Table of contents for January 2026 in Decanter

The holy grail It’s not just teetotallers watching the booming non-alcoholic drinks category with interest. Drinkers looking to moderate, those on driver duty, those who have to abstain for health reasons – there are many wine lovers who dream of a nonalcoholic alternative that would give the same experience and reward. But as Majken Bech-Bailey, an innovator in the category, points out in this month’s A drink with... interview (p12), anyone expecting a non-alcoholic wine alternative to taste like wine will be disappointed – because it contains no alcohol. You have to accept that it will be a different experience, even if the drink is equally complex in a different way, and served with the same ceremony. But the growth of this category can only be a good thing –…

DON’T MISS Women’s retreat in Bordeaux Wendy Narby (pictured right, on the right), Decanter contributor and author of The Drinking Woman’s Diet, has teamed up with Sally Evans (pictured left), owner of Bordeaux’s Château George 7, to organise a four-day retreat at Château Monlot in St-Emilion, aimed at women in mid-life. The Flourish retreat will focus on personal growth and goal setting, and will celebrate wine as part of a healthy lifestyle, combining workshops and presentations with yoga, wine tastings, and more. Prices from €1,950pp. viebonnevoyages.com/product/flourish-retreat Tiny Wine tasting packs Tiny Wine was set up to make great wines accessible to everyone, selling 100ml bottles prepared without introducing oxygen, using Coravin technology. UK wine drinkers can order curated kits or build their own from a selection from more than 60…

A momentous shift is taking place in the UK’s wine culture – a swinging back of the pendulum from the wild west of alternative wine culture. While tastes and fashions change, it’s no coincidence that this swing is in parallel to our testing economic times and the world’s rather uncertain socio-political future. The last decade has seen an explosion in wine’s ‘other’ side – other grapes, regions, countries, styles – and a tearing up of the vinous rule book. But now, we in the trade are seeing a shift back towards the known, the familiar and, ultimately, the comforting, as people seek out recognisable grape varieties and appellations once again. When I joined the wine trade in 2012, I did so on the foundations of WSET textbook learning and the…

The growth in alcohol-free drinking has mostly been driven by 0% versions of alcoholic drinks, such as dealcoholised wine or non-alcoholic beer. But now, a growing number of drinks are being created that have no direct alcoholic equivalent. Tea is a common base (think kombucha or sparkling teas), but so, too, are shrubs. Also known as switchels, shrubs might seem to be a new phenomenon, but in fact they have a history that goes back centuries. Shrubs are based on vinegar – usually apple cider vinegar – which sounds like an unpromising starting point for a drink, but actually has several advantages. For starters, drinks without alcohol (or man-made preservatives) eventually go off, but vinegar is a natural preservative. It’s also a very good transporter of flavour, which, again, is…

With 12 Outstanding wines across five countries, involving seven local grapes, this was a fascinating, diverse and high-scoring tasting. It also provided a strong signal that the whole region of 10 nations – under the broad umbrella of ‘southeastern Europe’ – is coming of age and offers lots of exciting options for adventurous wine drinkers. The results gave a clear message that indigenous varieties, once written off as plodding workhorses, can deliver both global quality and wines with real personality and distinct differences that reflect each country. It should give producers a boost, showing they can have real confidence in native varieties and don’t have to rely on adding Merlot or Cabernet. Ana Jackson MW was impressed by the high quality across the board. ‘It was great to see the…

• Co-op, Les Pionniers Vintage Brut, Champagne, France 2013 £35.20 Co-op Made by Piper Heidsieck, this latest mature vintage Les Pionniers is a class apart when it comes to supermarket own-label Champagne – with gorgeous, yeasty-patisserie richness, a still-electrifying swish and a cut of fine acidity and pointillist mousse. DW Alc 12% • Merry Edwards, Sauvignon Blanc, Russian River Valley, California, USA 2023 £53 Vinvm, Wine Direct Tropical and citrus-driven, this offers a complex blend of fresh herbs juxtaposed with mango, melon and a gentle minerality. A hint of oak spice and long lees ageing add complexity and the end result is an exuberant wine that doesn’t overplay its hand. HN Alc 14% • Paros Farming Community, Seiradi Cuvée Premno, Cyclades, Greece 2022 £40 WoodWinters This indigenous red blend opens…

CHRIS LOSH Who? Chris has been writing about drinks for 30 years, in which time he’s edited multiple magazines and written numerous books as well as hundreds of articles and columns. In 2023, he co-founded the World Alcohol-Free Awards, the first international competition dedicated to drinks at or below 0.5% alcohol What, & why read? In a slot usually dedicated to spirits, Chris introduces the ‘shrubs’ non-alcoholic category. His recommendations could be just what you need to perfect your Dry January plans ADAM MORGANSTERN Who? A New York City-based photographer and writer, Adam’s work covers travel, wine, spirits, food and adventure in general. Widely published, his work has appeared in The New York Times, Robb Report, Time Out New York and Forbes. He was also co-founder and editor of Organic…

