Whatever happened to the bestselling wines of the 1970s and 80s? Some, happily, are no longer with us or have been banished to the dustiest reaches of the corner shop, brands such as Hirondelle, Lutomer Laski Riesling, or Le Piat d’Or, that neither we nor the French adore any more.
Others, remodelled, repackaged, occasionally even drinkable, are still slogging it out in the pitiless commercial battlefield of a supermarket near you: Mateus Rosé, Black Tower, Blue Nun.
More interesting are the regional appellations that after years of neglect, critical disdain and flatlining sales, have returned as something else entirely. Regions that have gone from cult to own-label mainstream favourite to beyond the pale and back again. The paradigm of the retro-vintage comeback king is beaujolais. The vignerons of the gamay-producing area north of Lyon once sold millions of bottles of nouveau, that bubblegum-and-banana-scented young red bottled within a couple of months of vintage. But after the 1990s, sales collapsed, their reputation for quality in tatters. It’s taken plenty of angsty reflection and, in many cases, financial struggle, but thanks to its cluster of adventurous small producers and its ability to provide the sort of light, fresh red wines that work so well by the glass, beaujolais – even nouveau, from the right producer – has become a must-list for a certain kind of modern wine bar and small-plate restaurant.
Muscadet, typecast as a cheap and cheerful partner for seafood, was washed away by the fruit-rich new wines of the New World, its complacent producers having cashed in with enormous quantities of sub-standard, brand-damaging acid water. Again, it’s taken a while, but a hardcore of small producers around the Loire estuary have been chiselling out a reputation for dry whites on a par with chablis.
Other regions to have thrown off the 1970s kitsch include: Vinho Verde from northern Portugal, whose whites can be thrillingly peachy and pure where once they tended to the insipid but tart; the Veneto, home of trattoria staples white soave and red valpolicella, now responsible for some of Italy’s most elegant wines; and the Rheinhessen, once all but synonymous with liebfraumilch, now reestablished as the site of great dry rieslings.
But for the full nostalgia-tinted house, nothing beats lambrusco. Not as the sweetly gassy, £2.99 initiation rite for generations of teenagers and pre-loading clubbers, but in its original, gorgeously gastronomic form from Emilia-Romagna: a vivid, finger-staining, antipasti-partnering sparkling red.
Pierre Luneau Papin Domaine du Verger Muscadet Sèvres et Maine sur Lie, France 2018 (£12.95, josephbarneswines.com; vinovero.co.uk)
From a modern master of muscadet, this is a typically luminous dry white, tight and nervy with a dash of salt and zesty citrus and a savoury palate. Perfect for shellfish, and at a price that puts comparable white burgundy to shame.
Anselmo Mendes Muros Antigos Loureiro, Vinho Verde, Portugal 2018 (from £8.95, thewinesociety.com; handford.net; bottleapostle.com)
If you grew up on the wince-making acid, prickly spritz and lemony sweetness of old-style supermarket own-label vinho verde, you’d scarcely believe this pristine, racy, floral, citrus and exotic-fruit-scented white came from the same region.
Lambrusco Classico Vigne delle Monte, Emilia-Romagna, Italy (£12.75, leaandsandeman.co.uk)
There is still plenty of pallid soda-pop-like lambrusco (and, indeed, its perry-based imitator, lambrini) around. But this is the real thing: an intensely dark cherry-fruited sparkling red with salami-matching grip, and a moreish tangy dry finish.
Gonzalez Byass Solera 1847 Cream Sherry (from £13.45, thewhiskyexchange.com; oddbins.com; cambridgewine.com)
The 1980s was the beginning of the end of sherry’s imperial period as a bestselling wine. Now even the fustiest of styles, cream, such as the suavely sweet fruitcakey Solera 1847, is back on the smartest restaurant lists.
Korona Egri Bikaver Bull’s Blood Hungary 2016 (£14.95, slurp.co.uk)
Before Aussie shiraz and Argentinian malbec, the “bull’s blood” red wines of Eger in Hungary provided British drinkers of the 1970s and 80s with their big red needs. This modern version is a cut above: a deep, spicy, plummy partner for autumnal stews.
Alexandre Burgaud Beaujolais-Village France 2018 (£11.50, bbr.com)
Alexandre Burguad’s delightful young wine is a far cry from the banana-bubblegum beaujolais nouveau of folk memory: it’s exuberantly fresh, crunchy, currant-fruity and aromatic with a moreishly sappy, charcuterie-friendly freshness.