With dishes such as chilli con carne or red meat cooked in a spicy marinade or rub, red wine can be good but choose one that is generously fruity because the chilli will effectively turn down the volume on the fruit and you want to have some left. Not forgetting mountain. Dominating the cava towns is Montserrat, a craggy outcrop of pink conglomerate. It’s worth planning a visit to the Benedictine monastery, Santa Maria de Montserrat, to coincide with a performance by the famed Escolania boys’ choir, usually at 1pm in the basilica. Organic producer Llopart offers lovely mountain views. Rioja goes really well with the paprika-spice of chorizo, and you could also serve it with almost any dish in which chorizo is a strong flavour, for instance: cod with butter beans in a chorizo and tomato sauce; squid, chorizo and red pepper stew; or just chorizo sausages cooked in red wine and served with chunks of fresh bread. You could finish dinner with a chunk of Parmesan cheese and keep on with the Valpol which will go really well with that too. Domaine des Valanges Saint-Véran 2020

Mind you, these bubbles make me think of sitting on a beach with an impromptu picnic and watching the world go by. However, I am sure that you can come up with your own ideas. For some people, wine is just a drink. For me, it’s as much a part of dinner as whatever is on my plate. And just as a cook might say, “this is good with French beans or a green salad”, or think about how the different parts of a meal might sit together to satisfy the appetite, I think about the place of the wine, its taste and perfume, on the table. Of course it’s also a great wine to drink with tapas; there’s an affinity with almost every dish from pan y tomate to fried prawns with garlic. Quinta do Noval 10 Year Old Tawny NV Matching every course with a wine can feel fussy, detracting from the fun rather than adding to it. I make an exception if lunch or dinner is simply a main then a pudding, when a dessert plus a good wine turns it into an event. A few good combinations: strawberries and moscato d’Asti; orange salad and cream sherry; tarte Tatin and sweet riesling or Coteaux du Layon (sweet wine made in the Loire from chenin blanc). Basil The palate is refreshing, the sparkle balancing the green and citrus fruits. It is light but long and elegant.There are two ways to go here. You can look for reds that have generous fruitiness, such as Portuguese reds, southern Rhône blends, Australian cabernet-shiraz blends and also reds from South Africa: Cape blends (which contain some pinotage), Rhône-style blends or Bordeaux-style blends.

So many people ignore port unless it’s Christmas; a mistake, in my view. Tawny port is a great drink at any time of year. Aged for a long time in wood, until its colour fades to a gleaming garnet and it begins to taste of orange peel, caramel and roasted hazelnuts, tawny port is at its best served straight from the fridge, after dinner. In the same way it can work with other salty, fatty foods such as cured hams, fried chorizo or salty, hard cheeses like aged pecorino. Cava also works well with asparagus risotto and with Spanish rice with artichokes and tomatoes.

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Basil has a slightly anise-like smell and contains the aroma compound linalool, which is also found in lemon peel. If you’re eating basil in pesto or putting a lot of it in a tomato salad then try wines made from the cortese grape (used to make Gavi) which tastes a bit like lemon pith and bay and seems to go very well. Spicy food