We live in strange times. How appropriate, then, that the weirdest development ever to affect the wine world is now its hottest trend. Namely, NoLo (no- and low-alcohol wines). Definitions of these terms remain fluid; neither the EU nor the UK has yet fixed its terminology, while the USA defines ‘non-alcoholic wine’ as being under 0.5% alcohol by volume and ‘alcohol-free wine’ as being under 0.05% abv. Low-alcohol wine has a wide spread of definitions; best to check the abv on the label rather than relying on generic descriptors. But the trend is scorching. At a time of widely reported declining global sales of wine, sales of no-alcohol wines have been forecast to grow by 7% annually through to 2028, and by 10.4% by 2034. Sales have already risen by…

As I sit down to write the first column of 2026, I’ve realised that I never really addressed its title: ‘The ethical drinker’. What does ‘ethical drinking’ actually mean? Does it relate more to the act of drinking alcohol, or to the product itself? There isn’t really a straight answer to this, as it’s probably a bit of both: an awareness of the way we consume, a curiosity about the wines we choose, their provenance and their wider impact, and acting on this curiosity and awareness in our buying behaviours. As I reflected on the topics covered over the last year – from labour standards, bees and biochar to the importance of community, the health of the oceans and packaging – I found myself revisiting the wines and people that…

There’s nothing better than a really good wine visit. Geeking out in the vineyard and winery, talking to people who know their little patch of land better than anyone else, exploring exactly what makes that place special and tasting the results isn’t just a joy – it’s an honour. It’s the behind-the-scenes, all-access tour. A new series of books aims to capture that experience on the page. Written by Marc Bouffard (who you may know better by his Instagram handle, @englishmans_claret), the series will tackle each of Bordeaux’s main communes via its most famous estates. The first focuses on St-Julien. The appellation isn’t Bordeaux’s most illustrious, nor is it home to the region’s most prestigious addresses; indeed, it’s often defined by its neighbours (combining the elegance of Margaux and the…

ASK DECANTER Each month our experts answer your burning wine questions. Email your queries to editor@decanter.com Sicily travel advice I’m planning to holiday in Etna this spring. Can you recommend two or three wine estates that offer great wines and a great visitor experience? Kevin Gardner James Button, Decanter’s Regional Editor for Italy, replies: Etna is a great destination for a wine break, with its dramatic scenery and dynamic wine scene. The region is bristling with wineries, each with its own vibe and style of winemaking. Ciro Biondi (ibiondi.com; Via Ronzini, 55a, 95039 Trecastagni) on Etna’s southeast side is a great place to start. This small-scale cult producer is less than an hour’s drive from Catania airport. Enjoy a tasting of the fine, almost Burgundian wines made from grapes grown on…

A lot of freedom (and, as Charles Dickens taught us, a lot of happiness) can come from an absence of expectations. What you do with that freedom – and joy – is another matter. Winemakers across Lisboa have used it to transform the region from a sleepy source of unremarkable wine dotted with cult-worthy gems to a hotspot of creativity, sustainability and experimentation that has greatly influenced the evolution of Portuguese wine as a whole. As an ageing millennial born and raised in Lisbon, I’m the first to feel both pride and awe at the speed at which Lisboa wine has become ‘a thing’ – perhaps even a ‘movement’. When I was a kid, our parents would frown upon drinking local plonk… Romain Gonitel, one of the founding partners at…

Australian winemakers’ prowess with Shiraz lit up the Decanter World Wine Awards in 2025, and underlined the enticing diversity of premium styles to be explored. Brilliant Shiraz wines span many growing regions, from the heartlands of McLaren Vale and the Barossa Valley in South Australia to the cooler-climate Yarra Valley in Victoria. Individual sites and old-vine plots add nuance, enabling winemakers to weave a tapestry of subtly diverging styles around this grape variety, which goes by the name of Syrah in France’s Rhône region and elsewhere. Top Australian Shiraz wines balance richness with elegance and poise. Many display a core of luscious fruit, from blackberry to plum and some red berry notes, which can be complemented to varying degrees by spicy, earthy and mocha-esque tones, along with extra savoury elements.…

