Liz’s fizz...but no, you can’t get it at Majestic
Queen joins the English sparkling wine craze – and all 3,000 bottles have been snapped up
IT IS a sparkling wine that offers richness and finesse, and is perfect for making the loyal toast. Especially when you consider that it’s the first product from a promising new British vineyard-owner – the Queen.
For Her Majesty has turned winemaker, producing 3,000 bottles of fizz from her Windsor Great Park estate. All the bottles were quickly snapped up, despite not being available from high street wine merchants such as the suitably regal-sounding Majestic.
The Queen is the latest landowner to join the booming business in English sparkling wine, which is increasingly challenging French champagne and Italian prosecco as the tipple of choice. The industry now boasts annual sales of about £100million.
But she is also rejoining an old family business – Henry II first cultivated grapes at Windsor Castle in the 12th Century.
This new Windsor Great Park bubbly has been more than five years in the making, as 16,700 chardonnay, pinot noir and pinot meunier vines – all of which are champagne varieties – were planted in a seven-acre, southfacing patch of the park in 2011.
The first grapes were harvested in October 2013, and after fermenting, blending and spending two years ageing in the cellars, the wine was released three months ago.
The fizz was 12 per cent proof and available only as part of a threebottle gift set for £75, but it soon sold out.
Grapes from the estate were made into wine at the family-run Ridgeview estate in Ditchling, East Sussex. Ridgeview chief executive Tamara Roberts said: ‘The Windsor grapes are very good.
‘I have tried the finished product and it is delicious – a superb example of a top-quality English sparkling wine. And as the vineyard matures, the wines will get better and better.’
A second batch of wine is expected to be released this autumn, priced £35 a bottle, and Ms Roberts estimates that within six or seven years, the vineyards could be producing 20,000 bottles annually.
Because the first vintage was so small, Ms Roberts said it was likely many buyers would keep the wine as an investment rather than drinking it. However, it is recommend that it be consumed by 2025. She said: ‘I have got a bottlele at home in a beautifulul box and I might hold on to that. Rare vintages can go for astonishing prices.’
She added: ‘It is imposossible to guess how much ch it might be worth one day – it’s however much somemeone is prepared to pay – but it has all the right accolades, grown on the Queen’s estate, the first vintage. Who knows?’
The crop was planted and harvested by wine retailer Laithwaite’s, tenant farmers at Windsor. The Duke of Edinburgh, who is head ranger of the Great Park, paid particular attention to the project. The grapes sent to Ridgeview in October 2013 were quickly pressed to make the base wines. In 2014, they were blended and bottled, with more yeast and sugar added to create a second fermentation, the traditional method of making the bubbles. The wine then spent 24 months ageing in the cellars.
Julia Trustram Eve, of the English Wine Producers trade body, said: ‘It is fantastic to see another homegrown success.
‘I have not been fortunate enough to taste any myself, but I have dropped a monumental hint with the maker that I would very much like to do so.’