Consistently one of the best wines in Aldi, it’s clean, lemony and refreshing.
And at this price you can add orange juice, peach juice, or a drop of Chambord liqueur, if you’re feeling swanky. The ultimate party fizz.
(12.5%, £14.99, Vintage by Saga)
Surely the poshest of the value sparkling wines. This has all the quince and lightly tropical fruit of Chenin Blanc but made with the expertise and swagger of Bollinger, the Champagne house that has owned the estate for 50 years.
(12.5%, £29.99, Waitrose & Partners)
Pink food, pink wine. Serving smoked salmon starters with blinis, or those rather moreish cream cheese and salmon rolls? Then buy this.
It’s made in Champagne’s hugely underrated south and is a steal at this price.
(12%, £38, Laithwaites)
Gold-medal winning, top scoring, world renowned and an English sparkling rosé.
Among the very best pink sparkling wines, it has a mix of ripe fruit and savoury complexity.
(12.5%, £22.99, Vintage by Saga)
A toast to the New Year and to new dreams. Ben and Hannah Witchell gave up their day jobs to pursue a dream of making wine in Norfolk. They succeeded in spades.
This is a succulent, mouthwatering gem that’s frothy and juicy and packed with character.
(0%, £9.50–£10, Waitrose & Partners; Noughty; Majestic)
Just serve this and don’t tell them. Nobody will know – seriously.
It looks like a great sparkling rosé, smells like it, and tastes like it. In fact, rather better than a lot of sparkling rosé: dry, berry-scented, delicious – and my top tip.
(0%, £109, Harrods; House of Clarity)
The goal here was to create a wine with complexity, depth, and persistence that would impress wine lovers, just without alcohol. And this does.
It’s made with all the effort and intensity of a £109 regular wine. Why shouldn’t it also cost as much?
(0%, £9.95–£12.99, Laithwaites)
Love prosecco, but not prosecco’s ‘next day’? This is for you. It’s made from the same grape – glera – and shares that frothy, almond and pear character but with no alcohol.
Oddbird is one of the most exciting of the new alcohol-free wine producers. Look out for it.
(12%, £58, Berry Bros & Rudd)
If it’s just me, on my own, when everyone else has gone, I open this – and let the layers of candied peel, citrus, and beeswax unfurl. All woven together with a sort of wet-stone tension.
I know, I’m sounding like a wine nerd. This is the wine nerd’s Champagne. It’s gorgeous.
(12%, £95, Gusbourne)
What makes this worth £95? It’s the intensity and focus. It’s not ‘bready’, it’s ‘croissant’; not ‘citrus’, but ‘Meyer lemon’ and you won’t find ‘tropical’ notes, you’ll smell Galia melon.
This is top-flight, luxury, single-vineyard, hand-crafted, precision-engineered winemaking.
(12%, £69.75, The Whisky Exchange)
The thinking person’s luxury rosé. Close your eyes and you’ll find red wine complexity with bubbles.
It’s a plump sofa of a wine, cocooning you with pastry and almond as you enjoy the ripe red fruits of Grand Cru vineyards.
(12%, £34, Woodchurch Wine)
I love this wine, and I’m not alone. It’s a regular top medal-winner.
Expect aromas of English strawberries and soft fruit with a sweet scent of almond and marzipan. All balanced on the palate by a gorgeous frothy freshness that lingers into a toasty finish.
(12%, £34–£36, Hambledon Vineyard; Vintage by Saga)
A favourite from England’s oldest commercial vineyard (founded in 1952).
It was the first to produce commercial sparkling wine in 1978 and, curiously, the village is the birthplace of cricket. Elegant and fragrant, it has spritzy citrus and apricot fruit and lingers for an age on your palate.
(12%, £50, R&H Fine Wines)
Dermot Sugrue – remember the name. Many say this Irishman is England’s best winemaker. And on this he probably is: it’s complex, lingering, nuanced with layers of apple and citrus and toast and nut.
The finest English sparkling wine I’ve tried this year.
Enjoy the long weekend with a 4-bottle case of hand-picked wines from Vintage by Saga - just £15.96. Perfect for long lunches, garden gatherings and relaxed evenings.
Enjoy the long weekend with a 4-bottle case of hand-picked wines from Vintage by Saga - just £15.96. Perfect for long lunches, garden gatherings and relaxed evenings.
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