The Jancis Robinson Story | Mission Blind Tasting | Wine writing competition

Wine discoveries – December 2025

• 4 min read
Rippon vineyard

Twenty-two reasons not to do Dry January. Among them, a Pinot Noir produced by Rippon, from their vineyards on the shores of Lake Wānaka in Central Otago, New Zealand, pictured above.

After December’s dinners and parties, toasts and cocktails, it’s natural to feel the need to recalibrate – we do, too. But to us that doesn’t mean we’re doing Dry January. As you may have read in Jancis’s FT article on Saturday, How to drink less wine, we don’t actually find that many NoLos to be enticing. Instead, we just get a bit pickier about what wine we buy.

This comes in part...

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