2015 Château Pineraie ‘Cuveé Authentique’, Cahors

£22.50 inc. VAT

This is one serious wine and if you love your red deliciously rich, ripe, full bodied and inky then you must give this a try as its opulence is astounding.

The Cahors region is south east of Bordeaux and north of Toulouse and, more importantly, is the home of Malbec. The reds from here were traditionally quite tannic and required a few years of cellaring but along came Argentina with their juicy and approachable Malbecs and practically cornered the market. Learning from Argentina’s success a new generation of winemaker has struck a balance and began producing wines with all the structure and style of the traditional method but requiring less aging – this is not more evident than with this estate’s entry level red.

However, the baby has not been thrown out with the bathwater and classic authentic Cahors is still produced and here’s a superb example. Produced from 5 hectares of vines averaging 60 years (some planted in 1920!) this wine is big, big, big but not just fruit, fruit, fruit. There’s ripe damson, blackcurrant and black cherry along with rich, milky fudge, spicy tobacco and chocolate. But the real beauty is that the winery has done the aging for us and this Cahors is drinking perfectly. The tannins are soft and fruit wonderfully mature and despite its full bodies style the alcohol is only 13%. It’s aged for 18 months in mainly new oak barrels that give it extra richness.

Great with Cassoulet it would also be a superb wine to crack open with the cheese and not bad with a Montecristo either.

13%