Normally an excellent wine, even if it is getting a bit pricey these days. This bottle would have been a lot nicer a few years ago.

Pouilly-Fuissé Vieilles Vignes 2001, Château-Fuissé
Quite a dark yellow colour; this makes me worried as soon as I see it. Yes, it is really rather oxidised on the nose. Oh dear. There is some weight and fatness to it, but it is basically pushing up the daisies. The palate is quite weighty, but is also totally shot. There is also a nasty, harsh acidity to it. Like an aged, corpulent harlot this repels with its sickening stench, yet it tries to tempt me to dip in just one more time, knowing that if I do the only result will be to feel violently ill.

I feel this month's recommendations are terribly reasonably priced for the quality they represent.

Champagne Blanc des Blancs Cuvée du Centenaire, Alfred Gratien: One of the best NV Blanc des Blancs I've had. Read the note here. I've just purchased three more bottles, at least one of which I'll keep for a few years. £29 from the Wine Society.

Chambolle-Musigny 1999, Domaine Fourrier: Pretty, charming and down-right enjoyable Chambolle that is ready to drink now. £19.95 from Four Walls Wine.

Chardonnay 2005, Moss Wood: A lovely Western-Australian Chardonnay that might be quite big, but it is neither short on charm nor hard-work to drink. Certainly amongst the best Australian Chardonnays. £19 from Jeroboams.

Bandol Château la Rouvière 2002, Domaines Bunan: OK, 2002 isn't quite as good of a vintage as the 1998 I had the other day, but this is a good drink that'll improve for five years. It is one of the most affordable 'serious' Bandols these days. £15.95 from Yapp.

Pinot Gris 2006, Tim Adams: A light, refreshing but characterful Pinot Gris made by the Clare Valley Master. Much better than that Italian Pinot Grigio filth. £10.49 from Noel Young Wines.

Well, the poll is now closed. I'd rather view the mere eighteen votes it generated as an indication of the difficulty of the question, rather than the minimal number of people who visit here; perhaps I am optimistic.

Of course, with so few votes no definite conclusions can be drawn from the results, but I am pleased Musigny got the most votes. La Tache is clearly a serious wine, though, and I don't hold it against anyone for voting for that Grand Cru. Quite a lot of votes for Morey-St.-Denis Grand Crus.

I got this from Horrids, of all places, and it only cost me twelve notes. This is Domaine Bunan's most serious wine. I recall it being slightly anonymous; it has improved greatly. I love Bandol, and when it is this good all of my trust in it is well-rewarded.

Château La Rouviére Bandol 1998, Domaines Bunan
This has a wonderful perfumed nose of medicine and herbs; it smells like thyme mixed with cherry-menthol flavour Tunes. In this sense it is really Bandol. However, it is extremely clean, which is distinctly atypical. It smells marvellous, most attractive. The palate has a serious tannic structure, solid meatiness, and great cough-mixture fruit, but again is really clean. It still has serious complexity, though. With impressive length too. Hell's bells, one of my ageing experiments worked! Yummy, this is a real treat of a wine. Ready to drink, but will keep.

We have a few wines planned for tonight, the first of which has been a pleasing surprise.

Riesling Spätlese Serringer Schloss Saarstein 2005, Schloss Saarstein
Unlike previous bottles of this that I have opened, this smells quite clean and has a more pronounced mineral character. It has good peachy fruit. It is obviously pretty ripe. There is a bit of spritz on the palate, along with really nice fruit, good minerality and a nice backbone of acidity. It has a degree of complexity and reasonable length. Not great by any means, but quite a nice drink.

Riesling Polish Hill 2004, Grosset
This has shut down a tad since I last had it a year ago; it has lost a bit of the lively lime character. It is still quite mineral, and it has a lot of style. Just seems awkward and middle-aged (I am middle-aged and I am awkward). I still think this has a good future in front of it and I would not hesitate to recommend it to anyone. Just age it for a bit before you drink it.

Gigondas Prestige des Hautes Garrigues 1998, Domaine Santa Duc
Robert Parker gave this 93 points and said it'd age until 2018. He is very well paid and drinks a lot of wine, of course. This honks of an extremely booze-tastic, Port-like drink; some kind of crazy fortified Mourvedre. There is really rather a lot of jammy fruit on the nose as well. It seems far from balanced. It also seems a touch mature. Ageing this has done the palate no favours, the jammy fruit is not powerful enough to balance the frankly worrying level of alcohol. No balance, rather dirty and far too muscular. If this wine knew where your stolen bottle of Musigny 2005 was and was alone in a room, blind-folded, with its hands tied behind its back and you went in with a cricket bat, you'd be the one walking out in a daze. Can that ever be nice?

