This week: 25 best wines under £6

Time to trade up. Even skinflint drinkers will have to change their miserly habits and buy more expensive wines. The combined assault of a duty increase and sterling losing value against the euro has seen a dramatic leap in wine prices. Most high-street wine buyers have all but abandoned the £2.99 slot, and £3.49ers are scarce, too.

Clearly, £3.99 has become the new £2.99, with £4.99 the popular point to sell the sort of good, ordinary swiggers that most of us are happy to crack open at home midweek. Posh supermarkets like Marks & Spencer now sell more wine between £5 and £6 than ever before; the average spend on a bottle of wine at Waitrose is now £5.92. At long last British drinkers are spending an average of £4-plus on a bottle of wine. Phew.

All of which means that if I am to be of proper use to you, it is time for The Times Top 100 to shift from sub-£5 for its cheapest category to sub-£6. You may grumble, but wine has hardly gone up in price over the past 20 years compared with other foodstuffs.

If you want to get the best – and the best value – from your bottle of wine, with but a few exceptions, you will soon have to fork out more than a fiver for it. Good luck.

jane.macquitty@thetimes.co.uk

STAR BUY

2005 Château Bellerives Dubois Bordeaux Supérieur, France, Majestic, £6.99 or buy two for £4.99 each until June 19.
Côtes de Blaye has long been acknowledged as one of the best of the lesser bordeaux spots, and in a great vintage like 2005 the quality is impressive. So check out this two thirds merlot, one third cabernet sauvignon wine, a seductive, supple, ripe, plummy, smoky-oaky, sandalwood-scented claret.

WHITES

House White, Vin de Table, France, Marks & Spencer, £3.79.
Every summer selection needs one – an inexpensive, lowish alcohol (in this case, just 11.5 per cent) yet punchy white. Gascony once had a monopoly on these juicy French summer whites. However, this exclusive, zingy, lemon zest-spiked non-vintage wine, in practice a 2007, from regular M&S supplier Domaine Virginie in Languedoc-Roussillon, is every bit as sparky as the Gascon original.

2007 Sauvignon Blanc-Grenache, Maison Maurel Vedeau, Vin de Pays d’Oc, France, Tesco, down to £3.99 until June 15.
Philippe Maurel and Stéphane Vedeau founded their Languedoc firm in 1992 and are now thriving négociants. This easy-swigging white is two thirds floral, grassy sauvignon blanc, with the remainder faintly appley, more full-bodied grenache. Along with its red sister, below, just what’s wanted for all those summer buffet and party menus.

2007 Sunrise Sauvignon Blanc, Valle Central, Concha y Toro, Chile, Waitrose, £5.49; Booths (0800 197066), £4.99.
The young, vibrant, easy-glugging Sunrise varietal wines are a relatively new arrival from Chile’s biggest winery, Concha y Toro. The floral, nettle and flowering currant-charged fruit makes this an easy-swigging white that still has sufficient varietal flavour to impress. Good with white meat or fish; an alternative apéritif to herby Kiwi sauvignon.

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