Top Wine Buys at Aldi

Recommendations from the Spring/Summer 2024 tasting

A few weeks ago I attended a press tasting of wines for spring and summer held by Aldi. This was an interesting opportunity to look at an extremely sharply priced, highly commercial wine range from one of the major UK supermarkets.

A wine range like this is bought with the customer in mind, but also highly responsive to sales on the ground. If a wine doesn’t sell as expected, it will be dropped without ceremony.

That means tasting a range like this is an opportunity to both see what is doing well for Aldi — all the wines that aren’t new and therefore have earned a conditional place on the shelves — as well as the wines that are new (47 of 98 bottles on show) which the buyers at Aldi predict/hope/expect will work for their customers.

There was a focus on sustainable packaging including new cardboard bottles (with a plastic liner) and plastic bottles replacing or sitting alongside glass in some bottlings. Unfortunately, I can’t recommend any of those wines, which is a shame. It’s not enough for a wine to be sustainably packaged; it has to be worth shipping in the first place, and I found most of them pretty dreary.

It was, however, encouraging to see that Aldi, like most other supermarkets, have a burgeoning ‘Unearthed’ range focussing on more obscure regions and grape varieties, and there are certainly a couple of very good wines for the money in this range, highlighted below.

I’m an open-minded taster and I wanted to taste honestly and go with my palate which, let’s be honest, is built on tasting and drinking considerably more expensive wine. My logic was that if an Aldi wine impressed me, it would impress a lot of people. My basic benchmarks were: if this was the house wine in a restaurant, would I be happy with it? If someone poured this at a barbecue, would I drink it or switch to G&T? Given the price point, I wasn’t expecting much more than good, solid drinkability, so I haven’t bothered with scores and drink dates, which seemed a bit pretentious.

I worked through the wines quickly (98 of them in 160 minutes, so 1.6 minutes per wine, including taking notes, which is pretty speedy even by professional standards). As a result, I requested certain samples from my highlights to make sure they stood up not just to 1.6 minutes of tasting, but actual drinking in a more relaxed enviroment. I shared the samples with some friends and relatives who like wine but don’t work in wine, and asked them what they thought — always a very enlightening and valuable exercise for those of us in the wine business.

I’m pleased to say that all the samples held up to more considered scrutiny, but you largely get what you pay for at Aldi. If you’re in the £5-7 range, expect a drinkable wine, nothing more. On the whole, I wouldn’t recommend these wines, with a couple of exceptions noted below. That’s fine; they hardly need me to recommend them, as they’re selling on price alone.

But the maths is cruel here. We currently have a flat rate tax (known as alcohol duty) of £2.67 per bottle of wine, with VAT at 20% added on top of that. So, if you’re buying a £4.99 Aldi wine, you’re paying around £3.20 in tax alone (yes, HMRC charges you VAT on the tax they’ve levied — nice), leaving £1.79 for literally everything else: bottle, label, distribution, marketing, sending samples, and the actual wine.

The £7-£8 range is a bit hit and miss. However, at £8-£10 there is some good stuff that I’d happily buy, drink and serve at home. Here, crunching the same numbers, a £10 wine has a whole £6.80 after tax to play with, and it really, really shows in the wine quality.

At £10 you’re not getting twice the wine of a £5 bottle; you’re getting nearly four times as much wine in the bottle.

Bearing that in mind, my highlights from the tasting are below, arranged by style (sparkling, white, rosé, red). You can check the Aldi website to see if you can arrange a click and collect (they don’t sell online anymore) but this service doesn’t seem to available in central London stores, where you’ll have to pop in and take your chances.

Top Wine Buys at Aldi: Spring/Summer 2024

You get what you pay for at Aldi.
At £10 you’re not getting twice the wine of a £5 bottle;
you’re getting nearly four times as much wine in the bottle

Sparkling

Contevedo Cava Brut NV

Classic Cava with that smoky rubber-band nose that reflects the decent chunk of characterful Xarel-lo in the blend (35%). That’s nice to see, as it gives it a proper Catalan feel. Dry, fresh and unbeatable for the price, which is currently less than a pint of mass-market lager in any London pub.

£5.45

Organic Prosecco NV

I rather liked this, although it’s not the purest Prosecco out there. A slightly minty, Mojito-esque nose leads into a palate that’s got plenty of pear juice fruit. At the price, a no-brainer, and I preferred it to the sweeter and slightly more confected Specially Selected Prosecco DOCG.

£7.19

Organic Prosecco Rosé 2022

Fresh red fruits, a nicely crisp palate with good freshness and acidity. Nicely balanced and good value. Simple party wine.

£7.99

White

Unearthed Custoza Bianco 2023

White pepper and yellow apple here, with good acidity, although there is a little sweetness on the finish that I’d prefer not to be there, but it softens the rather bracing impact of white wines from this part of Italy. From Custoza DOC, this is commendably obscure. Many independent merchants wouldn’t dare list it, but it’s all you’ll see on the wine lists of Verona and aroundabouts.

£9.99

Baron Amarillo Rueda Verdejo 2023

This is one of the very few sub £7 wines that I thought was genuinely good, not just cheap. Now, you have to like Verdejo because this really tastes of Verdejo. Lemon and yellow grapefruit on the nose, along with the pungent, salty-sweaty-grassy thing that Verdejo does so uniquely, then quite a serious palate with a pleasing grip and bone dry texture that’s also very typical. Where that sits on the spectrum that ranges from ‘attractive commuter’s armpit’ to ‘salted grapefruit for breakfast overlooking the Mediterranean’ is up to you.