When I purchased this in 2004 a noted American wine-critic described this and other wines from the producer as being better than Côte-de-Beaune Grand Crus. You just had to try them to know that was a laughable assertion, but they were really nice for the sub-twenty notes price. I put this and an old-vines cuvée wine in one of my cellars and on yesterday's visit to it I decided five years was probably quite enough ageing for a Pouilly-Fuissé; I was right.

Pouilly-Fuissé 'La Roche' 2002, Daniel Barraud
The nose is really quite big, fat and bold, with nutty hints of oxidation, ripe lemon fruit and a degree of minerality. It smells nice enough, but just a bit over-mature. It does smell like type (if mature) Pouilly-Fuissé. It tastes rather fat and nutty, again with hints of oxidation. The fruit is nice, as is the soft texture and the mineral-hints are good to taste. However, ageing for five years hasn't really done this any favours. On release this was a charming, if not terribly complex, wine of some style and verve. Now it just seems a bit tired and all the favours are somewhat disjointed. It hasn't gained anything from ageing, only lost its harmony and freshness. There is not the 'tits out for the boys'-quality it had when younger. It is a perfectly reasonable drink, and I will remain a customer of Barraud's wines after trying it, I just won't bother ageing them in future.

Today marks six years since my partner moved to England. I wanted to open something good, but I fear I have fallen slightly below par.

Champagne Brut Chardonnay 1998, Pol Roger
This has a very pure nose of lemon fruit with a hint of minerality. That, sadly, is pretty much it; it really lacks complexity. The palate also has good lemon fruit, some minerality and a hint of weight, but is really quite linear and direct. The acid is too fierce and there is not enough of anything else to balance it out. The mousse is also not as fine as one might hope for from a Pol Roger wine. It is a refreshing drink, with enough fruit and minerality to help one plough through the bottle, but it is sadly not up to the Pol standard. At least it is better than the straight vintage 1998, but I think the Gratien NV Blanc des Blancs I had recently is considerably better than this. It was a lot cheaper, too.

I've just opened another bottle of Domaine St. Pierre Cornas 1995 from Jaboulet. My last note on it seems pretty accurate to me, so I won't bother boring you by repeating more of the same. A couple of things are worth saying about this, though.

Firstly, this is a really svelte, silky and sexy Cornas. Lovely smooth fruit and a really charming tannic structure at a developmental stage that is certainly up for enjoying now. This is a truly lovely Cornas and should be enjoyed by all.

Secondly, it is really easy to enjoy this as it is a complete bargain from the Wine Society. At a shade under twenty notes a bottle I find it hard to think of a more pleasing and ready-to-drink wine that one can get quite so easily.

Oh the excitement of a new toy, I'm going to try and put a poll on this page. I want to know what your favourite red Burgundy Grand Cru is. There is an option for if you cannot decide. I'll leave the poll running for two weeks (until 29 March 2007) and then post the results. If you want to put a reason why you chose a particular vineyard, please feel free to leave a comment. Oh I hope this works.

After the severe disappointment of the Van Volxem I am pleased have a wine that is really terribly good. Quite reasonably priced at eighteen notes a bottle from the wine soc. This is the kind of thing we like!

Riesling Spätlese Graacher Domprobst 2005, Willi Shaeffer
A wonderful, rich nose of luxuriously ripe fruit; peach, grapefruit and even mango. This smells like a very ripe spätlese. Even though this is very fruity it is not short on mineral complexity. This a really charming, harmonious nose. The palate is really beautiful, very ripe, but beautiful. There is a lot of peachy fruit, a great mineral character and really fine acidity. It is extremely well balanced and very long. This has the harmony and balance to age for a very long time. This is a top bunny wine. The only fly in the ointment as far as me enjoying this so very much now is that it means I only have one bottle left. Curses!

A few days ago I tried a bottle of Van Volxem Riesling Scharzhofberger 2005 with a friend; I was terribly disappointed by it. The winemaker, Roman Niewodniczanski, has made some great wines in the past, real models of harmony and elegance, but he just seemed to fail with this wine in this vintage. Normally he picks grapes at Auslese ripeness levels and ferments them to about 11.5% alcohol, which means they are off-dry. This wine was 12.5% and pretty god-damned dry. Like a lot of German trocken wines from the more Northerly wine regions, this resulted it it being extremely taut and linear, with nothing to balance the searing acidity. Indeed, it was actively unpleasant and we couldn't bring ourselves to finish the bottle. I had really hoped for great things, 2005 is such a good vintage in Germany after all, but with this I felt so let down I couldn't bring myself to write a note about it immediately.

Bearing in mind decent wine starts from around a tenner a bottle, this month I have tried to find some wines that are in that price bracket. Even I don't drink Grand Cru Burgundy all of the time...

Pinot Blanc 'Brand' 2004, Domaine Albert Boxler: He is not really allowed to put the name of the Brand Grand Cru on the label, but this utterly delicious white wine comes from fruit grown entirely on that great vineyard. It has a real depth of flavour and great complexity. Don't bother ageing it, drink with great pleasure as soon as you get your hands on some; this is a serious bargain. £14.75 from Lay and Wheeler.

