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If you're feeling impoverished after the summer holidays, you may well be casting around for cheap, characterful reds. And the best place to find them is Spain, which I'd contend is the only country that can still produce a drinkable wine for less than £4.
How come? Well, first of all it produces a heck of a lot of grapes – it's the world's third-biggest wine-producing region, after France and Italy (China, fascinatingly, is now fifth). It also has a lot of relatively undiscovered and underrated wine regions, and its weather is more reliable than the rest of Europe, which keeps prices steady, according to Tesco's product development manager, Laura Jewell. That supermarket's best-selling Simply Garnacha (13.5% abv), from Campo de Borja, tops the £4 mark at £4.79, but is invariably fresh and fruity, despite the lack of a named vintage – normally a drawback with a still wine, but Tesco shifts enough of it to ensure stock is regularly replenished.
An incredible £1 cheaper is Aldi's Toro Loco Tempranillo 2013 (£3.79; 12.5% abv), from Utiel Requena – the perfect student red, if ever there was one, and a good cooking wine for those starting to think about autumn stews. Asda's juicy, gluggable Casa Luis Tinto 2013 (£4; 13% abv), a blend of tempranillo and garnacha from Cariñena, is another bargain buy that would go down well with everything from bangers and mash to takeaway pizza.
Pay twice that amount for a Spanish red, though – which is still not bad when you compare it with wines from other regions – and you'll be rewarded by a very decent bottle indeed. Both Marks & Spencer and Waitrose have put a fair bit of effort into broadening their Spanish ranges, focusing on wines made from old vines in lesser-known regions. Two monastrells (the Spanish name for France's mourvèdre) that appealed recently are M&S's Tapa Roja Old Vines Monastrell 2013 (£9; 14.5% abv), from Yecla, which wears its abv surprisingly gracefully; and Waitrose's Al-Muvedre Old Bush Vine Monastrell 2013 (£8.99; 13.5% abv), which is made in Alicante by one of Spain's most talented winemakers, Telmo Rodríguez.
What's interesting about these wines is that neither is oaked, which keeps the price down and preserves the vibrant fruit character. Spain doesn't have to use oak barrels to bolster underripe grapes, nor allow the extended "hang time" (jargon for leaving grapes on the vine) that can lead to jammy flavours. Both would be great with fabada, a robust pork and bean stew.
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