Wine merchant Lay & Wheeler have been part of Majestic Wine for a while, and for the first time at this week’s Majestic press tasting some of the Lay & Wheeler portfolio was shown. Here are my notes on some of the wines.
Valdesil Pezas de Portela Godello 2010 Valdeorras, Spain
Textured, rich and powerful with sweet melony fruit and some herbal notes, as well as characters of straw and nuts. Broad and intense, yet still fresh. 93/100 (£25.20 Lay & Wheeler)
Ocean Eight Verve Chardonnay 2011 Mornington Peninsula, Australia
Powerful with lovely complexing matchstick/mineral reductive notes, as well as faint hints of cabbage, supporting precise, concentrated pear and citrus fruit. Lively and linear with real complexity. 94/100 (£25 Lay & Wheeler)
Domaine de la Taille aux Loups Montlouis Clos Mosny 2011 Loire, France
Fresh and herby with citrus and apple notes on the nose. The palate shows supple pear and apple fruit with a citrus twist. Lively, showing nice focus and purity, with real character. 92/100 (£19.25 Lay & Wheeler)
La Gerla Rosso di Montalcino 2010 Tuscany, Italy
Elegant, supple and sweet with cherry and berry fruits. Light styled and better for it with lovely purity and elegance. Smooth and pure with fine cherry fruit and mineral notes. 93/100 (£16.20 Lay & Wheeler)
Mauro 2010 Castilla y Leon, Spain
Deep coloured, this is a rich, ripe, dense red wine with notes of cherries and blackberries, and a smooth, supple texture. Lovely mineral undercurrents help keep this fresh and interesting, and not just another big ripe red. Stylish. 93/100 (£28.80 Lay & Wheeler)
Elio Grasso Gavarini Vigna Chiniera Barolo 2006 Piedmont, Italy
This is special: spicy, mineral and slightly tarry on the nose with sweet cherries, plums and some warm herbs. The palate is pure, fresh and structured with finely grained, grippy tannins meshing well with the bright cherry and plum fruit, as well as some herbiness. Serious. 95/100 (£48 Lay & Wheeler)
“Serious. 95/100 (£48 Lay & Wheeler)”
Well, seriously expensive certainly. Would you honestly fork out that amount for a single bottle? Surely there are many other wines that are “spicy, mineral and slightly tarry on the nose with sweet cherries, plums and some warm herbs”?
Indeed, many supermarket wines for under a tenner – especially from the S of France – invariably describe themselves as being herby, spicy and characterised by plum and cherry flavours with fine tannins.
L&W may be part of MWW but they have a completely different way of working.
Often the only ‘delivery’ option is ‘customer reserves’ – for which there is a monthly charge. Then there is a further charge for withdrawing the wine and a delivery charge (even to a local MWW store), unless the order is over an ungenerous £200 (compare Wine Society, free over £75). So, unless you are spending a lot of money and want cellaring, look elsewhere.
Hello!
Glad you enjoyed some of our wines at the press tasting!
Just quickly, regarding the comment above about our charges, it is certainly true that we operate differently from Majestic Wine.
If any of our wines are available for immediate delivery, we will deliver free to all mainland UK addresses on orders over £200.
The majority of our clients purchase wines in bond and en primeur to store for their future enjoyment. There are storage fees associated with this, currently £9.36 per case per year. There are also delivery charges at the time of delivery, currently £15 including VAT, which covers up to 3 cases and includes insurance for full replacement value. If wines need to be removed from bond, then duty and VAT need to be paid at this point – but that all goes to the government!
Delivery to Majestic Stores is free for members of our Fine Wine Plan, our subscription-based cellar creation scheme. This scheme starts at £50 per month, with all funds used for wine and storage charges, rather than administration fees. Members subscribing over £100 per month receive – among other benefits – a free case of fine wine and 10% discount to be used at Majestic Wine.