Pinot Noir 2004, Diamond Valley: I met the winemaker of this estate when he was doing the vintage at Domaine Dujac in Burgundy, a charming fellow. This is a good Pinot Noir with plenty of fruit and a reasonable degree of refinement. £13.99 from Oz Wines.

Sancerre 2005, Domaine Vincent Delaporte: A good, mineral and reasonably complex Sancerre. I always used to be happy when I worked in a shop selling this and I could recommend it to people after some Sauvignon Blanc. £10.95 from Lea and Sandeman.

The Fergus 2002, Tim Adams: Now here is some serious quality for a tenner. A Grenache-based wine that gets a bit more rigour by fermenting with with Cabernet  and Shiraz skins, it is a heroic but tasty drink when young and it ages into something really quite delicious. Drink when you buy or keep until it is ten years old. £9.99 from Oz Wines.

Shiraz 2003, Tim Adams: OK, I like the wines of Tim Adams a lot. They are very high quality and he doesn't feel the need to over-charge for them. This is a good Shiraz that is very fruity and not over-blown in the slightest. Drink with pleasure now. £9.99 from Oz Wines.

Here is the note for the Pommard Clos des Epeneaux 2001 I mentioned yesterday, it is a great wine. Also we had a bottle of Champagne. It is a Grand Cru Blanc des Blancs, largely from the 2002 vintage, that has been fermented in oak barrels; very Burgundian.

Champagne Blanc de Blancs Cuvée Du Centenaire, Alfred Gratien
Lawks, this smells just like white Burgundy. Lemon fruit, oak and a creamy minerality. It is very complex and stylish on the nose. Mmm... lovely. The palate has a really fine mousse and lovely lemon fruit. The oak is perfectly integrated. There is a great mineral tang to it. I think this would age really well. This a terribly serious non-vintage Champagne, and quite delicious too. Top bunny!

Pommard Premier Cru Clos des Epeneaux 2001, Comte Armand
A brilliant, pure nose of cherries and strawberry fruit. The purity of fruit is quite Côte de Beaune-y, but its fleshy density is quite like Nuits St. Georges. There is a hint of stalkiness to the nose which I've never noticed before on this wine. The palate is utterly beautiful with lovely fruit and real refinement. Great concentration. The acidity is really fine, and there is a really subtle seasoning of new oak. Really much too young, but still extremely enjoyable. Crikey, this is a completely brilliant Pommard, I love it.

My mother purchased some Pommard Premier Cru after thinking it was pretty good at a tasting. She gave me a bottle of it and I did not think it was that good. As a consequence I have been saving one of my treasured bottles of Clos des Epeneaux 2001 out of my long-term cellars for her to try when I next encountered her, leaving me with but two bottles and two magnums to age. She is coming to Town tomorrow so I can finally pop it. I realise it is much too young, but it is such a magic wine hopefully it will convince her to buy better stuff in the future. By which I mean, follow Elitist Review buying recommendations, of course!

Two lovely friends around for dinner last night. This is what we ate, and the list below is what we drank.

Champagne Cuvée Nicolas-François 1996, Billecart-Salmon
Lots of fruit on the nose, ripe apples. There are hints of yeastiness and cold cocoa, it smells quite complex but rather tight at the moment. There is plenty of fruit on the palate, but it is really rather acidic. There is real complexity on the palate, but it just seems a bit tight and closed at the moment. Really stylish and intellectual, but as this ages it will become terribly charming.

Gevrey-Chambertin Premier Cru Clos St. Jacques 2002, Bruno Clair
There is plenty of ripe, red fruit on the nose, fresh and charming. A vague hint of dustiness is also present, old wood perhaps? The palate has plenty of fruit with plenty of subtle flavours and is really quite complex, but just like on the nose there is a vague hint of dirtiness which spoils it a tiny bit for me. It was by no means bad, but it could have been better.

Côte-Rôtie Côte Brune 1991, Gentaz Dervieux
A rare treat to try Gentaz Dervieux these days, sadly it soured by there being a hint of corkiness to the wine. It isn't completely impossible to taste, but is not really that nice to drink. There is obviously still plenty of fruit left, and it seems to have real complexity and elegance. Difficult to know whether the dry palate is due to age or the corkiness, corkiness is my guess and based on this I'd say it is clearly not to old, but doesn't need keeping any longer. A real shame it is corked

Châteauneuf-du-Papes 1994, Vieux Télégraphe en magnum
This is obviously quite ripe on the nose but not so ripe it is soupy. The fruit has a certain degree of maturity, although it is still full of life. It smells quite a lot of blackcurrants, but with some plumminess too. The palate is round, rich and ripe, a mouth-filling wine of charm and softness. This is really quite good and certainly up for drinking now.