Spain’s cult red, the Dominio de Pingus, delivers a benchmark for the country year in and year out, and wine lovers and collectors around the world clamor to get their hands on a bottle. But how does 2020 compare with 2019?

We were hot on the trail of more German spatburgunders this week, and we also tasted some excellent Peter Lehmann wines from Australia and serious gamay from France.

Our tastings of nearly 500 wines over the past week yielded some awesome 2018 Brunellos, surprising 2020 German pinot noirs and impressive Yunnan and Ningxia offerings.

The team at JamesSuckling.com tasted more than 32,000 wines over the past year, with a few exceptional bottles rising to the top. Find out which wine we rated No. 1 among our Top 100 Wines of 2022.

We uncorked some pure and beautiful pinot noirs, chardonnays and cabernet sauvignons from Napa and West Sonoma Coast over the past week, and the historic estate of Immich-Batterieberg in Germany gave us two spectacular rieslings.

Most of our October tastings were taken up by Australian and New Zealand wines, in conjunction with our annual reports, but there was plenty more from Spain, South Africa and Germany.

The worst aspect of Germany’s 2021 growing season was the long rainy period through June and the first half of July. But those growers whose grapes survived the mildew attacks and stayed clean, the fine fall weather was a game-changer. It flipped the vintage dramatically in a way nobody expected.

We tasted more than 850 wines over the past week, including some sterling New Zealand pinot noirs, a few silky German cuvees and some fantastic South African chenin blancs.

Behind the scenes in small wineries on New Zealand's North Island, Bordeaux blends continue to rock, none more so than from the numerous producers found on Waiheke Island.