A Medium Bodied French Fillie For My Pleasure (Tesco Cotes du Rhone)

Member Name: marandina

Product:	Tesco Cotes du Rhone
Date:	18/05/02 (174 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Reasonable price

Disadvantages: Pretty run of the mill

Well here you are thinking by now that I'm just a lager fiend with my beer opinions from around the world. Shhh...I'll let you into a secret, I like wine too! Not just any wine though, it has to be red. Wine was always meant to be red, you know, the colour of claret as they say on my manor (guvnor).

There are all sorts of red wine and all sorts of quality and price ranges. One of the best known is the Cotes du Rhone.

The river Rhone flows through France creating the famous Rhone valley. The Cote du Rhone is the most important region in southern France and runs south along the Rhone River from Lyon broadening into a wider, flatter valley before reaching Avignon. The northern soil is predominately granite and schist with some iron and lime. The southern soil is prevalent with clay and sand with outcrops of limestone.

The wines acquire their character from the rugged terrain, producing a big, heavy, sturdy wine that is pungent and slow to mature.

Needless to say, this combination of warm southern French climate and a particularly suitable soil weave together to create a combination perfect to produce the grapes renowned for their inclusion in one of the best known red wines. The years 1998 – 2000 saw a particularly good vintage for this particular one with the first and last being dominated by the Grenache-orientated southern Rhone, source of most Cotes du Rhone, as well as Chateauneuf-du-Pape and Gigondas. 1999 was a sensation in the north where the syrah grape is prevalent along with wines such as Cote Rotie and St Joseph.

As I said earlier, price can vary a great deal. I tried the standard Tesco Cote du Rhone for this opinion retailing at £2.99 but you can pay around £10 for Saint Cosme, Gigondas, £6 a bottle for 2000 Domaine de l'Ameillard, Calranne or even £17.50 for 1999 Le Vieux Donjon, Chateauneuf-du-Pape. You can only ever compare like for like and Tesco do offer a nice range of red wine at a pri
ce band of £2.99 - £3.99. In our case, the Cote du Rhone would compete with Dorgan, Grenache and Grenache Prestige although a standard Merlot and even Syrah are priced accordingly.

OK, so much for the wine fly-by and we aren't expecting miracles at these prices. First up is the bouquet. This particular wine hasn't got a strong smell. I tried to pick up the faint whiff of fruit but really couldn't so a low score on this front. Right, let's try it for taste. Well, it's a bitter taste. Wine making in the region has improved over the last decade with vineyards being in better shape and a more considered approach to fermentation and maturation. You can't help feeling that the price reflects the taste in our case, as I can't get over excited at it. Still, as ever after a couple of glasses you can begin to let go and alcohol by volume of 13% isn't unreasonable. Alternatives if you want to pay more and are keen on this wine might include standard Cotes du Rhone from growers like the Gonnet brothers of Domaine de Font Michelle in Chateauneuf who can offer a reasonable bottle retailing at around £7.

The style of this one is mainly a smooth; medium bodied red wine with a hint of spice. The bottle indicates juicy fruit flavours although they are hard to decipher from the bouquet or the taste. One of the great cardinal sins with red wine is to put it in the fridge. Please don’t if you do already, as you’ll end up with just a very cold drink with its natural flavours suppressed. This one like all red wines should be served at room temperature. Ideally, the wine should be stored horizontally in a dark place. Surprisingly, a wine rack is a good idea if you have one or even a wine cellar if you are one of the posher members of the Dooyoo community!

Red wines tend to go with meats. This Cotes du Rhone is recommended served with most dishes especially grilled meats and sausages. The label recommends drinking withi
n 2 days of opening and within one year of purchase. Wine does tend to go funny once uncorked if left for any length of time so drinking within 2 days of opening would be at the outside.

Tesco Cotes du Rhone is bottled by Roger Bernoin at 84350 Courthezon (Vaucluse) France and, as ever, the bottle heralds the fact that the wine is specially selected for Tesco.

Occasions where red wine might be drunk? Well, we like it with a video I have to admit and the elevation; even briefly, to a perceived higher plane through wine drinking is a strong lure for most folks. We do seem to gravitate to wine later on and I’m no exception having grown to appreciate the finer qualities in life (no, I didn’t need any lessons from the more grandiose members of this illustrious site although the lengths I go to to impress Jill and Sue!). Also, dinner parties often see the wheeling out of the most opulent of wineglasses as folks go all out to impress. This isn’t for me personally. I just adore red wine.

So, overall scores on the doors? Well, low on bouquet, average on body, reasonable on taste. For the money it’s OK but there are nicer alternatives mentioned above. In the light, fruity range we like Dorgan so as a final verdict we’ll give this 3 stars – one docked for lack of bouquet and one docked for only average taste. If you like Cotes du Rhone you’ll have to spend more on a nicer version!

If you do like the sound of this then wine can be purchased via the Tesco website at Tesco.com although you have to buy it in cases of 6 75cl bottles (Cotes du Rhone retailing at £17.04 i.e. the equivalent of £2.84 per bottle). Just a mention that the site is worth a visit anyway with a wide selection of wines available and some good deals including a 25% discount off North & South American wine per case as long as purchased before 31st May 2002.

There you go; told you I had some class (well, just a little bit d
9;yer think?).

Thanks for reading

Marandina :O)

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