The Best Supermarket Wines on the Shelves right now – tasted and rated by Christopher Burr, MW

On Friday 5th September 2023, we invited Master of Wine Christopher Burr to taste and rate a number of different wines available in your local supermarket. The aim was to try and find some great tasting, good value bottles that you can enjoy right now, or put aside for Christmas.

The beauty of buying wine in the Supermarket is simple, you can add it in with your weekly shop alongside all your groceries. Plus, there will often be an incentive to buy in the form of multibuy savings or discounts, such as the ever popular ‘Buy 6, Save 25%’ sale you’ll find at many stores throughout the year.

Rather than focus purely on the price however, we asked Chris to taste these wines and rate them on their value for money. That is, is the wine in the bottle, worth what the supermarket is asking for it?

To make the results clear and easy to understand, we’ve assigned a scoring system out of 5 based on Chris’s review. Five is the highest score a wine can have and one is the lowest score.

That being said, here are the stand out bottles that you’ll find in store and online right now:

White Wines

Tesco Finest Vinas del Rey Albarino - Tesco

£9.00

From Galicia in Northern Spain, comes Albarino. A lip smacking white wine that transports you to sunnier climes. This particular wine has an attractive pale green tinge in the glass and on the nose has a floral character but certainly lots of citrus too. It has a clean and bright flavour, which you would expect from this wine style. There’s also a hint of bright orange peel on the finish.

Chris says this is the perfect wine to pair with fish and suggests you might even want to try it with Lobster and chips! Good value for money.

4/5

Tesco Finest Gavi - Tesco

£8.50 (£7.50 Clubcard Price)

This Gavi is made by a family with a long winemaking history, so Chris was expecting this wine to be of good quality, and he was not disappointed. An attractive, pale colour with a green tinge in the glass, this wine smells of fresh limes with a slight minerality.

Taste wise, its full of white peach flavour and a refreshing bright citrus finish. Mouthfilling, with a slightly fuller body than typical unoaked wines, this is an elegant drop! Very drinkable and would pair well with baked fish dishes. A very good price too. (Currently available at the Clubcard price of £7.50)

4/5

Audrey Wilkinson Chardonnay – Waitrose – Chris’s Top Pick

£15.99

A 2018 vintage Chardonnay, this bottle is a slightly higher price point, but Chris felt the price was justified. A pale yellow colour, this wine has a nice ripe nose but also fresh. You can smell a little bit of honeysuckle and honey, combined with a touch of oak.

Despite hailing from the Hunter Valley in Australia, Chris remarked that this Chardonnay tastes very ‘French’ in its restrained elegance. It has a beautiful balance, rounded without being too oaky or creamy.

Chris really enjoyed this wine, and would pair it with white fish in a cream or butter sauce, which would match the buttery flavours of the wine perfectly.

4.5/5

Philippe Raimbault Sancerre – Waitrose - Chris’s Top Pick

£17.99

Another higher price point here, but this is the perfect wine for indulging at Christmas. A proper Sancerre, Chris remarked that this bottle was ‘worth every penny’. A deep yellow colour leads to ripe lemon and minerality on the nose. Immediately you get the intensity of this wine. You can almost taste the terroir. It has soft, creamy fruit flavours and a gorgeous mineral finish.

One to impress your guests this year, a wine for sharing! Pair with moules marinere or perhaps skate with capers and butter.

5/5

Red Wines

Journey’s End Sir Lowry Cabernet Sauvignon – Waitrose

£14.99

This wine is crafted by an experienced winemaking family, who are actually British Expats now living in South Africa where this wine is created.

A 2019 Vintage, this wine has a deep, dark colour, starting to show some amber from aging. This is quite unusual for a relatively young wine and is a result of 18 months of its short life in oak barrels.

You get dark fruit on the nose, complex oak and attractive aging characters like smoke and leather. This is carried through in the taste, which is a nice blend of the dark fruit and mixture of leather and oak. Absolutely worth its asking price and would be wonderful with Venison.

4.5/5

Tesco Finest Margaux – Tesco Chris’s Top Pick

£22.00

A lofty £22 per bottle, this bottle of 2018 Margaux was asking a lot, and boy did it deliver!

Not only was this Chris’s top pick, but it was well received by the whole WinesDirect team too.

A gorgeous bright red colour with a slight rusty hue, this wine has a complex nose. We picked out dark fruit but also leather and old oak. This is an excellent wine with the perfect balance of fruit and acidity. It’s classy and complex with great intensity, leaving good length on the palate.

Full of ripe tannins which he says were typical of the 2018 vintage, Chris absolutely loved this wine. He said its perfect culinary match would be lamb, cooked pink, with lots of rosemary.

5/5

Louis Guntrum Pinot Noir – Waitrose

£14.99

This wine is a bright, pale red and very attractive in the glass. Chris describes is as a ‘typical’ Pinot Noir. Full of ripe Strawberry and cherry fragrance which carries through to the flavour. A juicy, elegant wine and very nice if you like a lighter style.

This is an easy drinking wine, which would be lovely with grilled fish or pasta.

A little on the expensive side at £14.99 but overall a very nice wine that leaves you wanting more.

3.5/5

Champagnes

Waitrose Brut NV

£20.99

We couldn’t do a Supermarket round up without looking at some great value bubbles! First up, the Waitrose NV Brut. This Champagne had a nice, clean and fresh citrus flavour. It’s quite a young Champagne with just a hint of biscuit on the nose and on the finish. Overall, good every day Champagne which is nicely made. Good value for £20.99.

3.5/5

Tesco Finest Premier Cru Champagne – Chris’s Top Pick

£21.00

Chris was really impressed with this Champagne. Nice, fine bubbles and full of ripe fruit such as peach and pear. All rounded off with a hint of biscuit. The taste is creamy, juicy, elegant making this a very good and in Chris’s eyes, punching well above its price range at just £21.00.

5/5