CRIKEY, there’s rather a lot of beer here. A very lot. Ales heavy and light, light and dark, and almost stretching back as far as the eye can see. And a fair few ciders too.

We come every year to the York Beer Festival and yet the number of casks is still a little intimidating.

However, nestled in amongst all this nectar, holding its own little court at the top end of the beer tent, is a wine counter.

Yes, if you didn’t already know, there are indeed a few wines on offer at this festival of ale. However, like with the beer and cider, it’s not just your supermarket fair and, in keeping with the ambiance and tone of the event, there are offerings from this fair island of ours, not just the usual wine producing suspects.

There didn't used to be wine back in this festival's early days but, as it expanded to become the huge event it is today, there became a need to offer tipples other than booze for the visitors who attend for the experience and atmosphere even if they don't actually like ale all that much.

To that end there are pub favourites available - the likes of Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Grigio, Malbec, Rioja and Merlot, even a Prosecco if you want a touch of fizz. Oh, and low alcohol options.

But of perhaps more interest are a few English wines, including from our from very own Ryedale Vineyards in Westow.

Like last year, we preferred their whites to their reds – the 10.5 per cent easy-to-drink Yorkshire’s Lass being our favourite. It's a domestic award-winner apparently.

The medium dry Wolds View, also at 10.5 per cent, had a lovely minerality too.

The red we tried was called Strickland Estate, a 11.5 per cent offering made from Rondo and Pinot Noir grapes. It can't really compete with the fair from over the Channel but it does give further proof that wine producing in this country is not the joke it used to be.

Perhaps the more stereotypical festival fair were the ye olde English country garden favourites also on offer – the likes of gooseberry, cherry, strawberry and elderflower wines. The bright cherry and the floral, gentle elderflower tipples were our pick.

Then, of course, there were honey meads - a drink not to everyone's liking but surely something that shouldn't just be left to the bees.

These ones hail from Lyme Bay in Devon, on the border with Dorset, and among them are a Christmas mead with typical Yuletide spices, and a mint mead, which is a bizarre combination for your tastebuds to comprehend but a lovely drink to pour on your ice cream, apparently.

The ginger mead is a more natural fit, although if the tastebuds were left confused by the mint one, this drink knocks a bit of sense back into them.

The Festival, on Knavesmire, continues until tomorrow night so there's still plenty of time to get down.

On another note, if you pass a Co-op on your way there, there's an excellent value red currently hailed as their "September Star Buy" - a 2013 Château Lalande Cabardès (£6.99).

While we have our walled city, this drink hails from near the fortified city of Carcassonne in the south of France and is a rather unique blend of Atlantic grape varieties (35 per cent Cabernet Sauvignon and 20 per cent Merlot) and Mediterranean varieties (30 per cent Syrah and 15 per cent Grenache).

The result is an elegant wine, with baked plum flavours and a warming vanilla finish. One for a meat roast we reckon.