Burgundy set for another small harvest As en primeur season begins for Burgundy’s small 2024 vintage, it has emerged that the size of the 2025 crop is also relatively low. Burgundy’s 2025 vintage was estimated at 1.43m hectolitres (mhl), or 190.7m bottles, said the Bourgogne Wine Board (BIVB). That’s bigger than 2024 (about 1.2mhl) yet below the 10-year average of 1.48mhl. Winery stocks were above the five-year average in August last year, however. BIVB said ‘a smaller 2025 harvest’ means ‘total available supply should be better aligned with current market conditions’. Will Hargrove, head of fine wine and associate director at merchant Corney & Barrow, said the 2024 vintage was notably affected by rain, while heat curtailed yields in 2025. ‘The climate change scenario is that we’re getting these different…

Sitting by the hearth with a glass of wine, I’m thinking about fire. Flames may warm my toes now, but they can be devastating in dry months. As wildfires have battered the wine industry in recent years, follow-up reports have largely focused on the damage. But perhaps we’ve missed the larger point. What if the real question isn’t how fires threaten wine, but whether wine regions could shield the rest of us from wildfires? Consider Napa’s recent transformation from victim to warrior. After the devastating fires of 2017 and 2020, Napa Firewise CEO Joseph Nordlinger and his team identified two barriers to resilience that plague fire-prone regions: fragmented efforts and simple complacency. In response, the team built a shared-services hub for Napa County, coordinating equipment, planning and funding ‘so we…

Of the 2,999 wines rated 95 points or more in the 12 months to the end of October 2025, just 30 – equating to 0.01% – earned the perfect 100-point score. And while a few of them feature on the pages that follow, Decanter’s Wines of the Year was never intended to be a copycat annual countdown of the highest scorers, or a simple list only rewarding perfection. It is, as we say in our headline, the regional highlights for 2025. Our team of Regional Editors have selected five wines from across each of their respective areas of expertise, all scoring 95 points and above, to showcase the quality and diversity on offer across the wine world. Some of the 65 wines they’ve tasted themselves; other scores and notes have…

Lessons in chemistry The so-called Golden Ratio of roughly 1:1.618, is found across the natural world – and has been applied to everything from music to art. But what about drinks? That was the question asked by chemist-turned-Master Distiller John Hall, who decided to use the ratio at every stage of production for his new gin: from still design to botanical proportions to dilution. The result is Aureus Vita (Alc 61.8%, £169-£170/70cl Fortnum & Mason, Hedonism), distilled once a year in tune with the harvest of its signature botanicals: juniper and baobab pulp. Tasted neat in a No-Add Martini (75ml of frozen Aureus Vita stirred over ice for 25 seconds) it’s noticeably textured, with detailed, harmonious aromas of camomile, oatmeal, citrus, pine and liquorice. It also makes a delicious AV…

It has been said that Chardonnay represents one of the clearest and most precise lenses through which we can view terroir, and this impressive tasting offered ample evidence to support that assertion. The affinity between Australia and Chardonnay is well established, of course, so expectations were high before this tasting. On the other hand, however, there have been times when this particular lens has proved to be ill-focused, with regional differences blurred either by too-obvious winemaking or by the terroir-masking fallacy of early picking. Not so on this occasion, with all three of the judges discovering commendably distinct regional expressions. Beth Pearce MW commented that ‘more than ever, the wines seem to be showing a sense of place rather than simply reflecting the winemakers’ preferences for reduction and/or ripeness’. This…

• M&S, Crémant d’Alsace Blanc de Blancs, France NV V £14 Ocado If you like your sparkling wines on the fruity side, look out for this new addition to the M&S fizz range from Cave Jean Geiler. Lots of tangy, apple and pear fruit-gummy flavour then a hint of almond and crystallised citrus on the finish. Refreshing party fun. DW Alc 11.5% • Sainsbury’s, Taste the Difference Gavi di Gavi, Piedmont, Italy 2024 £13 Sainsbury’s Like the TtD Vieilles Vignes Chablis (£17.50), this 100% Cortese is a step up from the often so-so supermarket ranks of its genre; a Gavi that ripples with cool stream clarity and freshness, subtle white flowers, preserved lemon and juicy fresh pear and apple. DW Alc 11.5% • Cambalala, Specially Selected Chardonnay, Stellenbosch, South Africa…

An ‘incredible auction moment’ Eye-catching prices for historic French-origin wines lit up the festive auction scene in early December, bringing down the gavel on 2025 in style. All lots found buyers when Christie’s auctioned historic wines from the cellars of Burgundy’s prestigious producer-merchant Bouchard Père & Fils in early December. Total sales hit almost £2.38m, and the star lot was a single bottle of Bouchard Père & Fils, La Tâche 1886. It fetched £325,000, including buyer’s premium, eclipsing a pre-sale high estimate of £19,000. It’s an example of what can happen when bidders set their sights on a particular opportunity. ‘There was a round of applause when the hammer came down,’ said Tim Triptree MW, international director of Christie’s wine and spirits department. ‘There was spirited bidding,’ he said, adding…