INDEX:
Click on your choice
Features:
History
Variety
Celebration
Not British!
Where to buy
Learning more
Links
Vineyards:
Listing of vineyards
'Cornish gem'
- feature on Camel Valley Vineyard
|
| Vineyards:
Want to be listed on the Number 1 English wine website?
- contact us (see foot of page for details) |
| Questions
& advice: Due to the volume involved we no longer answer
individual requests for information or advice - sorry! Look around
our pages and you may well find what you are seeking! |
This website was launched 9 December 1999
Latest update:
22 November 2011
© 1999-2011
www.english-wine.com |
|
2011
- A year of two halves (weather & geographic)
Some English vineyards had a really vintage year in 2011 with rain
at the right time, and the sun's warmth when it was needed. However,
others didn't - the south-east and east Anglia seem, broadly to have
got almost the ideal weather for grape-growing whilst the south-west,
midlands & north got quite different weather and so very different
results. However, we know there was a lot of variation in the weather
pattern even locally so perhaps it's best to say that every vineyard
had its own weather this year - but there will certainly be good quantities
of interesting wines resulting from the 2011 harvest.
Good news for English wine buyers
One of the most frequent comments we receive is "why don't supermarkets
stock English wine? Well, some do, especially of local vineyards (if
they are big enough to have a surplus sufficient to supply supermarkets).
And now, Waitrose
Online is making a feature of selling English wine - along
with specialist online supplier Best
English Wine, this means it is now really easy to buy English
wine even if you have no vineyards close to you. |
Have
you discovered English wine?
Wine from grapes grown in a vineyard at Walthamstow, just 6 miles
from the centre of London, was enjoyed by the famous diarist Samuel
Pepys in 1667 – “I at Sir W.Batten's …. and there for joy he did
give the company that were there a bottle or two of his own last year's
wine growing at Walthamstow, than which the whole company said they
never drank better foreign wine in their lives”
Today it is even easier to find English wine which stands up well
against wines from any part of the world - welcome to
our website which can help you learn about English wine.
Bob Tarr, webmaster |
| Key facts
about English wine |
| There are now around 400 English
vineyards producing around 2m bottles per year |
"Quality wines"
are subject to rigorous controls.
The quality of "Table wines" is not assured
but there are gems to be found |
Where's the biggest English
vineyard? Only 20 miles from London (Denbies, Dorking -
250 acres) |
| Whites - wide variety,
but traditional English whites have floral bouquets & high
acidity - very refreshing! |
Reds - Once thought impossible
- but it is and they vary from light, thru mellow and even full-bodied |
Sparkling - The great
success story - similar soils to champagne and edgier climate
mean truly great English sparkling wines - as evidenced in blind-tasting
international competitions where some English sparkling wines
now beat the best of Champagnes |
|
|
|
Buying English wine the easy way
Finding English wine to buy used to be none too easy - some supermarkets
stock none, some just one or two from the local vineyard and off-licences
generally much the same.Only a few specialist wine merchants stocked
a good selection. Now things are different with a number of vineyards
selling online direct to the public and the emergence of specialist
online merchants offering a wide selection of English wines, white,
red and sparkling. |
 |
Stanlake Park Wine
Estate has a rich and fascinating history going back to the 12th
Century. The first vines were planted by Jon Leighton in 1979 and
the vineyard has now expanded to 25 acres with over 20,000 vines.
Stanlake Park now grows the greatest number of grape varieties in
England – including the classic Champagne varieties Pinot Noir and
Chardonnay. The vineyard offers wine tastings for a modest charge
and has a vineyard shop . Light lunches and snacks are available and
the home shopper can order wines online.
To visit our vineyards listings page - click
here
|
|
Three
Choirs Vineyards (left) is just one of the English vineyards you can find
on this website -please visit it both in our directory of vineyards
and in the real world - it's a great day out with a visitor centre and vineyard
and winery tour, a wine & gift shop and AA Two Rosette restaurant open
for lunches and dinners. You can even stay there in the on-site hotel and
really immerse yourself in the romance of the vine (if the romance is of
a different kind you can get married there too!). Visit our directory of
vineyards - click here
