Best Red Wine in Malta (for less than $10) - Part 3: The Final Verdict

Yes, there is a third part to this saga.  Turns out it is not too difficult to find reasonably priced, home-grown, wine in Malta.  Really, has nobody every done a full-on wine tasting of Maltese wines before now?


Anyway, here is La Croce, another entry from Camilleri wines.




Blurb on Bottle: Locally grown, intense red and fruit character on the nose and palate supported by a medium bodied intensity and soft tannins making an approachable wine suitable for everyday consumption.


We Say:  You can smell the tannin, but the taste is surprisingly crisp and smooth.  No sticky after-taste with this one, it's great value at less than a fiver.

Bought For: €3.50

Best Red Wine in Malta (for less than €10) - Part 2

Back with a few more bottles of Maltese goodness.  Here's a little tip for you wine fans, as told to me by a vintner over here: keep your red in the fridge and take it out about 30 minutes before you want to drink it.  Room temperature in a Maltese summer can be considerably warmer than in a drafty old French castle.

First in the firing line is Marenzio, part of 'The Classic Collection' from Delicata.





Blurb on the bottle:  Soft, mellow and medium bodied*. An easy drinking, fruity red wine.

We say: Not one of the best on the market. It's alright, but a bit of a sour taste to it.  Danya says 'no', I say 'why not?'.  Not as good as Torre or Medina though.

Bought for: €4.35

Best Red Wine in Malta (for less than €10) - Part 1

So as to simplify things, and to protect both my wallet and my liver, I am imposing a couple of restrictions on this search.  Firstly, the wine must be available for less than ten euros, as the title above would suggest.  Secondly, I am only checking out Merlot wines in this survey, as they are your basic introductory red wine and pretty much everybody likes Merlot.  It should also be noted that I am by no means a Wine Expert, but I know what I like.

First off, it is La Torre from Marsovin in Marsa.

Blurb on Bottle:  Easy drinking, fruity with aromas of plums, cherries and coffee.  Pleasantly smooth finish.

We Say:  Not a bad effort.  Crisp, plummy flavour with a slightly acrid after-taste (so I can't agree with that 'smooth finish' from the blurb) but it's an adequately decent wine at this price.

Bought For:  €4.28

Top Ten Things to Eat (and Drink) in Malta

Humans like top ten lists.  (Especially the Men humans, they makes us feel as though there is organization and righteousness to the universe, which is always reassuring).  So here is my list of the top ten things - in very particular order - to stick in your gullet during your stay on the island:

1.  Maltese Sausage: Maybe it's because I've recently returned from a Muslim country where pork is hard to come by, I don't know.  But that first pasta with Maltese sausage just tasted absolutely delicious.  In fact they've been a favourite of mine since I first came to the island.  I don't know whether it's the garlic, the coriander or the rosemary, but they just taste great.  And speaking from my vast experience on the subject, it's a shame more local restaurants don't include Maltese sausages in their English breakfasts.

Maltese Wines

some wine

Wines from Malta used to have a pretty abysmal reputation, but it seems things have improved considerably in recent years.  A bottle of wine from the supermarket can cost as little as €2 and it's hard to complain too much about the quality at those prices.  Of course you can always pay a lot more, since the wine industry generally is one which benefits from the type of dumb rich people who like to impress each other by buying ridiculously expensive objects.  Anyway studies have been done which suggest that in blind tests people really can't tell the difference between cheap and expensive wines, so just get one you like the taste of.  Disregard completely the opinion of those people who suck wine in through their teeth with their eyes closed, before sloshing it around their mouth, spitting it out again, and then comparing it to some kind of a tree.