Have you noticed how short the build-up to Easter is nowadays? No sooner has the Christmas debris been carted away than the supermarkets start loading their shelves with Easter eggs. And hot cross buns have long since become a year-round feature. What can still be special about Easter is your choice of wines, and there are lots of cracking bottles you can scoop up today to celebrate with tomorrow.

The stop-start weather this spring means I’m not craving the full-on, assertive, verdant flavours of the sauvignon blanc grape. I still need, however, a sparky dry white aperitif and first-course wine to serve tomorrow, after a bottle of fizz, of course. Step forward the entirely respectable 2003 Chablis 1er Cru, Blason de Bourgogne (£9.99 at Somerfield until April 8), which delivers lots of rich, nutty, steely fruit suitable for smoked salmon. If you don’t want to splash out on this superior premier cru chablis, one rung down from the grand-cru level, go for the 2006 Chablis, Blason de Bourgogne (£6.99 at Somerfield until April 8), whose lively, leafy style closes on that classic cheesy, minerally chablis finish.

With aperitif and first-course wines sorted, what red should you bring out with the traditional paschal lamb? Most wine lovers believe that lamb can take any good red, with claret and red burgundy getting equal votes. I still feel that baby lamb, even if it’s not the finest, pale milk-fed sort, is best partnered by beaujolais. Worryingly, most of the ’05s and ’06s I tasted for this column were thin, anaemic, acidic wines and undeserving of centre stage. The two that romped home, and the two I shall be swigging, are Georges Duboeuf’s 2006 Fleurie Flower Label, whose gorgeous, fat, supple, velvety raspberry fruit Majestic Wine is giving away for £8.99 (or buy two for £6.99 each), and the lively, elegant, cherry-scented 2006 Taste the Difference Beaujolais Villages (£5.99 at Sainsbury’s). If it must be claret for Easter, you could do worse than the fat, ripe, truffly yet plummy 2006 Montagne Saint Emilion, La Rose Peyrière, a merlot-dominated blend topped up with cabernets. Morrisons’ Easter egg to the nation is to cut the price of this wonder by £3 to £4.99. Buy now before it sells out.

Selecting the right pudding wine is a worry with all those wine-hating chocolate bunnies hopping about. Any of you serving simnel cake, Stilton or Roquefort tomorrow, followed by apple crumble or a simple, fresh fruit salad, should race round to the Co-op for the best sauternes bargain I’ve seen in months. Half bottles are the perfect pudding wine size for the Easter feast and 2005 Château Roumieu, a top sauternes vintage, with its wonderful, waxy, marzipan, crystallised peach and pineapple flavours, is a snip at £5.99 at the Co-op until March 30. Miss this and you will miss out.

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