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English wine isn't the joke it was once. Only the other week in Bubbly, my hosts happily volunteered their admiration for the likes of Ridgeview, Chapel Down and Nyetimber instead of suppressed their laughs.It's correct our best wines are now superb indeed. They are not inexpensive, though, thanks partly to the savage quantity of duty levied on them (and there had been me thinking that our esteemed lords and pros wanted us to buy UK).There are over four hundred active vineyards in Britain and Wales with nearly 3,100 acres of vines more and more before. Sure, a few of these are inclined by part time hobbyists, but multi-million pound companies like 265-acre Denies, near Dorking in Surrey, are fully commercial.

Plantings have gone up fifty percent since 2004 and there are currently commercial vineyards as far north as Yorkshire and as far west as Cornwall ( where Camel Valley's Bob Lindo and boy Sam have just won a great deal of glittering awards ). It sounds nonsensical, but there are even 2 brand spanking new vineyards in London one in Enfield and one in King's Cross collaboration between Alara Wholefoods and the Urban Wine Company). And superstore giant Waitrose is also getting in on the act. Planting on the carefully rolling chalk hills of its Leckford Estate in Hampshire started last week.

"This is a logical step for us," claims Justin Howard-Sneyd, the supermarket's wine-buying chief. "We presently have a fifty percent share of English wine sales through multiple outlets and to be certain that our patrons can continue to enjoy such wines we are investing now to deal with future expansion. It is a long term project. It is going to be 3 years before we see any fruit and another 2 years of winemaking and maturation before we are able to produce the top quality champagne that we have in mind." The 1st 2 types are now Britain's most planted (the Germanic Bacchus is 3rd). It is usually concluded that there are soils and climate conditions in south-east Britain that suit completely the production of champagne. "It’s no longer a cottage industry," asserts Howard-Sneyd. "And English champagne can struggle with bubbly on cost. Our still wines have a tougher time in the market place."

Over in Enfield, planting at Forty Hall Vineyard started a fortnight ago, making it the 1st vineyard to be planted in London since medieval times. Vineyard boss Sarah Vaughan-Roberts is brim-full of hopefulness: "All around here is clay, but we stumbled on this small blip of land with sandy gravel on south facing slopes and it's simply excellent for grapes. We've planted a preliminary acre of bacchus with which to make a light and crisp white wine. Enfield doesn't sound that romantic I know, but wine is not just made in posh and lovely places." 40 Hall is the ancestral home of the Parker Bowles family, so it has to be reasonably posh. It's now owned by Enfield Council and leased to Capel Estate Horticultural University.

The vineyard forms part of a wider academic initiative which tries to build 40 Hall Farm as a heart of local organic food production. The university has backed the 1st plantings of one acre and has made another fourteen acres available if sponsors and volunteers can be discovered. A tiny on-site winery is planned and it's was hoping the 1st bottles will be on the shelves in time for the London Olympic Games of 2012. "When I started this project, I was met up with little but laughter," asserts Vaughan-Roberts. "Now all I am getting is support. What's so exhilarating is the realisation that there's now a truly real requirement for English wine and that it is easy to earn a decent living making it." If they can achieve success in Enfield, who's to claim that those inviting chalk hills on the M25 around Clacket Lane service station will not one day be covered in vines