Maybe it was because the Harveys Bristol Cream van used to draw up outside our headmaster, Coot’s, house, that I grew up to think of sherry as fit only for vicars, aunts and schoolmasters. It never occurred to me at the time that that sherry might re-invent itself as one of the world’s great appetite whetters. Witness the wine lists of the likes of Le Café Anglais or Moro and it’s plain to see that, chilled down and drunk with salted almonds or olives, there’s not much to beat a refreshing fino or tangy dry manzanilla like Hidalgo’s sea-salty, tapas-friendly La Gitana, around £7.49, widely available. But is sherry the exception that proves the rule that the wines of yesteryear are best left gathering dust?

Like the footballer’s mullet, Steppenwolf and chicken Maryland, many of the wines of the ‘70s have either disappeared from view or struggled to make a comeback. A haze as sepia-tinted as the ads for Mateus Rosé may linger over the period, but it’s hard to work up a nostalgic lather for an era of such cheerless sugar water as Blue Nun Liebfraumilch, not forgetting the awfulness of Hirondelle, rustic Bulls Blood, confected pink Anjou rosé, bland Piat d’Or and the pretensions of Mouton Cadet. Lutomer Laski Riesling was the first wine I recall with both the name of the place and the grape variety on the label, but when it turned out to be the central European impostor olasz riesling and not rhine riesling, it was summarily downgraded by the EU to the unfortunate rizling.

Rioja was the first wine I remember enjoying in quantity, Paternina’s Banda Azul Rioja to be precise. It cost £1.99 from Victoria Wine (RIP), and was all the sweeter for the five per cent case discount by the case. For a week in November, it was fun too to glug beaujolais nouveau: the wine that launched 1000 lorries. The nubile red that gushed from the wooden vats of Lyonnais sausage country started out unpretentiously juicy, but someone forgot to turn off the taps and by the 1990s nouveau had become old hat. Soave had its moment and chianti, until the wicker flask became the naffest tablecloth adornment of every third rate spagbol valpol trattoria. Lambrusco lived long in the memory only for its humble screwcap, an idea before its time.

Some of the old brands have made brave attempts to stage a comeback. Piat d’Or has had a makeover by raising its status from vin de table to vin de pays, Blue Nun changed the habit of a lifetime with a new label and a slight improvement on the sugar water of yore. Good old Mateus Rosé has had a revamp, while Black Tower celebrated the fact that Big Brother’s Jade, Kate and Alex championed its cause. It’s even launched a new sparkling wine in a can. The problem is that the old brands come with too much baggage. They’ve been overtaken, first by the supermarkets with their own respectable labels, and secondly by the New World revolution.

I’m not sure if it was the Paul Masson carafe that helped launch the New World order, but it was certainly the precursor of enjoyable California brands like the spicy and warming, sweetly raspberryish 2005 Ravenswood Lodi Zinfandel, £8.99, Majestic, Oddbins, Waitrose. Added to the excitement of Australian chardonnay and New Zealand sauvignon blanc, the discovery that the grape variety gave us a handle on the style and flavour of the wine was immensely helpful. Like Jacobs Creek Chardonnay, widely available at around £5.95, Montana Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc - the aromatic, gooseberryish 2007 is down to £5.99 from £7.49, Morrison’s, to 9 March, Sainsburys, to 11 March - has kept its taste and credibility.

South America and, latterly South Africa, have banged the last nails in the coffin for the underperforming European brands of yesteryear. Thanks to ample sunshine, the snow melt of the Andes and economies of scale, South America has given us consistently flavour-filled Chilean reds like Casillero del Diablo’s blackcurranty-sweet 2005 Cabernet Sauvignon Shiraz Reserva, £8.99, down to £5.99, to 9 March, Morrisons, and juicy Argentinian malbecs such as the 2005 Argento malbec, £5.99, widely available. So it is that with an occasional, perhaps even dewy-eyed glance back to an age of knowing no better, we can be thankful that at least where wine’s concerned, we’ve reached the point of no return.

Something For the Weekend 1 March 2008

Under a Fiver

2007 Casillero Del Diablo Gewürztraminer, £4.46, down from £5.96, Tesco, to 25 March.

Casillero del Diablo has become a Chilean byword for good value, as demonstrated by this fragrantly scented dry white made from the aromatic Alsatian grape variety with its trademark scent of rose petals and exotic lychee-like fruit flavours.

Under a Tenner

2006 Quinta de Crasto Douro Red, £7.50 - £7.66, Wine Rack (buy two get one free), The Wine Society (www.thewinesociety.com).

Forget Mateus Rosé, this is a taste of the real Portugal, a deep, rich blackcurrant pastille-scented red from the Quinta de Crasto in the Douro Valley whose opulent, blackberry jam-like fruit juiciness comes across as rich and sleek textured.

Splash Out

2004 Castello di Volpaia Chianti Classic Riserva, £14.99, Adnams, Southwold, Suffolk (01502 727222)

No wicker flask, just pure sangiovese fruit quality in this polished riserva from the Volpaia estate, showing aromatic dark cherry notes, ripe concentrated dark sour cherry fruitiness with savoury, clean-edged acidity and wearing its cloak of spicy, vanillan oak so delicately that it’s almost invisible.