British wine is a sparkling success

Move over champagne – British-produced wine is having a moment. Those conducive climes, partcularly in Sussex and Kent, are giving French and Italian competitors a run for their money, as sales of the home-grown grape rose some 200 per cent, with a £100 million profit this year alone. Waitrose, that barometer of sophisticates’ taste buds, also reported a 95 per cent increase in sales since last year.

The Sussex-produced Nyetimber and Ridgeview lead the way, but so too are smaller concerns doing well (there are now some 400 vineyards across England and Wales) – the sparking yields accounting for two thirds in the rise of sales in this bountiful year, post the warmer spring and summer of last year.

Pimm’s may just have been ousted from our summer drinks top spot this year. Bottoms up.