£18.75, Harvey Nichols; £14.75, Hawkshead Wines
There are a lot of red wines I don’t want to go near in a heat-wave but this one is a dream if it’s lightly chilled – soft and juicy with strawberry-like fruit and a refreshing twist of cherry kernel and damson skin. It’s made from Gamay, the grape of Beaujolais, and it’s the hero red variety for chilling (though be careful not to numb it completely). It’s not an easy grape to grow outside the Beaujolais region, despite the sunny natured wines it produces, so how Te Mata Estate came to plant it on the other side of the world in its Woodthorpe Terraces vineyard, I don’t know – but it was an inspired move. It’s a wine that’s likely to go with more or less anything savoury you feel like eating in hot weather, including spicy dishes, so just let it go with the flow. Or drink it on its own.
Te Mata Gamay Noir 2015, Hawkes Bay, New Zealand
£18.75, Harvey Nichols; £14.95, hawksheadwines.co.uk; £20, thenewzealandcellar.co.uk