We don’t tend to buy much wine from supermarkets these days as we have a reliable online/mail order service, but we do browse the wines and spirits aisles from time to time, just to see how prices compare. On this occasion, we’d just bought some food for a barbecue, and, deciding we wanted something a little lighter than our usual choice of red wine, we went to see what Sainsbury’s had to offer in the way of rose. We really only intended to buy a bottle, but we spotted a box of Blossom Hill White Zinfandel on the shelf, which, being priced at £17.15 for 3 litres, worked out £2.81 cheaper than the equivalent four 75cl bottles. We opted then, for the box version.

The box (the design of which has recently changed) stood out because of the colour – it’s deep pink, almost red in fact, with cream coloured swirls running through it. You remove the cardboard disc from the side of the box, and pull through the black tap, which is then operated by pressing down on the button with your thumb. It’s fairly easy to operate, but it does have a tendency to drip a little afterwards, so don’t position the box where it could drip on a carpet, for instance. Despite the name, the white zinfandel grape doesn’t produce white wine, but is a lighter version of the red zinfandel, both grapes being grown exclusively in North America, I believe.

The wine is almost exactly the same colour as the reddish pink on the box, except that it has a slight transparency to it and when it was poured, minute bubbles appeared and rose to the surface. I half expected it to taste a bit fizzy, but in fact, it was very smooth and had a fruity taste which I couldn’t quite place, being somewhere between strawberry and raspberry. There was a slight sweetness to it as well, although not too sweet that it clashed with the meat and fish we had cooked on the barbecue. We’d previously chilled the wine, but I found that I got more of the taste once it had been out of the fridge for a while; that said, I wouldn’t advocate letting it get too warm – this is a wine that is best drunk somewhat cooled, rather than chilled. It went very well with the barbecue, and I would imagine it would be perfect for drinking with salad dishes, especially al fresco.

This wine isn’t very high in alcohol content in comparison with other wines – there’s just 10% alcohol in it, which is one of the reasons why it is so easy to drink. It’s very light, leaving a pleasant aftertaste, and after one or two glasses it hardly feels like you’re drinking alcohol at all. The disadvantage of this is that you tend to quaff rather more than you would a more potent wine, and unlike a bottle, where you can see how much you’ve drunk, the fact that it’s in a box means it’s difficult to keep track of your consumption. It does say on the box that it will stay fresh for six weeks after opening, but I don’t think we need worry about that in our house. The box is very sturdy, but surprisingly easy to tear apart when it comes to squeezing those last drops out of the foil container inside. The fault we found was that the tap stopped pouring quite a while before all the wine was gone, and we ended up getting about 2-3 more glasses out of it by splitting open the box.

It’s the kind of wine ideally suited to summer drinking; as I have said, it goes down very smoothly, and has a light, fresh taste without being too bland. Nor does it make you grimace on the first taste, as some of the cheaper wines do. If you’re looking for a classic wine, then look elsewhere, however, I’d recommend Blossom Hill for casual everyday drinking, and it’s ideal for parties, if you can’t bear to part with your decent stuff!