Jane MacQuitty's top 100 winter wines - 25 under £12

Our essential round-up of the season’s best bottles concludes with a selection of the very finest wines guaranteed to spread some festive cheerJane MacQuitty
WHITES

2007 The Wallops Marlborough Chardonnay, Allan Scott, New Zealand, Hedley Wright (01279 465818), £13.50.Marlborough chardonnay makes a welcome change from sauvignon, and it’s one of the few whites that can take on turkey. I loved this bold, rich, toasty, oaky white’s elegant hazelnut palate. A step up from Scott’s standard range, the Wallops is one of this estate’s prestige wines – the Kiwis’ answer to domaine-bottled burgundy.

2008 Ata Rangi Sauvignon Blanc, Martinborough, New Zealand, Noel Young (01223 566744), £13.79, Wimbledon Wine (020-8540 9979), £15.99. If you want a nippy, refined sauvignon to perk up Christmas palates, this precocious ’08 is the bottle to serve. Martinborough, on the North Island, gets rather overlooked in the Cloudy Bay South Island sauvignon stampede. A pity, as this floral, white peach-stashed, yet herb and gooseberry-laden, wine demonstrates.

2007 Château Doisy-Daëne, Grand Vin Sec, Denis Dubourdieu, Bordeaux, France,The Wine Society (01438 740222), £14.50. My love affair with dry white bordeaux continues, and Denis Dubourdieu’s sauvignon sec, one of the first dry white wines from the Sauternes district, gets my Christmas vote. Much as a luscious barsac from this château will woo festive drinkers, I suspect this powerful, citrussy, oaky white will win out. Makes a superb Christmas Day apéritif.

2004 Chablis Premier Cru, Les Vaillons, Domaine Billaud-Simon, France, Whitebridge Wines (01785 817229), £14.99, Montrachet (020-7928 1990), £17.99. Premier cru chablis pleases on Christmas Day, but most would rather not spend £30 on their bone-dry festive treat. Situated on the left bank of the Serein river, opposite the swanky grand crus, Vaillons nonetheless delivers all the ripe, elegant, leafy, minerally flavour and finesse you would expect.

2007 Domaine Georges Vernay, Viognier, Le Pied de Samson, Vin de Pays des Collines Rhodaniennes, France, Yapp Brothers (01747 860423), £16.95. Precisely the firm I’d expect to have an aristocratic viognier from one of Condrieu’s finest producers – but from vineyards immediately above the steep slopes of the real thing. So you get much of condrieu’s seductive scent and flavour, heavy with spicy, peach and hawthorn-styled fruit, at half the price.

2006 Savigny-les-Beaune, 1er Cru Les Peuillets, Blair Pethel, Domaine Dublère, France, Howard Ripley (020-8877 3065), £17. Love burgundy? It’s high time Howard Ripley was on your speed dial: once again, this merchant has triumphed. 2006 white burgundy is thought by most to have the edge on 2005, and is deemed a top white burgundy year, so compare and contrast this fine, oaky, spicy, sandalwood and hazelnut-spiked wine with the star white.

2006 Salomon Undhof, Von Stein, Grüner Veltliner Reserve, Austria, Lea & Sandeman (020-7244 0522), £18.95. Austria’s finest grüner veltliners marry well with the Christmas feast, as their spicy, sparky, white-pepper flavours can cope with all those rich sauces. 2006, with its Indian summer, was one of Austria’s finest recent vintages, and the rocky, terraced Hund and Danzer vineyards, overlooking the Danube at Stein, produced exceptional quality grapes.

2007 Cometa Fiano, Bianco di Sicilia, Planeta, Italy, Majestic Fine Wine, £25, or buy two for £20 each until December 22. You’ll have to go to Majestic Fine Wine (020-7604 3143 for your nearest branch, or order direct) to grab this gorgeous, scented Italian white. At 14.5 per cent alcohol, this is no shrinking violet and delivers a tremendous thwack of concentrated grapefruit and apricot-layered fruit. Just the ticket with a game terrine or meaty pâté.

