Wines of the week: cabernet franc is the perfect fresh red to enjoy in the sun

Les Argelières Cabernet Franc, IGP Pays d’Oc, France 2023

£11, Cambrian Wines

When I’m looking to buy a bottle of red from the south of France, I generally prefer wines made from grape varieties that have proved themselves in the heat and dust of the Mediterranean climate. Among others, grenache, carignan, mourvèdre and syrah are at the base of almost everything I like from the Midi: hearty wines filled with spice, wild herbs, liquorice, black olive and brambly fruit. Still, there are some brands that challenge my preconceptions, notably Les Agelières made by Marilyn Lasserre which, having already impressed me with a convincingly jaunty, juicy pinot noir, has now won me over with a brilliantly bright, curranty, subtly pencil-lead-shaded take on my favourite Atlantic French summer red variety: cabernet franc.

Domaine Bousquet Finca Lalande The Land Cabernet Franc, Uco Valley, Argentina 2024

£11, Waitrose

Thanks to its ability to make red wines that fit in with the current fashion for freshness – bottles that work well after a brief spell in the fridge or an ice-bucket – cabernet franc is increasingly being bottled as a single-varietal all over the world. Winemakers in Argentina have proved particularly adept with cabernet franc, which seems to thrive at high altitude, notably in the Uco Valley subregion of Mendoza, the country’s Andean winemaking heartland. Among the recent favourites I’ll be lining up for chilled summer-red drinking over the next few months is the super-succulent and unoaked bottling, with its cooling streak of tomato plant leafiness, and the slightly lusher, but still vivid and fresh dark currants and cherries of Zuccardi Apelación Cabernet Franc, Uco Valley 2020 £19.73, Oxford Wine.

Lulu L’Alouette Chinon, Loire, France 2023

£13, Majestic

The two regions with the longest history of making cabernet franc are both on the western, Atlantic-influenced side of France where the variety first emerged. Not that you’d necessarily know that from the labels: as with so many parts of France, the winemakers of the Loire and Bordeaux prefer to put the emphasis on place, or terroir, rather than grape. In the Loire, the cab-franc centre of gravity is in four appellations devoted to the variety in Anjou and Tourraine: Bourgueil, St-Nicolas de Bourgueil, Chinon and Saumur-Champigny. I am a big fan of the classic, racy Loire style, which to me is the essence of summer wine, and which is nicely expressed in such great-value examples as Majestic’s graceful Lulu l’Alouette Chinon, and Tesco’s sappy raspberry-scented Les Terrasses St-Nicolas de Bourgueil 2024 (£11.50).