The Domaine Weinbach Riesling Alsace Grand Cru Schlossberg Cuvée Ste. Catherine 2018, our No. 1 French wine for 2020, along with our No. 2, the Famille Hugel Riesling Alsace Schoelhammer 2010, and some of the other top quality rieslings we tasted from Alsace this year.
It’s crazy to think that I didn’t get to France to taste wines and visit wineries and winemakers this year due to the pandemic. I have been to France every year, many times a year, since 1983 as a journalist and wine critic. I probably spend about six weeks a year there normally.
Nonetheless, we managed to rate more than 3,100 French wines over the last 12 months. Most of the wines, about 2,100, were Bordeaux. This included about 1,000 samples of 2017 from bottle and another 1,100 of 2019 barrel samples. In total, we rated almost 19,000 wines from all over the world since last December.
Read more: All our 2019 en primeur articles and Zoom tastings
I don’t think I have to make an excuse for tasting so many wines from Bordeaux. It remains the benchmark of France, particularly in Asia, where I am based. Hong Kong is the No. 1 export market for Bordeaux today. Also, Bordeaux remains a reference point for me for judging fine wines with my history of drinking it with my father in the 1970s and 1980s and my early transition as a journalist to a wine critic in the 1980s in France. I lived in Paris in the mid-1980s.
However, this year I decided to include more wines in our Top 100 of France from other appellations including Alsace, Beaujolais, Burgundy, Champagne, Rhone and a few others. I only wish we had tasted more wines from the Rhone Valley, Loire Valley, Champagne and the South. Let’s hope that we can all travel more freely next year and visit France!
James tastes the Burgundy wines of Mark Haisma with importer Jason Ginsberg in Hong Kong.
Also, several regions other than Bordeaux and Burgundy offer fantastic value and provide incredible real and authentic wines with character. This is particularly true with Alsace and Beaujolais. In addition, many of the best producers also adhere to admirable viticulture practices such as organic or biodynamic farming methods, which follow through to more holistic and non-interventionist winemaking. The end results are wines that not only taste wonderful but seem more real and even better for you.
All this is why my French Wine of the Year is the Domaine Weinbach Riesling Alsace Grand Cru Schlossberg Cuvée Ste. Catherine 2018. I have been enjoying the wines of the Faller family since 1985 and their wines’ precision and subtle and complex character are so enticing. The Cuvée Ste. Catherine Riesling from the great granite soils of the Schlossberg Grand Cru is a long-time favorite. And the 2018 is one of the best ever, although I can’t wait to taste the 2019 in bottle since the vintage is already legendary for the region! The wine also comes from biodynamically farmed vineyards, which are Demeter certified. It’s hand-made in the cellar with indigenous yeasts and aged in old large oak casks.
“We do our best to follow the traditions of our family and region in our winemaking,” said Catherine Faller, the head of the domain last year in a Lalique lunch for the top winemakers of the region. I make my range of wine glasses at the famous French crystal firm of Lalique in the town of Wingen-sur-Moder in Alsace and every other year we organize a lunch for top winemakers of the region.
Read more: Burgundy spotlight on vintage 2019 and a trio of warm vintages
James has always loved the clarity and honesty of the wines of Château Thivin and the Château Thivin Côte-de-Brouilly Clos Bertrand 2018 is the the No. 10 wine in our list this year. It sells for about $35 a bottle.
The Domaine Weinbach Riesling Alsace Grand Cru Schlossberg Cuvée Ste. Catherine 2018 really is a masterpiece in dry Riesling with intensity and brightness combining with an incredible array of exotic fruit character with slate and spice undertones from the unique slate soils of the great grand cru vineyard.
Our No. 2 wine, the Famille Hugel Riesling Alsace Schoelhammer 2010, is also a great dry riesling from a great grand cru – the Schoenenbourg. The fact that it is released late, when the Hugel family deem it ready to drink, makes it even better. It’s from amazing vineyards rooted in clay marl soils and the wine acts like a beacon shining its uniqueness and character. Perhaps it’s what gives it the “earthy magic” aromas and flavors we often find in the wine.
The No. 5 Domaine Valentin Zusslin Riesling Alsace Grand Cru Pfingstberg 2017 is equally compelling with an incredible subtlety and minerality that just brings you back for glass after glass. The Zusslin family are dedicated advocates of biodynamic farming and low intervention winemaking. Their riesling from the grand cru of Pfingstberg is always so intense and age-worthy.
Five of the other Top 10 in the list are Bordeaux with everything from a $60 a bottle Sauternes, Château Rieussec Sauternes 2017 (No. 4) to the sublime first growths of Château d’Yquem 2017 (No. 6) and Château Margaux 2017 (No. 7) at around $250 and $400 a bottle respectively. The great Pomerol of Château Trotanoy was at No. 3 with superb balance and a relatively reasonable price of $180 a bottle for the most recent vintage on the market, 2017. And I couldn’t help but include the incredible Domaine de Chevalier Pessac-Léognan Blanc 2017 at No. 9, which is one of France’s great age-worthy whites at $70 a bottle. The 2017 vintage was a very good to outstanding quality year with many wines that are drinkable at an early age compared to the current greats such as 2019, 2018, 2016 and 2015. So don’t miss out on the best from them.
Read more: Alsace’s fireworks and crisis
James tastes two Henri Giraud Champagnes over Zoom with Cellar Master Sebastien Legolvet and Sales Director Stephane Barlerin. You can check out the Zoom conversation here.
I had to include a Champagne in this year’s top 10 list from France and I know it’s expensive at over $400 a bottle but it’s phenomenal quality. The Henri Giraud Champagne Argonne Brut 2012 is so dense and powerful yet it remains incredibly agile. The selection of wines that are barrel fermented and aged that go into this Champagne are incredible and give the wine an uncanny balance of energy and richness The wine is so fabulous to drink now but I think it will age incredibly well and highlights the concept of great Champagne being a great wine for the cellar first.
Finally, this is the first time we have included a Beaujolais in our Top 10 wines from France and it should have been sooner. I am a huge fan of the region with its incredible culture of old vines and real winemakers. I drink Beaujolais every week in Hong Kong and just love the authenticity of the wines and the fantastic value. The clarity and honesty of the wines of Château Thivin have long impressed me and the Château Thivin Côte-de-Brouilly Clos Bertrand 2018 may be the best wine they have ever made in my opinion. It’s the No. 10 wine and sells for about $35 a bottle. I hope you enjoy this year’s list of our Top 100 wines rated from France. Please remember that it is by no means comprehensive but only reflects what we tasted and rated this year at JamesSuckling.com.
– James Suckling, editor & CEO
