The journey of Senior Editor Stuart Pigott and Tasting Manager Kevin Davy in France’s Rhone Valley over the past week took them through the northern part of the region, where the red syrah grape dominates and where their tasting sessions were on the amazing side.
“None was more spectacular than that with Maxime Chapoutier at the headquarters of the family’s eponymous winery in Tain l’Hermitage,” Stuart said. “Of course, we have to tell you about the perfect M. Chapoutier Ermitage L’Ermite 2020, which has as much mountain freshness as concentration and underplayed power. Syrah doesn’t get better than this!”
Asked to explain the brilliance of these wines, Chapoutier responded, “The good acidity was the surprise of the vintage.”
That made a lot of sense to Stuart. “The 2020s are all big wines due to the high ripeness of this hot and dry vintage, and the acidity really helps to keep them bright – at M. Chapoutier, diamond-bright!” he said.
“When consumers think of this appellation they generally focus on power, but the Delas Hermitage Lieu Dit Ligne de Crête Les Grandes Vignes 2020 has an effusive nose of summer flowers and remarkable elegance,” Stuart said. “For those who prefer full-throttle power, there is also the very impressive Delas Hermitage Les Bessards 2020.”
It wasn’t all “Big is Beautiful,” though. Stuart and Kevin made an excellent discovery one evening at a local wine bar, from the small Domaine Vincent Paris in Cornas. “These wines are easy to find in New York, but not in Germany where I live or Hong Kong where Kevin lives. This kind of spotty distribution is not unusual for small top Rhone producers,” Stuart observed. “Thankfully the prices are friendly.”
For Stuart, the standout wine from this producer is the Domaine Vincent Paris Cornas Granit 60 Vieilles Vignes 2021, which he described as, “My dream of Cornas in a glass.” It has an incredibly deep blackberry, smoky and pepper nose plus a plush and pristine palate. We were also extremely impressed by the wines of Cornas’s established star, Domaine A. Clape, but they won’t be easy to buy.
At the world-famous house of E. Guigal, the current releases were firing on all cylinders. Whether it be entry-level Cotes-du-Rhone or single-vineyard Cote-Rotie, this is an incredibly consistent producer with global distribution. Our focus was not only on the 2020 vintage, though. “The range of 2021 wines I tasted at Paul Jaboulet Aine showed that consistently high quality was possible in this challenging vintage,“ Stuart said. “No surprise that the Paul Jaboulet Aîné Hermitage La Chapelle 2021 was the star among them.“
Jaboulet’s winemaker, Caroline Frey, took Stuart up on the hill of Hermitage to show him the geological complexity of the appellation and how hard it is to cultivate the steep slopes. “In the Le Meal section of the hill, which is the core of La Chapelle, the only way to work the soil is by winch ploughing,“ she explained as they watched this work.
“I once did that myself in a very steep German vineyard, and it was a wild ride!” Stuart remembered. “Hats off to the people who do this demanding job full time.”
Stuart and Kevin were able to visit a string of steep terraced vineyards in the northern Rhone. “Chateau Grillet sticks in my mind because this 3.75-hectare estate with its own appellation is now back in top form thanks to Korean-French winemaker Jaeok Cramette,“ Stuart explained.
Although Chateau Grillet is happy to focus on whites from the viognier grape, other producers in the northern Rhône are being pigeonholed by the market as being either white or red producers even though they do both at a high level. “Domaine Georges Vernay is a good example of this,“ Stuart said. “They are rightly famous for Condrieu white from the viognier grape, but the reds are also superb. The Domaine Georges Vernay Côte-Rotie Maison Rouge 2020 has enormous depth and great smoked bacon character. The combination of the two is a real achievement for winemaker Emma Amsellem.“
Our highest-rated white in the northern Rhone is not a viognier, but a Marsanne – the nearly perfect M. Chapoutier Ermitage De L’Orée 2020. “The fabulous interplay between creamy richness and mineral freshness shows what this grape can do in the northern Rhone,“ Stuart said.
FRESH AND BALANCED IN PORTUGAL
The quick tasting trip to Portugal that James and Associate Editor Andrii Stetsiuk made at the end of April continues to deliver some fascinating wines for the adventurous. This report includes ratings on more than 100 Portuguese reds, mostly from the Douro Valley but also from such areas as Alentejo and Dao.
In general, we see premium wine producers in the country moving away from big and rich reds and focusing on more balanced and fresh wines that show their provenance in a clearer and more energized way. This is particularly true with the reds from the Douro and Alentejo that we rated. The fact that producers in Alentejo are using vineyards at higher altitudes to capture the freshness and brightness in their grapes highlights this, as do Douro producers who harvest their black grapes earlier than in the past.
In addition, many of the red wines of Portugal are made from little-known local grape varieties and very old vines that make for fascinating drinking. Take, for example, the Quinta do Vallado Douro Vinha da Granja 2019, which is made from 32 different grape types co-planted in ancient vineyards, with some vines aged more than 100 years. That’s a unique bottle on Planet Wine!
CAN CAMPANIA LIVE UP TO ITS POTENTIAL?
In Italy, Campania boasts a hegemony of indigenous grape varieties, arguably the most exciting in the entire country by virtue of their capacity for superlative wines. But Senior Editor Ned Goodwin MW’s recent tastings of Campania reds confirmed that while the region was once responsible for the greatest wines of the ancient world, it has yet to realize its potential in the modern one.
