Shifting stock by heavy discounting is what wine merchants do in January. So, as I suggested last week, now is the time to get matey with a wine merchant. As usual with bin-end bottles, follow your own nose and tastebuds and not the merchants’ hype. Checking out the small print is essential, as is the website www.wine-searcher.com, which lists wines, current prices and stockists.

Ploughing through almost three dozen so-called bargain bin-ends reminded me that while good wine will always mature, dodgy bottles are made in every vintage, even from the great years and the top producers, and the only thing these will do, given time, is deteriorate further. Prestigious châteaux and domaines with prices well below others of their ilk for that vintage are useful dodgy wine indicators.

As in previous years, the merchant to plunder pronto is Farr Vintners (020-7821 2000), whose main business is bordeaux. Go for Château Monbousquet’s 2001 vintage, a fine cinnamon and sandalwood-scented steal at £26.05 – £11.50 cheaper than elsewhere, and a whopping £20 cheaper per bottle than its en primeur price. The star white burgundy buy is Verget’s 2005 Meursault “Tillets”, for whose gorgeous, creamy, citrus and hazelnut-scented fruit I would happily pay a lot more than the £17.24 asked. Farr insists on £350 as a minimum sale order, but has cut this to £200 for Times readers, with duty and VAT on top, so identify yourself and get cracking.

For me, the Wine Society (01438 740222) can do no wrong, and although my Top 100 ’05 star white has sold out, the richer, fatter ’06 will be even better long-distance. So bulk buy the delicious 2006 Mâcon Charnay, Cuvée Claude, Domaine Manciat-Poncet, with its rich, greengage and lime-blossom fruit, at £6.25, not £7.95. Stone, Vine & Sun (01962 712351) is another good burgundy sale source, with a splendid duo from Vincent Dureuil-Janthial, the steely, fully mature white 2004 Rully (£12.25) and the smoky, beetrooty red 2004 Mercurey (£11.50), getting my vote.

Laytons (020-7730 8108) is the place to go for glorious odds and sods, with the fine, nutty, lemony 2004 Jordan Chameleon Sauvignon Blanc-Chardonnay a snip at £4.68; ditto von Kesselstatt’s luscious, wax and marzipan-charged 2002 Piesporter Gold-tröpchen Riesling Spätlese at £8.10. Of the six Berry Bros (01256 340182) sale bottles, the best was the sumptuous, fat, strawberry-charged 2005 Hautes Côtes de Nuits from Domaine Bertagna, down to £9.95, and the unusual 2005 Domaine Carnaval Roussanne with its lemony lime spice for just £4.15.

Finally, two other sale lists running until February 1 that are worth combing through with www.wine-searcher.com close to hand are Justerini & Brooks (020-7484 6400) and Corney & Barrow (020-7265 2430). Happy hunting.

jane.macquitty@thetimes.co.uk

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