France

Pouilly-Fumé sits across the river from Sancerre on much the same flint, and Tracy has been in one family since 1586.

Bué is one of Sancerre's best communes, and this estate holds a slice of Garennes and a full hectare of Chêne Marchand - vineyards that c...

Most Sancerre never sees a barrel.

Chenin Blanc at its most direct — no oak, no sugar, just apple, stone fruit and salt.

Silex is the flint soil that gives Sancerre its smoky edge, and Laloue bottle it on its own from a single three-hectare parcel of forty-y...

The Cherrier family have farmed here since 1848, and this is Sancerre in its riper register - full and textured rather than lean, with th...

Fitou is the Languedoc's oldest red appellation and still one of its least fashionable, which is why a wine of this weight costs what it does.

A four-grape white that ignores appellation lines to chase freshness, drawing Chardonnay, Petit Manseng and Chenin off cool clay-limeston...

Eight generations of one family on terraced black slate and clay-limestone at the foot of the Pyrenees, every vine certified organic and hand-picked.

Barrel-fermented Chardonnay aged on its lees in new 500-litre oak usually comes from much further north and costs a good deal more.

Duval-Leroy makes Femme de Champagne only in years it considers exceptional, and 2002 is widely held to be the Champagne vintage of its decade.

Blended exclusively from reserve wines, which is unusual and gives maturity and toast without losing the house's citrus freshness.

Louis Barruol of Château de Saint Cosme is one of the Rhône's most respected winemakers, and this is his négoce label working outside app...

Abelé 1757 is the fifth oldest house in Champagne and keeps production deliberately tiny, so this cuvée rarely travels far.

Suduiraut is one of the great names of Sauternes, and mature bottles of a classed growth rarely reach the shelf at all.

Made by the addition method with 15% still Pinot Noir, which gives real red-fruit flavour rather than colour alone.

Palmer & Co only makes this cuvée in a vintage it rates highly, and every grape comes from Premier and Grand Cru vineyards in the Montagne de Reims.

A grower Champagne from a single Premier Cru village, farmed organically and ploughed by horse, at the price the large houses ask for a b...

Most rosé Champagne takes its colour from a little red wine added at blending.

Aged three times longer than the appellation requires, which buys the fine, persistent mousse and the depth the price suggests.

The benchmark cuvée from the oldest wine house in Champagne, and the clearest statement of the no-malolactic house style: rich and volumi...

A first-rank Pomerol estate on the Saint-Émilion border, Merlot-dominant and now fully mature at fourteen years old.

Vosgros sits in a sun-trap amphitheatre on the left bank, which is why it gives a rounder, riper Chablis than most Premier Crus.

All Pinot Noir from Grand Cru villages in the Montagne de Reims, which is where the grape carries the most weight and structure in Champagne.