2006 Puligny-Montrachet, Premier Cru Les Pucelles, Domaine Alain Chavy, France, Howard Ripley, £23. The big one: a sensational premier cru puligny, at an unsensational price. Les Pucelles is one of the slower maturing of the puligny premiers crus, displaying more festive food-suitable steel and power at this stage than the rest. I loved its lively, lemony, waxy, floral, faintly honeyed, stone fruit-charged style, and so will you.

STAR WHITE 2005 Mercurey Les Bacs, Château Génot-Boulanger, France,Wine Rack, £20.99 or buy three for £13.99 each.Fancy white burgundy at this price is an unexpected windfall, so buy long of this brilliant mercurey from a small estate. It’s lively, yet lingeringly ripe, sweet, hazelnut and glacé fruit flavours make a dreamy festive white. Mercurey is best known for its red burgundies, but given the outstanding quality of this, that could all be changing.

2006 Gigondas, Cuvée Tradition, Domaine des Espiers, Philippe Cartoux, France, Hicks & Don (01380 831234), £12.75, Stone, Vine & Sun (01962 712351), £14.50. The best gigondas are mini châteauneufs. 2006 was a particularly good vintage in the southern rhône, and this is one of Cartoux’s finest gigondas yet. It delivers the sort of vivid, crimson-purple hue blessed with delicious, spicy, red-fruit flavours that will win it many festive fans.

2006 Cerasuolo di Vittoria Classico, Azienda Agricola Cos, Sicily, Caves de la Pyrène (01483 554750), £13.70, Philglas & Swiggot (020-7402 0002), £17.25. A tasty blend of nero d’avola and frappato that gets my festive vote. Cos was founded by Giusto Occhipinti with two classmates in the early Eighties, and what is so impressive about this red is its gorgeous, unadorned, faintly chocolate and morello cherry-spiked fruit. Ancient and modern Italy rolled into one.

2007 Châteauneuf-du-Pape, Cuvée des Antiques, Caves du Fournalet, France,Majestic, £13.99. Nothing on the label gives the game away, but this superb châteauneuf from a good southern rhône vintage comes from Ogier and their famous Caves des Papes cellar in the heart of the appellation. Principally grenache but with a dollop of syrah, mourvèdre and cinsaut in the mix too, you get a lot of ripe, inky, briary, herby bang for your buck with this one.

2006 Maverick Greenock Rise, GSM, Barossa Valley, Australia, Lea & Sandeman, £15.75. GSM stands for grenache, syrah and mourvèdre, the all-popular rhône red blend and the grapes behind gigondas and châteauneuf-du-pape. In Aussie hands (and especially at one of my Barossa favourites, Maverick), this blend transforms into a voluptuous, elegant, sweet red with intense, complex, briary fruit. At 15.5 per cent alcohol, this is as bold and burly as they come.

2005 Moulin d’Angludet, Margaux, Bordeaux, France, Waitrose, down to £15.99 until January 6. The second wine of the Margaux property Château d’Angludet, and although not a classed growth or cru classé, it tastes as if it should be. 2005 is a great bordeaux vintage and the combination of a good property and year delivers some fine, ripe, leafy, spicy, almost chocolatey claret flavours, with that pencil box-scented finish that red bordeaux fans can’t get enough of.

2006 Chorey-les-Beaune, Pièce du Chapitre-Monopole, Domaine Tollot-Beaut, France, Tanners, £17.10, Philglas & Swiggot, £23.99. Charming Natalie Tollot-Beaut and her two cousins Jean-Paul and Olivier are the Young Turks behind this label, and a fine job they are all doing. Tollot-Beaut’s juicy red burgundy style is a distinctive one heavy on seductive, spicy, sandalwood scents – the perfect bold, ripe, leathery red to accompany game.

