This is one of my favourite wines. It is very VERY fruity and not to everyone’s taste, but if you like fruity wines you HAVE to try this one. I picked it up for under £6 at ASDA, which is a fairly stable price for this wine. It is good value at this price point and I would recommend giving it a try if you are a Rioja fan.

I find with the low-price red’s that an awful lot of them taste very similar. This one breaks the mould and provides something very different. Put it this way, this is one wine I would bet my house (ok, a case of wine!) that I could identify blindfold!

The scent is fruity and the flavour is quite intense. This wine would hold it’s own amongst most dishes. It is very easy to drink and a perfect accompaniment to a summer BBQ!

This wine was on offer at 3 for £10 at ASDA the other day. I have had it before but I decided to pick up a bottle for review.

The Andrew Peace wines are produced from single vineyards specially selected by Andrew Peace from various parts of South Eastern Australia. The collection includes two red blends, a Shiraz, and a chardonnay. This bottle is 100% Shiraz.

The first thing that hits you with this wine is just how smooth it is. It is medium bodied and very very juicy. I could drink this wine all day (well, until I fell over!). Other reviews mention vanilla, and while I can see what they mean I would say it’s more of a fruity taste similar to black cherry. Hey, the other reviews mentioned toast too… what the…?

This is what I would call a safe bet wine. I can’t imagine anyone not liking it really, it compares well with the Hardy’s Stamp Shiraz, my other “safe bet”. I will continue to snap up this one every time it is on offer, as the Andrew Peace wines are rarely this cheap.

Great value

This wine was on offer at Sainsbury’s, £3.99 reduced from £7.99. It was on a bulk stack at the front of the store so I thought I would have a punt.

All I can say is this is a fantastic bargain and I will be going back this afternoon to buy more if they still have some. This is as good (if not better) than the Hardy’s Stamp. It is subtle, smooth and very very moreish. I am certainly going to keep a lookout for this on offer again, and I might even try some of McGuigans more expensive wines (the Limestone Coast one sounds interesting).

It says on the bottle “keeps for up to 2 years”.. yeah, right! It’s not going to keep for 2 weeks in my house!

Heartily recommended

First impressions of this wine is it is a full bodied shiraz with a lovely fruity flavour and a lovely rich aroma. This wine benefits more than most to being opened well in advance of drinking.

It is not overpowering at all for a shiraz. That said, it would go nicely with food such as lasagne, or any bolognese based dish. It is strong enough to hold its own, but subtle enough to allow the food to take centre stage.

This is another £8 reduced to £4 bottle, this one being one of the better examples. I would not be disappointed if I paid £6 for this bottle and at £4 it is a steal!

I bought this wine from Co-Op, reduced from £7.50 to £3.99.  It is described as a smooth, medium bodied wine with hints of berries and spices. It originates from Central Valley, Chile and has a very interesting, almost military monika on the front of the bottle.

On opening this bottle the scent is indeed quite smooth, and is certainly not offensive as some cheap Cabernets tend to be. I would even go so far as to say it is a pleasant scent more akin to the more expensive bottles.

The taste is a little sharp to begin with and I certainly would not recommend this with any sort of light dish, although being a Cabernet you would expect this. The berry taste is very evident, almost having a damson taste to it. It is not as smooth as some of the other Chilean wines I have tasted, but is certainly palatable and pretty good value for £3.99.

To conclude, this wine’s rating is based on being good value at the £4 mark. If it were it’s original price it would certainly lose a star.

I bought this bottle from ASDA in a 3-for-10 promotion. I must say that I really was not impressed. The ticket price of this bottle is £8 and there is NO WAY it is worth that.

I polished the bottle off over a period of a few hours (I figured it may be one of those “gets better the more you have” wine’s… it isn’t!) but it was a bit of a struggle. I went to bed and in the morning BOY did I realise why it was a struggle. I don’t know what they put in this wine but it’s hangover in a bottle. I really would avoid this if at all possible.

This is a full bodied, fruity red wine. It has a strong, deep taste and is very moreish. Standard pricing for this wine is a little on the high side (around 5-6 pound) but occasionally it is on offer in Asda, Co-Op or Morrisons at around the £3.75 mark.

Hardy’s produce this wine in a few variants, this one and she plain Shiraz are the best of the bunch in my opinion.

If you are looking for a good general purpose wine that punches above it’s weight then this is a good option.  I tend to snap up a few bottles every time I see it on offer.

Watch out for this one on the shelves, as when it is on offer it tends to move FAST!