“Naples is Campania’s capital, a city of immense beauty, a contagious immediacy and great cuisine,” Ned said. “Its volcanic environs are smattered with high vineyards, from 300 to 800 meters in altitude, allowing for strong diurnal shifts and a cooling influence – and thus the dominance of fresh whites, despite Campania’s location in Italy’s deep south.
“Yet there are majestic reds, with aglianico the greatest variety,” he said. “In Irpinia, where the township of Taurasi is the equivalent of a grand cru, aglianico is capable of wines of a dark-fruited brood, a swath of dried tobacco, mint and camphor and a structural latticework of high acidity meshed with ferocious tannic mettle. No wonder it is referred to as the ‘Barolo of the south.'”
Yet aglianico grows throughout Campania, from the warmer alluvials of Sannio to coastal Cilento. “Too often it is misinterpreted with notions of softening its structural carapace – either through excessive new oak or clunky semi-carbonic effects of whole cluster to whole berry fermentations,” Ned said.
Ned said he wasn’t sure which was worse: “attempts to soften and hide aglianico’s personality this way or older-school endeavors with excessive cask aging, resulting in stale, dried-out wines. This is a shame, because there is greatness to be found in aglianico, but too often it is a case of ‘if only’: if only the oak was not so poor, the cuvaison was not so long, the handling was better and there were no microbial issues.”
“The finest traditional producer of aglianico wines in Campania is Salvatore Molletieri, and his best wine, the Taurasi Vigna Cinque Querce 2016, is a sculptured masterpiece defined by elastic, almost sooty tannins, tightly furled and prodigiously complex,” Ned said. “It needs time in bottle but is a worthy addition to any cellar. In a more modern vein, the Donnachiara Per Umberto Riserva 2018 is a product of Riccardo Cotarella and his slick thumbprint of smaller format and new oak.”
READ MORE TOP 100 WINES OF ITALY 2022
The surprises of Ned’s tasting were two gorgeous single-vineyard expressions, the Irpinia Campi Taurasini Case Arse 2020 and Leo Cubans 2020 from Giovanni Carlo Vesce. More dangerous, Ned said, was the Ognostro 2020, a vintage that Ognostro winemaker Marco Tinessa called “incredible.”
“This is a minimalist aglianico crafted in amphorae. Electrifying!” Ned exclaimed.
Bearing in mind the trend toward lighter red wines the world over, there is also a great deal to like about the second most widely planted red cultivar, piedirosso. It is grown around the lower reaches of Naples and is the mainstay of red Lachryma Christi (“Tears of Christ”) wines. Pockets of Amalfi also harbor fine examples, particularly those from Marisa Cuomo. Check out Cuomo’s Ravello Riserva 2019, which is bolstered with 30 percent aglianico.
SPAIN’S EXPRESSIVE REDS
Finally, we continued our tastings of Spanish wines over the past week in our Hong Kong office, with a few offerings from one of the most formidable names in the country, Alvaro Palacios, proving once again Spain’s talent for making world-class wines with tension, clarity and etherealness.
Alvaro Palacio’s vibrant garnachas from his Palacios Remondo in Rioja and delicate mencias from his Descendientes de J. Palacios estate in Bierzo – all from the 2021 vintage – were among the top wines we rated this week, including the Descendientes de J. Palacios Bierzo La Faraona 2021, Descendientes de J. Palacios Bierzo Las Lamas 2021 and Palacios Remondo Rioja Quiñón de Valmira 2021. We can’t wait to taste his wines from Gratallops in Priorat when we travel to Spain this summer.
In a Zoom call with Senior Editor Zekun Shuai, Alvaro Palacios said 2021 was an “aromatic vintage” that produced “charming and retronasal” wines. It commenced with the winter storm Filomena in early January, covering their Rioja vineyard with 10 to 15 centimeters of snow. But the summer in Rioja was mild and dry, and then a much-needed rainfall in early September brought humidity before the dry and cold cierzo wind helped the grapes reach better health and spot-on ripeness.
The result was stunning reds full of energy and perfumes with a bright, lustrous ruby sheen, mineral texture and nervy acidity. The otherworldly single-vineyard Quiñon de Valmira 2021 is the most expressive and the airiest of them all, with a lifted, tangy pepperiness and Mezcal-like note that might come from the use of whole clusters and indigenous yeast.
For the mencia-based Bierzo wines, the cool and dry spring after a damp December set the tone for the vintage before the coming of what was described as a “capricious” summer and a challenging September with a warm and damp start. The wines were both delicately fragrant and minerally introverted. The collectible, old-vine La Faraona 2021, from a half-hectare vineyard at an altitude of 800-860 meters, was the most mineral delivery, transmitting more austerity and verticality over its sibling, the more perfumed, precise Las Lamas in 2021.
– Stuart Pigott, James Suckling, Ned Goodwin MW and Zekun Shuai contributed reporting.
The list of wines below is comprised of bottles tasted and rated during the past week by James Suckling and the other tasters at JamesSuckling.com. They include many latest releases not yet available on the market, but which will be available soon. Some will be included in upcoming tasting reports.
Note: You can sort the wines below by country, vintage, score and alphabetically by winery name. You can also search for specific wines in the search bar.
