World's best wine town?

No contest. Jerez-de-la-Frontera. The home of sherry. There are no other towns as totally dedicated to its wine as Jerez. Wine villages are common, but towns which think of nothing else but their wine? Which drink it and party on it round the clock? I can only think of Beaune and Epernay in Champagne that come close.

Everywhere you go in Jerez there is a bar or a bodega. Unlike other areas there are few cellars out in the countryside. The Sherry Houses are all in town, even now after much 'rationalisation'.

I nearly bought one once. It was tiny. Had ceased trading years before so the dusty, little locked-up office was like a time capsule of ancient hand-written ledgers and wads of yellowing old labels, antique typewriters and such.

But the barrel hall was still full to the rafters with the old soleras ... still producing wonderful stuff to improve the blends of the big company that had bought it. I have done some mad things in my time but alas buying a Sherry bodega was one I didn't manage ... yet!

Sherry is special. So special I have set up a regular delivery service direct from Cadiz by sea so I can get new supplies every 6 months. Called it The Sherry Line.

I have set it up with an old friend, David Trimby who, in the old days was the UK's Mr Sherry. As the agent for Lustau Sherry, David helped introduce us to the fact that Sherry went way beyond dry, medium and sweet.
The Lustau family - or families - became good friends. We used to rent a villa off them by the sea at Puerto Santa Maria and spend Easter catching the first of the sun. That was when our boys were so young and daft for the sea they didn't notice the cold. Barbara and I would sit and sherry-sip in warm, glassed-in beach bars while our three little nutters - blue with cold - shrieked about in the surf!

At night in Puerto or Jerez we would graze all evening on the vast arrays of seafood laid out in places like big old-fashioned sweetshops. I never knew there were so many different types of Langostinos! The girls just made a big paper cornet and shovelled in scoops of whatever pink wee beasties you pointed at.

Then, with candyfloss and coke to placate the kids we'd wander round the bars for yet more in depth sherry sampling. I had no idea there was such a range of stuff.
One thing I did manage to verify was that the best tasting finos - the pale dry ones - were usually the most recently delivered. You could try and see if one label was a consistent winner. But no, that didn't happen. All the Bodegas pretty much made good stuff.

What made the difference was how long ago the stuff had been drawn from the protection of its barrel. That was key. And it explained why most top name sherries were in half-bottles rather than normal ones.

That's where us Brits have been blissfully ignorant, leaving sherry bottles on our sideboards and in cupboards for years. Here they measure the life of the bottles in just days. And in minutes once opened.

We think sherry is fortified wine, like Madiera and tawny ports which love being left around in contact with air. Sherry - certainly Fino Sherry - isn't like that at all.

Usually, if it's going to the UK, the Sherry houses will give their wines a dose of brandy to boost its resistance to being left around for ages. But that spoils it for the true aficionados - like everyone who lives in Jerez.

The Sherries that I get on The Sherry Line are 'as drunk in Jerez'. And the man many consider the Top Man in Jerez - Peter Dauthieu - chooses them for me.

If I mention that Peter's full name is Peter Dominic Dauthieu, I guess any British wine drinker over the age of 35 will understand that Peter Dominic comes from a legendary wine family. Today he runs several sizeable businesses. But his passion is Sherry ... fine and rare Sherry.

So as he goes about his daily business in Jerez, Peter keeps his eye and nose open for the special cask that might amuse the palates of his British chums on the other end of The Sherry Line. Two six-bottle boxes turn up twice a year, straight off the boat, and brighten my day. No doubt it does the same for the other 500 who signed up.

They tell me Sherry is coming back into fashion. This is good for Jerez. But I hope it doesn't get too popular. There isn't a lot of the really good Sherries. Anyway, with Peter and David looking after my supplies I should be sure of my sherry treats for years to come.