10 best white wines for sipping this festive season and beyond

Even the name sounds beguiling. Like the historic region in the Loire Valley in France it comes from, sancerre is a crisp white wine that’s enchanting and dazzling in equal measure. It also introduces us to the king of white wine grapes – sauvignon blanc.

New Zealand may make the running in the sauvignon blanc stakes but here in its homeland you can’t escape the heritage and the history on an estate that was established in 1513. It’s a perfect example of the winemaker’s art with delightful lemon and peach flavours allied to an almost chalky minerality. Drink it by itself or enjoy it with seafood and salads.

It’s time to introduce another classic white wine grape. Pinot gris may be better known in the UK under its Italian name pinot grigio but this example from Hakes Bay in New Zealand keeps the French name and adds a more than a modicum of New World appeal.

We’re back in the orchard flavour-wise, with ripe pears and honeyed notes supplemented by soft, stone fruit and hints of spice. Again, it’s an ideal partner for a light fish dish or as a welcome accompaniment to a good-quality soft cheese.

Along with sauvignon blanc, it’s time to make space for the other classic white wine grape – chardonnay. Away from its French homeland, chardonnay can now be found all over the globe.

This example, from California’s Napa Valley, is as welcome as mum’s apple pie, which is appropriate since that baked apple flavour is one of chardonnay’s most appealing traits. You can taste it here in full, along with hints of toasted oak, vanilla and pineapple. Helpings of viognier and gewürztraminer grapes are also blended in to give the wine that ripe, full-flavoured charm.

A drum roll and a round of applause please for the third of the world's three great white wines, the German riesling. Made from an aromatic German grape that is now grown around the world, this example is from its true home, the steep vineyards of the Mosel region.

A blend of riesling grapes from different growers, it's aged on the lees to protect and enhance that aroma-driven fresh and floral flavour with a blossoming minerality that tells you where it comes from with the first sip. Hugely drinkable, it’s a perfect aperitif or a welcome addition to a seafood meal or a salad.

If all you know of Spain is its red rioja or sparkling cava, prepare to be surprised and delighted. Albarino is a white wine grape native to Galicia, in the northwest of Spain and northwest Portugal.

It’s an area bound by the Atlantic and prone to more than its fair share of rain. Out of that, however, comes a zesty, aroma-rich wine with a seaborne but very welcome acidity. If you're fond, say, of sauvignon blanc, then give this a try, you won't be disappointed.

The story of Picpoul de Pinet sounds like a Hollywood feel-good movie. A small appellation from the Languedoc region of France comes out nowhere to conquer the world or more specifically the UK which now takes one third of its total production.

So, what’s so good about it? Well, it's fresh and bright with zinging apple and citrus flavours, and a mouthwatering salty minerality that mirrors the one found in the Mar de Frades Albarino. Easy to drink, easy to enjoy and easy to spot on the shelf in its specially designed “Neptune” bottle – a summer barbecue favourite that can be enjoyed all the year round.

Here's a blend of sauvignon blanc with another classic white wine grape, semillon. Big in France, it was discovered that this particular blend also suited the Australian terroir, where it developed a beautifully creamy and textured lemon-lime flavour with hints of lemongrass and tropical fruits such as papaya and guava.

If you can bear not to open it straight away it will benefit from being laid down for a few more years, allowing those fabulous flavours to become even more mouth-wateringly attractive.

Burgundy may be the home of the grand crus, the world’s most renowned and expensive white wines, but winemaker Mark Hoddy has managed to craft an elegant and mineral-fresh, Burgundy-style chardonnay near Limoux in southern France.

As with its much more expensive rivals, the wine is barrel-fermented, lees-stirred and aged in fine French oak. The result is a rich and textured white wine with oodles of ripe stone fruit and toasty vanilla flavours complemented by hints of spice and lemon. In fact, grand cru classiness at a much modest price.

It would be fair to say that winemaker Tony Lathwaite knows a thing or two about Bordeaux wine. He founded Bordeaux Direct in 1969 and then went on to create the UK company that bears his name. His Côtes de Bordeaux estate at La Clarière in Castillon had been all about reds.

But then he produced oak-fermented, lees-aged white that’s a blend of bold sauvignon blanc and the richer sauvignon gris – and has reaped the rewards it brings, including a trophy and 18 gold medals. If you’re expecting lots of citrussy, fruit forward flavours along with vanilla notes and hints of oak and spice, you won’t be disappointed. It’s a wine to savour and enjoy with fish or white meat.

A flagship English wine from a Kent vineyard that prides itself on its organic roots. This is a balanced blend of (and wait for it, this quite a mouthful) bacchus, ortega, faber, siegerrebe and huxelrebe grapes, which end up producing what many see as one of the finest English wines.

Hugely fragrant with citrus and soft fruit notes, there’s a tantalising yeasty, freshly baked bread aroma too, which makes this wine such a standout. Its organic production means that it was naturally fermented with no added yeasts.