Enjoying some rather warm days in April, our most favourite wines this time focus on exciting and refreshing whites 🎉. With days getting longer, this list equips you with everything you need for a sunny afternoon ☀️ in a park this summer!

And if you should need more inspiration, go straight to UnscrewMe and check out our growing list of wine tastings in London 🍾.

Bold Blend

• Wine: 2018 The Mix-Up, White Blend
• Producer: Blackbook Winery
• Region: Kent, England, UK 🇬🇧
• Story:
  Once again, we visited Blackbook Winery in Battersea when they launched their new vintages a few weeks ago. With our recent focus on urban wineries and wines from London, we really wanted to like the pure Bacchus most which they produce together with Forty Hall Vineyard. However, we must admit that this funky blend of Bacchus and Ortega grapes from nearby Kent in England, both fermented individually, won us over immediately after the first sip.
  “The Mix-Up” is a beautifully smooth and a fun wine to drink, our clear favourite Blackbook wine. The winery’s tasting notes call it “textural and aromatic” with “rich ripe stone fruits, hints of elderflower, cinnamon, clove and almonds”. We just call it delicious! 😎

Brilliant Bacchus

• Wine: 2015 Bacchus
• Producer: Giffords Hall
• Region: Suffolk, England, UK 🇬🇧
• Story:
  On a little weekend break in York, we explored the local wine scene and ended up at the excellent Pairings Wine Bar. There we sampled another Bacchus, this time from English producer Giffords Hall based in Suffolk.
  The 2015 vintage that we tasted was awarded a Bronze medal at the 2017 Decanter World Wine Awards (DWWA 2017). And another vintage won a Bronze medal at the International Wine Challenge (IWC). Not that any of the medals actually matter.
  The nose reminded us a bit of a Sauvignon Blanc. The flavour enticed us with grapefruit, lime and lemon notes. Typical for a cool climate white, the wine showed refreshing green apple and pear character with the overall fruitiness and floral notes perfectly balancing the fresh acidity. A wine that is difficult not to like! 👍

Lovely Loureiro

• Wine: Muros Antigos Loureiro, Escolha
• Producer: Anselmo Mendes Winemaker
• Region: Lima Valley, DOC Vinho Verde, Portugal 🇵🇹
• Story:
  During another excursion to a local place, the highly recommended Kateh Restaurant in Little Venice, Maida Vale, we enjoyed some Persian cuisine with a stunning wine from Portugal.
  Indigenous grape varieties are always exciting, and the white wines from the Vinho Verde region routinely hit the sweet spot for us. This varietal wine made from Loureiro grapes 🍇 is no different, delighting us with stone fruit flavours such as white peach combined with citrus fruit, green apple and a bit of herb notes.
  The cool fermentation temperature clearly helps preserving the freshness and fruity flavours of the grapes. And we’re not the only ones liking this wine, as we found a nice write-up on Jancis Robinson’s “Purple Pages” by Emily Percival. The herb notes are not surprising, since “Loureiro means ‘laurel-scented’ and the wine definitely has an edge that The Wine Society describes as ‘meadow fragrant’ and sets it apart from your average Vinho Verde”.

Sharing is Caring

We’re always happy to hear about new restaurants with great wine lists, newly opened wine bars in London or just a nice wine you discovered recently.

If you have any recommendations, please let us know! Either comment on here or get in touch via social media through Twitter @unscrewmeapp, Facebook UnscrewMe or Instagram @unscrewmeapp.

As always, stay tuned for our announcements about exciting wine tastings in London on UnscrewMe. We will have a couple of new locations ready for you in June. And while UnscrewMe offers the basic features we planned for the launch, we are eager to take it all to the next level over the coming months.

(After a couple of months at TechHub London that went by far too quickly 🙁, I’m now getting used to the unique Barbican Centre as my free co-working space for two days a week. Yet, I would probably get nothing done without a coffee or two at Clerkenwell Grind and Notes Moorgate … ☕️)

First published in May 2019.
Also available at https://medium.com/unscrewme/april-2019-wine-highlights-66df775420ad