Protocolo 2013 VdT de Castilla, Spain

€9 from O’Briens

An inexpensive light red wine with light dark cherry fruits and a hint of vanilla.

With pizzas, tapas and lighter dinners, or just by itself. It would make a great party wine too.

A perennial favourite with O’Briens customers, this is  a sort of not-Rioja; made by a Rioja producer with Tempranillo grapes grown outside the borders for the wine or from younger vines within. The label, once black and circular, is now white and oval. I cannot pretend that the wine will taste like the finest Gran Reserva Rioja; it won’t. But for €9 a bottle on current promotion, you cannot ask for more.