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If you think sherry is just for Christmas – something to sip while unwrapping another pair of gardening gloves from your aunt – it’s time to think again. This fortified wine not only offers a wide and exciting range of tastes and flavours, it’s also one of the least costly ways to experience centuries of traditional winemaking – history in a glass, if you like.
A product of southwest Spain, sherry hails from a specific region between the towns of Jerez and Sanlúcar de Barrameda. Most of the sherries are produced using the indigenous white palomino fino grape, while the luscious pedro ximénez grape forms the basis of the sweetest sherries.
Sherry is aged using the solera system, which sees casks or butts of sherry stacked together and continuously added to with younger sherries, to create a blend from different years.
Fino is the classic sherry. Dry and the colour of pale straw, it matures under a layer of surface yeast called ‘flor’. Without doubt, it’s the perfect aperitif – delicate but full of flavour. Manzanilla is similar but can only come from Sanlúcar de Barrameda, where it matures, with an accentuated saline tang, under a thick layer of flor. In recent years, fino and manzanilla sherries can also be enjoyed en rama (raw), which means the sherry is very lightly filtered and tastes as it would if it was drawn straight from the cask.
Amontillado, meanwhile, is a sherry that ages under flor before being exposed to the air, resulting in a darker colour and nuttier taste. Then there’s palo cortado, which starts life as a fino but then, for reasons still unclear, it loses its flor and turns into a more rounded and mature sherry.
Sherries that are found to have more body than others and show signs of being more robust are aged for a longer period without flor, creating oloroso – a darker hued sherry with a rich and expressive flavour.
Now you’re up to speed, read on for our full review of the best sherries on the market.
How we tested
We sipped several sherries, to bring you the very best (John Clarke)
Many of the dry sherries were tasted in the role that they fill with style and ease – a first-class aperitif. Others were enjoyed with light meals or tapas-like snacks. For each, we considered the flavour profile as well as value for money. Keep scrolling to find out which tipples took our fancy.
The best sherries for 2024 are:Best overall – Sánchez Romate dry oloroso encontrado: £16.99, Waitrose.comBest budget buy – Morrisons fino sherry: £8.50, Morrisons.comBest for pairing with food – Fino Vina Corrales Pago Balbaina NV (ex-cellar 2022): £34.25, Corneyandbarrow.comBest aperitif – Delicado 12-year-old amontillado sherry NV: £16.99, Laithwaites.co.ukBest medium dry sherry – Valdespino Contrabandista amontillado: £23.95, Leaandsandeman.co.uk