Denbies The Brokes Noble Harvest Ortega 2016

The scramble to produce the UK’s most exclusive, rarest, most expensive wine continues! At £60 for a half bottle, Denbies’ new The Brokes Noble Harvest Ortega 2016 jumps to the top of the leaderboard.

What makes it so expensive? Well, aside from the fact that producing a noble rot-induced dessert wine in England is already a perilous task, this wine was made from a single barrel of the very best fruit from the 2016 harvest.

The wine’s minimal presentation allows the golden nectar to speak before it even leaves the bottle. In the glass, there are aromas of preserved fruit, fig, dried mango and toasted oak spice.

It delivers a hugely concentrated palate with luscious, sweet and sticky stone fruit reduction. There is fantastic complexity with dried orange peel, spiced nut and crisp, pungent lime zest on the finish. It’s intense and very satisfying.

Unfortunately, the £60 price point ensures that very few people will get a chance to sample its wondrous richness and those that do will compare to the very best dessert wines in the world. I’m not sure we’re quite there yet, however, I will say that this is likely to be the finest drop of English-made dessert I’ve tasted.