Wine Region: Wine of Romania

(2025) A delightful, cheap and straightforward white with a handily low 11% alcohol. Made from the indigenous Fetească Regală, this bright, unoaked and zippy wine could be summed up as an amalgam of peach, Mandarin orange and lemon, light in texture and juicy through to the finish for party sipping or a refreshing aperitif.

(2025) Cramele Recaș is a very large producer and exporter of Romanian wines, and I suspect there are several different labels for this Pinot Noir, depending on where you buy it. There certainly appear to be several very similar Pinots from them, at the same price point, in different retailers. What you get is a very easy-going, fruity and sweetly ripe wine with a a cerise colour and notes of cherry and violet. It's not a Pinot for classicists, with only faint glimpses of the sous-bois and truffle the variety can offer, as it is all about juicy and pretty fruit on the palate with negligible tannins and a cherry-ripe acidity. OK, so it is not for the Pinot purist in some ways, but it is eminently quaffable and well made, and might well be able to grace the Christmas table if the budget is a bit tight - only £7.50 on offer at time of review. Watch the video for more information.

(2025) I don't often review wines from SPAR I confess. Their shelves always seem to be dominated by the biggest and most ubiquitous wine brands, and prices rarely keen. Here's a wine that I can get behind though. It comes from giants of the Romanian wine export scene, Cramele Recaș, a Pinot Noir blended with 4% of the indigenous Negru de Drăgășani. From 20-year-old vines, it was aged in tank but in contact with staves of French oak. The result is a plummy and ripe Pinot with quite a full body but a nice lift of raspberry and fresh herbs in the mix. Plush, sweet and ripe fruit, oak notes and mellow tannins make for an easy-drinking style, but a decent expression of the variety. Watch the video for more information.