I DON'T know about you, but I'm fed up to here and beyond with frankly dull white wines.

Why, oh why, can't supermarkets search out not too dry white wines with just a smidgen of character?

Perhaps they are either too lazy, or can't see beyond their endless walls of Chardonnay!

So imagine my surprise when Aldi sent me a bottle of Chteau Laulerie 2003 to try.

Here was a white wine that I could enjoy with food or with friends. It comes from the still little-known appellation of Montravel whose clay slopes lie between Bergerac and the Ctes de Franc - a sort of missing link between Bergerac and Bordeaux.

The property belongs to the charmingly named Dubard Frre et Soeur (brother and sister) whose vineyards, planted with old vines, overlook the River Dordogne.

I wasn't surprised to learn that the wine had been selected for Aldi by Benoit Calvet who, with his wife Valerie, runs one of the most innovative businesses in Bordeaux sourcing wines for most of the more forward thinking supermarkets and high street multiples.

M. Calvet told me that the grapes, an equal mix of 10-year old Sauvignon Blanc and really mature 40 year-old Smillon, are handled in the strictest anaerobic condition to protect them from oxidation that would spoil their aromas and flavours. Following pressing the juice stayed on its skins for 12 to 18 hours at a very low temperature for the solids to precipitate before a three week cool fermentation in temperature controlled stainless steel tanks at not less than 16C and not more than 20C.

The wine then rested on its lees, made up from dead yeast cells, to absorb even more of the enticingly aromatic flavours before being cold-stabilised and bottled.

I wasn't the least bit surprised to discover that last year this wine won a coveted gold medal at the Paris Concours Gnral Agricole. This is a vast annual food and wine fair held in Paris where the competition for the medals is fearsome. What is surprising, however, is that this wine only costs £4.99 - which is about top whack for Aldi.

n I thought that I'd put up a bottle of the Chteau Laulerie 2003 as a prize for this month's competition, so that at least one other Worcester News reader can enjoy all the pleasure that I experienced.

The winner will be the first corectly drawn entry to name the river which the Dordogne flows into before meeting the Atlantic beyond Bordeaux.

Is it:

A. The Lot.

B. The Garonne.

C. The Gironde.

Send your entry on a postcard to Philippe Boucheron's April Competition, Features Desk, Worcester News, Hytlton Road, Worcester WR2 5JX. Don't forget to add your name, address and a daytime telephone number.

The closing date for entries is Friday, April 15, and the usual Newsquest Midlands South rules apply.