2005 Mercurey 1er Cru, Les Naugues, Paul Jacqueson, Burgundy, France, Headley Wright, £17.49, Lay & Wheeler (0845 3301855), £17.95, Harvey Nichols, £21.50. The partner to the white mercurey on the previous spread is this delicious red burgundy made from mature, low-yielding 35-year-old pinot noir vines. A remarkably stylish, concentrated red with a really elegant, perfumed, strawberry-laden palate – perfect with medium-strength game.

2005 Chocapalha Reserva, Vinho Regional Estremadura, Portugal, Corney & Barrow (020-7265 2400), £17.54. A wonderful example of the toothsome new-wave reds that Portugal is now producing, full of unusual flavours from indigenous grapes that once no one knew anything about. A blend of port grapes tinta roriz and touriga nacional, plus alicante bouschet, this is a delicious, big, fat, squishy, spicy, mulberry and red fruits-stashed wine.

2006 Pommard 1er Cru, Les Poutures, Domaine Dublère, Blair Pethel, Burgundy, France, Howard Ripley, £19.50. 2006 was one of the better Côte d’Or red burgundy vintages in recent years, but only Blair Pethel’s third, and this shows he’s a Burgundian producer to be watched. Pommard, the largest village in the Côte d’Or, can be a crashing disappointment, but this one is not. Enjoy its well-crafted, cinnamon-scented fruit with roast game birds or turkey.

2004 Château Lalande-Borie, St-Julien, Bordeaux, Jean-Eugène Borie, France,Majestic, £19.99, Roberson (020-7731 2121), £21.95. The mustard labels of the classy St-Julien second growth stable of Ducru-Beaucaillou are as unmistakable as its clarets. Expect some fine, tasty, fat, spicy, truffley, drink-young fruit from this two-thirds cabernet sauvignon claret (topped up with merlot and cabernet franc) that will go down well with spicy red-meat dishes.

2003 Châteauneuf-du-Pape, Cuvée des Félix, Domaine Bois de Boursan, Jean et Paul Versino, France, Justerini & Brooks (020-7484 6400), £22.42. If venison is your Christmas Day centrepiece and money is no object, this is the magnificent red to serve. Unlike the other châteauneuf, what you get with this estate’s top, barrique-aged Cuvée des Felix blend is complexity and that rare but unmistakeable quality of a truly great, sappy, savoury, beefy, historic French red.

2001 Château Quinault L’Enclos, St-Emilion Grand Cru, Alain & Françoise Raynaud, Bordeaux, France, Montrachet, £24.99, Corney & Barrow, £36.83. Anyone wandering through the town of St-Emilion might be surprised to see vineyards inside the walls, including this one. Quinault’s rich, spicy, deeply fruity yet silky style is now owned by Cheval Blanc, hence the greatly discounted price of previous vintages such as this elegant, faintly chocolately ’01.

STAR RED 2001 Château Puy-Blanquet, St-Emilion Grand Cru, Jacquet, Bordeaux, France, Tanners (01743 234500), £15.95. Pedigree claret from négociant J-P Moueix, best known for Pétrus, still one of the world’s most prestigious reds. Merlot dominates this claret blend, as you would expect on the right bank, with cabernet franc the supporting player. A gorgeous, cedarwood-scented red supported by lots of perfumed, plummy, exotic, spiced fruit.

SWEET

2003 Ockfener Bockstein Riesling Auslese, Saarburg, Dr Wagner, Germany, Waitrose Direct (0800 188881), £13. All wine writers adore Germany’s luscious late-harvest rieslings; those of the Mosel and the Saar river in particular get a special MacQuitty thumbs-up. This is best savoured solo or with a festive clementine or two, and oozes gorgeous, steely, minerally spice, with that classic kerosene finish of a great German riesling.

2005 Oremus Tokaji, Late Harvest, Hungary, Berry Bros & Rudd (01256 340182), £14.95 (half-bottle). A festive bonne bouche. Quality in this remote corner of Hungary has improved out of all recognition since Western finance arrived. Owned by Spain’s Vega Sicilia, Oremus is one of many historic vineyards where standards have shot up, and anyone sipping this exotic, apricot and apple-layered pudding wine will have a memorable Christmas.