Arbui 2023

Picked absurdly late — and you can taste every extra week.

Ben: “Arbui” means tree in the local dialect, and the label carries the motto: trees wait, we don't. The joke is that they do wait — these goblet vines are harvested in mid-October, very late for somewhere as hot as Alicante, and the extra weeks turn up in the glass as dark, ripe, concentrated fruit. Then about a year in French oak.

In your glass: Dark and dense, close to a chewable red, with a firm drying grip and very little sharpness — sunshine in slow motion. The year of oak seasons it rather than flavours it. Pick it when the food is loud — grill smoke, braises, strong cheese — and you want a fifteen-euro red that argues back; not when you're after something to sip cold on a warm evening.

Serve it: 15 minutes in the fridge if the room is warm.

You’ll probably love it if: You like reds with sun and muscle — picked absurdly late, and you can taste every extra week.

Skip it if: Gentler at the same table → the red Bilaire (€9.90). The deep end of the same idea → Arbui V.47 (€37).