Drinks of the Month

Wine of the week: Domaine d’Escausses, cuvée des Drilles

Posted by Fiona Beckett (Google+) on May 3 2015 at 09:49

Although I’m supposed to be the wine expert in the family my husband has an uncanny knack of alighting on exactly the right bottle when we go out to eat, unfailingly plucking the bargain from any wine list.

This week’s triumph, at a late meal at Flinty Red after the BBC Food and Farming Awards in Bristol on Thursday night was a deliciously quaffable Gaillac, Domaine d’Escausses, cuvée des Drilles which was on the wine list at just £23 and went brilliantly with all the random small plates we ordered including a challenging dish of smoked pork belly with a spicy slaw and another of braised squid with polenta.

You can buy it for £9.99 from Corks of Cotham up the road who are joint owners of Flinty Red - a modest mark-up which shows how reasonable their wine prices are. The vintage in the restaurant (2012) appeared to be an earlier one than the 2013 had in the shop though. You can also buy it online from slurp.co.uk for £8.95 and other independents including Bentley’s of Ludlow, The Smiling Grape Company and Theatre of Wine

The cuvée is made from Duras and Fer (the local name for Cabernet Franc) - both indigenous varieties to south-west France and is imported - why am I not surprised? - by Les Caves de Pyrène who describe it as “the sort of red that we need to drink for medicinal quenching purposes.” Quite.

Apologies for the quality of the image and the bespattered label (low light, late night) but at least I remembered to snap it!

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