It was great to be back in New York City for the second edition of Great Wines of the World USA: a gathering we like to think set the tone for future such events as we get past the pandemic. More than 2,000 people participated in the tastings over two days and four sessions, with wine producers, trade and consumers coming together to share some of the greatest wines on earth.

We came across some local Galician heroes in our tastings of 695 wines over the past week and experienced even more of the Iberian Peninsula’s Mediterranean sensibility through less-revered grape varieties like bobal, garnacha tintorera, garnacha tinta and syrah.

Just about everything seems to taste great from the clean seas and green farmlands of Oregon, where you’re almost guaranteed impeccable provenance and flavor of whatever touches your lips. And from our tastings of 771 Oregon wines, there were more than a few standouts.

Our tastings of 571 wines over the past week included the last batch of Chilean samples, which took our palates to the long, narrow strip of land to the west of the southern Andes and its booming diversity of offerings.

We rated more than 500 wines over the past week from 11 different countries, but it was Chile and the incredible range of bottles it’s producing at the moment that really stood out, led by the Colchagua Valley winery Clos Apalta.

A biodynamic project from Chile is delivering elegant and mineral Mediterranean-style reds from the foothills of the Andes that are helping to change the playbook for winemaking in the country. We also uncovered an Italian riesling revelation…

April was a record-breaking month at JamesSuckling.com: 4,363 wines tasted, and it just feels like we’re picking up steam. U.S. West Coast wines featured prominently during the month, but southern hemisphere offerings also came on strong.

The 2019 Beaulieu Vineyard Private Reserve is a legend in the making, but it wasn’t the only wine we gave a perfect score to in our latest Weekly Tasting Report.

Our tastings of more than 800 wines over the past week reinforced our view that great modern icon wines like Opus One, Masseto and Seña always seem to be of exceptional quality.