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What to drink when you're binge-watching TV this autumn

If settling into your favourite corner of the sofa, pressing ‘play’ on the latest hit box set on Netflix is your usual drill, what are you drinking with it?

While watching the compelling episodes of the four-series show Ozark, Marty and Wendy Byrd create a semblance of normal family routine amongst their Mexican cartel shenanigans and money laundering, by dining together with their kids every night – always popping open a bottle of wine. For someone from the wine trade like Zeren Wilson, he started to wonder what they could be drinking. Good stuff? Cheap stuff?

We asked Zeren to take a deep dive and suggest the best wines to go with your next binge-watching session. Here are his recommendations.

what to drink when you're binge watching

Ozark (Netflix)

The Byrds always have wine with their dinner, and their table setting always looks cosy and inviting. I get twitchy about how they hold their wine glasses (by the bowl, not the stem) but I reckon a lush Californian Chardonnay may be what they are drinking, offering some comfort from the Cartel.

Paired wine: Frei Brothers Sonoma Reserve Chardonnay (Waitrose, £17.99)

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what to drink when binge-watching tv

The Crown (Netflix)

British royalty and its German associations and history are so strong that it simply has to be German Riesling, particularly when we consider that 100+ years ago they were the most expensive wines on the planet. Queen Victoria’s favourite wine came from the village of Hochheimin the Rheingau, and this wine is from a vineyard named after her: "Victoriaberg" meaning Victoria’s Hill. 

Paired wine: Victoriaberg Riesling trocken 2021, Joachim Flick (The Winery, £21.99)

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House of the Dragon

House of the Dragon (Sky)

A lot of wine is quaffed in this series. A lot. So much so that there's actually an official wine for the series - but it's only available in America. So for the rest of us, we have to take inspiration from the series. 

Amongst the many things they sling back, the wines of Dorn are from the hottest part of the southern land of Westeros, and sound to me like they are inspired by the sun-baked vineyards of Puglia in the heel of Italy. A chunky, broad-shouldered Aglianico, it is then. Known as the ‘Barolo of the South.’ 

Paired wine: L'Archetipo - Aglianico 2014 (Modal Wines, £26)

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what to drink when binge-watching tv

Peaky Blinders (BBC)

There is a bona fide wine collaboration with Peaky Blinders and a Saint-Emilion estate in Bordeaux which they say is ‘like the Shelby family, full of character, and as impactful as Arthur’. Or, as they describe it on the site: "A first fucking wine of Saint Emilion"

But while Thomas Shelby’s more partial to whisky, a more perfumed, classier Claret would be my preferred choice: head for Margaux instead. 

Paired wine: Rauzan Ségla 'Ségla' 2014 (Shrine to the Vine, £43)

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what to drink when binge-watching tv

Bridgerton (Netflix)

Champagne toasts, society balls, and the most units drunk on any Netflix show, apparently. It’s The Duke of Hastings and Queen Charlotte that seem to be necking the most, aside from the obsession with drinking lemonade, the Regency era’s “it’ drink. A good grower Champagne, please, for a stylish ‘flix and drinking’ combo.

Paired wine: Larmandier-Bernier 'Latitude' Extra Brut 1er Cru NV (Lea &Sandeman, £45.95)

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what to drink when binge-watching tv

The Sandman (Netflix)

Having read the Sandman graphic novels from when Neil Gaiman published the first one in 1989, revelling in their phantasmagoric dreamscape and other-worldly feel, the long-awaited adaptation is a filmic big deal for comic-book fans. The ephemeral, fragrant beauty of Burgundy’s most delicate wines, from the village of Chambolle-Musigny, feels appropriate here. 

Paired wine: 2018 Chambolle-Musigny, Vieilles Vignes, Domaine Thibault Liger-Belair (Berry Bros. & Rudd, £80)

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what to drink when binge-watching tv

Selling Sunset (Netflix)

Wine plays a prominent role in episodes of this reality series, with the real-estate brokerage often including wine collections as part of the sale of luxury homes, as well as having their own-label bottle made by a Paso Robles winery. Famously, cast members refer to the wine variously as ‘crap’ ‘gross’ and ‘shitty’ – let’s shake that up by suggesting one of Napa Valley’s prestigious family estates that makes sleek, sumptuous wines of true class.

Paired wine: Lyndenhurst Cabernet Sauvignon 2018, Spotswoode (Emile Wines, £77)

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what to drink when binge-watching tv

She-Hulk (Disney +)

She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, may at first sound like a ridiculous desperate comedy premise for a series, but the character was first created by comic legend Stan Lee in 1980, where she was also a lawyer in her ‘normal’ life. And in the show, that normal life sees then spend a fair amount of time in the bar (not the legal one). As Jennifer Walters transforms from a diminutive 5’4” into a green 6’7” superhero, a ballsy, powerful, full-throttle Rasteau can similarly smash a feisty winter cassoulet into submission while you watch. 

Paired wine: Rasteau: Domaine Saint Gayan 'Ilex' 2016 (Yapp Brothers, £15.99)

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what to drink when binge-watching tv

Midnight Diner (Netflix)

This beautifully paced series based around the food and customers of a 12-seater diner in a back street of Tokyo is full of beer and sake drinking, with wine not getting a sniff of the action, but chef/owner Kaoru Kobayashi’s signature dish of Tonjiru (pork belly and miso soup) deserves a killer combo: Enter a lush Condrieu, superstar Viognier.

Paired wine: Condrieu - 2020 Domaine Pierre Gaillard (Lea & Sandeman, £40.95)

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