GRAPEVINE

FOOD & DRINK KATHRYN MCWHIRTER'S TREATS AND BARGAINS

UNTIL last week I could have carved the names my favourite Cham- pagnes in stone and thrown away the chisel. If price was no object, there was no real competition: I would always buy Krug, Billecart-Salmon, Roederer, Dom Perignon, and in recent years its spruced-up partner-in-cave, Moet et Chandon. Then I tasted four champagnes from the family vineyards of Vilmart. It's not that they're new - the family has been growing grapes and making Champagne for more than 100 years. But they are a small family business, in a much smaller league than any of my other favourites, and I'd never come across them before.

The grapes are farmed organically and produce tiny yields, which means that more flavour is crammed into the limited number of bunches. The vineyards are owned by the Champs family, who farm the grapes and make the wines. Madame Champs, nee Vilmart, is the great-granddaughter of the founder, and her husband was wine-maker there even before he married the boss's daughter. Their son now also helps to run their 11 hectare (27 acres) of premier cru vineyards - the highest classification for vineyards in Champagne - in the sleepy village of Rilly-la-Montagne, just south of Reims.

The family cellar is one of only three wineries in Champagne that still use wooden barrels and vats to ferment and prepare their wines. I'd normally get much more excited about a winery gleaming with modern stainless steel tanks (you can wash and sterilise stainless steel and control its temperature), but the wines that come out of these wooden vats are consistently excellent.

The Champs family cream off the very best grapes and use the juice from the very first, finest pressings of those grapes, for these Champagnes sold under their own vineyard label, Vilmart et Cie. They also operate as merchants, buying in wine from other growers, blending it with the lesser wine from their own vineyards and selling these wines, only on the French market, under the name of "R Vilmart". (There's also a Vilmart Pere et Fils, distant cousins but otherwise unconnected, to confuse Champagne pilgrims who make it as far as the village.)

The Vilmart Champagnes get better and better as you ascend the price ladder (which is not always the case elsewhere), from the classy, complex, flowery Vilmart Grande Reserve Brut (pounds l7.50-pounds 18), upwards to the drier, elegant Vilmart Grand Cellier Brut (around pounds 20). Then there are two top- of-range Cham-pagnes that need to wait another five years or more in your cellar in order to taste their best: 1988 Vilmart Grand Cellier d'Or (pounds 24), which is rich and intriguingly complex in flavour, buttery, floral and chocolatey; and a fine, very dry 1990 Vilmart Coeur de Cuvee Grand Cellier d'Or (pounds 36.90) that was made to celebrate the centenary of the cellar. All these are sold, direct or by mail order, by Gauntley's of Notting- ham, 4 High Street, Nottingham, NG1 2ET (0115 9417973); and The Grape Shop, 135 Northcote Road, London SW11 6PX (0171-924 3638).

FOR a red worthy to follow that fizz, try the 1994 RBJ Theologicum, Bar- ossa Valley Mour-vedre Grenache (pounds 7.99 Australian Wine Club - tel: 01753 594925, Free-post Slough, Berks SL3 9BH). Three wine-makers/grape-growers by the names of Ryland, Binden and John-stone (RBJ), who all have top jobs at major Australian wineries, got to-gether five years ago to make the first vintage of this voluptuous red. It's styled on Chateauneuf-du- Pape and made with some of the Chateauneuf grapes, but it's unmistakably super-Australian in its amazing plum and cherry fruit, tinged with interesting hints of spice, dried fruits and herbs. At first they made only enough for themselves and friends, and it's still very much on ration even now they have now moved up a scale.

SAFEWAY is offering interesting savings from now until 16 September, especially on two organic Australian wines. 1993 Penfolds Organic Clare Valley Red (pounds 5.99, normally pounds 6.99) is a wonderful, velvety-soft wine - quite elegant because the Clare Valley has a fairly cool climate for Australia - with lovely flavours of mint and raspberry (from Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Shiraz). There are two vintages of the matching white. 1993 Penfolds Organic Clare Chardonnay/Sauvig-non (pounds 4.99, normally pounds 5.99) is an interesting, ripe, honeyed wine, mostly Chardonnay in flavour but with some tropical fruit Sauvignon, too. (Somerfield also sell this 1993 vintage for pounds 5.49.) The 1994 (also pounds 4.99 at Safeway) is good but too young and so less impressive, but it will settle down in a few months to be as good or even better than the 1993.

Among the whites, good bargains are the crisp, slightly musky 1994 Safeway Cotes du Luberon, Ryman (pounds 2.59, normally pounds 3.19) and, all at 50p below normal price: ripe, honeyed 1994 Gyongyos Estate Char-donnay (pounds 2.99); tropical fruity 1993 Domaine de Malardeau Sauvignon Blanc Cotes de Duras (pounds 3.49); and 1994 Bianco di Varona (pounds 2.29). The 1994 Merlot Vin de Pays des Coteaux de l'Ardeche (pounds 2.79), with its honeyed, raisiny-grassy flavour, was a bargain even before it dropped 50p.

Other current bargains at Safeway, though not reduced, are the 1994 Chapel Hill Balatonboglar Barrique-Fermented Chardonnay (pounds 4.99), Australian-made in Hun-gary, with pineapple fruit and attractive oak; a lovely, oaky but subtly flavoured 1994 Agramont Viura Chardonnay (pounds 4.19) from Navarra in northern Spain; and two wines made in the south of France by the Australian Penfolds company in co-operation with the French winery of Val d'Orbieu: 1994 Laporouse vin de Pays d'Oc Rouge (pounds 4.99) is a rich, grassy and raspberry fruity red made from Merlot, Syrah and Cabernet; and 1994 Laperouse Vin de Pays d'Oc Blanc (pounds 4.49) a delicious musky white. Two red snips are the attractive, blackcurranty 1993 Cabernet Sauvignon Estate Selection Gorchivka, Svischtov (pounds 3.49) from Hungary, and a super-fruity, light and very drinkable 1993 Domaine Roche Vue Minervois (pounds 3.89).