£5.99

Specially Selected Austrian Riesling 2022

This was a real bargain, with lovely crisp apple and lemon sherbet aromatics, a touch of lime juice on the palate and zesty freshness. I reckon this could convert quite a few people to this great and terminally under-appreciated grape.

£8.49

Athlon Greek Assyrtiko 2023

A new wine to the range, this is from northern Greece, not Santorini, but the intense varietal personality of Assyrtiko is there: bracing notes of chalk and lemon zest, an extremely dry, stony feel on the palate, muscular acidity and good balance. One of the best whites of the day. Bring on the grilled fish.

£8.99

Specially Selected Luberon Blanc 2023

This was a pleasant surprise. A blend of Rolle, Grenache Blanc, Roussanne and, ominously, ‘Other’, on paper this looked like it might be a sort of Cuvée Leftovers from whatever else the winery was making. Maybe it is, but these are good leftovers. Quite a neutral, unfruity white, this has a touch of peach and some green apple and a broad texture. A good wine for barbecued seafood this summer.

£8.99

Specially Selected Gisborne Pinot Gris 2023

I have a weakness for good Pinot Gris, which, when it’s good, is decadent, broad, full-bodied and singular. This is a really nice example of the grape, so if you haven’t tried it, this is worth a taste. Full and slightly honied, this has a cushioned plushness and absolutely no hard edges at all. It is the ultimate ‘smooth’ white wine. A good wine for pork chops, or mild Korma-style curries.

£8.69

Pink

Specially Selected French Coteaux de Beziers Rosé 2023

A blend of 2/3 Cinsault and 1/3 Grenache Noir, this is a very well-made Provence lookalike. Dry, spicy, fresh with a touch of melon and pomegranate.

£8.49

Unearthed Chiaretto di Bardolino Rosé 2023

Another obscurity from Italy, Chiaretto is, like the Custoza DOC white above, the sort of thing that most independent wine merchants don’t bother with, because they know they’ll sell one bottle for every 100 Provence rosés in their range, so it’s admirable to see Aldi having a go. Basically, it’s Valpolicella rosé — light, tangy, with a touch of sour cherry and redcurrant. I think a watermelon and feta salad would be a good match.

£7.99

Athlon Greek Assyrtiko Syrah Rosé 2023

Dry and serious, this is not for the Provence fans. It’s quite pungent, chalky and rather demands food, but I’m honestly not sure what. Greek salad? It’s certainly very refreshing with a nice mineral streak that’s absent from most rosé at this price.

£9.99

Specially Selected Rosorange Rosé 2023

I think this has already sold out in lots of stores, and it was one of the better rosés. There is something brilliantly casual about just mashing together two of the most fashionable categories — pink wines and orange wines — and calling it Rosorange. I won’t say cynical, but certainly masterfully calculated, although it’s definitely more of a rosé than an orange wine. A perfect meze wine, by which I mean well suited to either Ottolenghi-style extravaganzas, or scavenging hummus from the fridge before dinner.

£9.99

Red

Specially Selected Le Bourgeron Pinot Noir 2023

I poured a sample of this for some friends and they didn’t like it. That’s because, we discovered, they’re proper red wine drinkers and they like tannin and structure and depth, none of which are on offer here. This is a red wine for rosé drinkers, and needs to be chilled for half an hour in the fridge. Frankly, you could serve it fridge-cold. Still, I was rather taken with its easy, soft red cherry fruit. I wouldn’t bother with food for this one as it’s super light.

£8.29

Château Moulin-Borie Listrac Médoc 2016

Shurely shome mishtake? A Médoc from a great vintage for £11? I wasn’t expecting much, but I have an absolute weakness for these old school red Bordeaux, and this is the kind of thing I would fill the metaphorical boot with. This isn’t especially fruity although there’s certainly some evolved blackcurrant at the core. But it’s a very traditional, dry style with some oregano, earth, cigar ash, peppercorn and cedar, from 50% Cabernet Sauvignon, 40% Merlot and 10% Petit Verdot. Proper old-school claret!

£10.99

Specially Selected Ventoux Rouge 2022

Much better value than the Chassaux et Fils Côtes du Rhône (£5.19), which was generic and candied and tasted more like Beaujolais, this was a convincing southern Rhône red with the caramelised plum flavour of Grenache, the sweet black cherry fruit generosity of Syrah, good freshness from Carignan and nice grainy tannins bringing up the rear thanks to some characterful Mourvèdre in the blend. A bargain.

£8.49

Specially Selected Toscana Rosso 2022

I don’t often laugh out loud in wine tastings, but this wine label — pictured up top — is an amusing rip off of Antinori’s iconic Tignanello (£150). To be fair, the blend is similar too — Sangiovese, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot — and it does have Tuscan character with plenty of ripe black fruit, a bit of dusty, woody spice and just a touch of blackberry liqueur on the finish.

£7.99

Athlon Xinomavro Syrah 2022

Along with the claret, this was the red wine of the tasting for me. A blend of 75% Xinomavro and 25% Syrah, I would pay up to £15 of my own pounds for this and consider it good value, so at less than £10 it’s quite simply an outrageous bargain and proof that Greek red wine is now both in the mainstream and really good value for money. This has a lovely nose of raspberry, red cherry and plum with ripe, fine tannins and impressive length. It’s 2022 vintage, but I think this has a couple more years of cellaring in it, should you choose to stock up.

£9.99