Self-pity can be a splendid thing. A snuffling cold the other evening demanded something special in the 7 p.m. pick-me-up department. Something flavoursome and bracing, to jolt the strangled tastebuds back to life and lift the sagging spirits. Sherry. An amazing amontillado, smooth and hazelnutty but dry, might have brought tears to the eyes if the cold hadn't put them there already.
I've had a love affair with sherry for years - one of those cosy, really-miss-you-when-you're-not-around relationships. We don't see each other every day, or sometimes even every week, and I confess to serious outbreaks of passion for other pre-dinner drinks from time to time. But then back comes sherry, the old charmer - so much character! So much verve! - and it feels shameful not to have been faithful.
Sherry has been waiting a long time for fairer treatment, because of both an image problem and a split personality. It's difficult to think of any other drink that divides wine lovers quite so firmly into opposing factions. In support is a dwindling group of elderly traditionalists, plus an expanding group of serious wine fanatics - plenty of them young, and dynamic enough to go out canvassing. Against, are the masses of drinkers who view sherry either as dull and fuddy-duddy or as sticky and deeply naff.
What's so special about it that it deserves a better deal? Before we get into that, let's be clear that the only sherries worth bothering about are the quality ones from good producers - not the artificially sweetened commercial gunk that has done so much damage to sherry's name. The real thing, from Jerez, has genuine finesse, with powerful yet subtle flavours which evolve and linger. It stimulates the appetite like nothing else. And, considering its classy nature and the time and care that go into its making, it's very good value.
"If you're prepared to pay more than a fiver for a bottle of sherry you can get a wine of such style, grace, maturity and character that it would make 'em jealous from Napa Valley to New Zealand - at half the price," writes John Radford, introducing the results of a premium dry sherry tasting in a recent issue of Wine. Here, with higher taxes, the threshold is more like £7, but sherry is still a bargain treat.
The other vital point to grasp is that sherry is far more versatile a food companion than we're inclined to think. "Urgent Notice," writes Hugh Johnson in his 1998 Pocket Wine Book. "It is notorious that for the price of a bottle of top-class white Burgundy you can buy three of the very finest fino sherry, which with many dishes will make an equally exciting accompaniment." Think of all those delicious things that are served as tapas - everything from seafood morsels, smoked ham, fish, olives, stuffed peppers to Spanish omelette. Fino or saltier manzanilla tastes perfect with them all.
Julian Jeffs, the sherry expert who gave an exciting masterclass at Ireland's International Wine Fair in October, writes in his book Sherry: "Fino sherries are particularly good with food. My own favourite working lunch is a large glass of fino sherry with a salad, a slice of quiche or a well-filled sandwich." Daphne Broadbent, wife of the dapper Michael Broadbent, Christies' wine expert, announced in a recent interview: "We always have Tio Pepe with fish and chips."
Diehard fans such as these ease us out of the foolish notion that sherry should be drunk by the thimbleful. Finos, after all, are 15.5-17.5 per cent alcohol - only a couple of degrees higher than a full-bodied wine. Jeffs tells of his wife's horrified reaction when, during their honeymoon, he ordered chicken and a whole bottle of sherry at dinner. "But she didn't bat an eyelid when I ordered a second!"
Two other things are crucial to sherry enjoyment. One is a decent glass - big enough to hold that generous amount and still leave plenty of space for the tempting aromas to collect. If you don't want to invest in a set of traditional copitas, as used in Spain (but sold by good wine merchants here), an inexpensive ISO winetasting glass is absolutely fine.
The second essential is to drink finos and manzanillas not just well-chilled but fresh out of the bottle. Treat an opened bottle as you would a white wine, either polishing it off in one go or drinking it over a couple of days at most. Ideally, unopened bottles shouldn't languish, either at the back of a cupboard or on wine shop shelves, for much more than six months.
Half-bottles are a great solution to the freshness problem, and it's encouraging to see so many more good ones around. Especially noteworthy is the range of 10 halfbottles from the fine old bodega of Emilio Lustau, imported by Woodford Bourne - ranging from our light, delectable and not too pricey Bottle of the Week up to two Almacenistas - single-cask sherries of outstanding quality. Direct Wine Shipments flies the Lustau flag with flair in Northern Ireland.
Astonishingly, the Woodford Bourne 10 were chosen from a total of about 100 Lustau half bottles. "We're very, very pleased with the way they're selling," says trade marketing director Terry Pennington. "Quite a number of off-licences are stocking all 10, and restaurants such as Cooke's Cafe and the Red Bank in Skerries are tremendously enthusiastic." Signs, at last, of a sherry revival?