Dessert Wine

Dessert wines are some of the most complex and long-lived wines in the world. Their sweetness and concentration come from natural or winemaking processes that concentrate the grape's sugars and flavours: drying the grapes after harvest, noble rot on the vine, or adding grape spirit to stop fermentation while natural sugar remains. Our range covers all three. From Valpolicella in north-east Italy, Recioto della Valpolicella is made from grapes dried for months before pressing, the Italian passito tradition, giving a rich, sweet red. From Bordeaux, Cadillac sits across the Garonne from Sauternes and is made the same way, from grapes affected by Botrytis cinerea (noble rot), which brings honeyed richness. From Roussillon in southern France come two vins doux naturels: Banyuls, a sweet red made largely from Grenache, and Muscat de Rivesaltes, an aromatic sweet white. In both, grape spirit is added during fermentation to preserve the grape's natural sweetness. Adding some dazzle to your dessert need not be any more difficult than pouring from a bottle — or you can push aside the dessert trolley altogether and choose one of these wines instead. Like a fine whiskey, they are meant to be savoured, so sit back and let the sheer luxury wash over you. At Wines Direct we stock a small, carefully chosen range of dessert wines from independent producers.