What's New on Cru - The Latest Fine Wines on Cru World Wine
Prices:
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Aladame Montagny 1er Cru Les Maroques 2016 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £174.47 -
Wine Spectator (97)
Laced with ripe cherry, strawberry, floral, spice, iron and leather flavors, this red is complex and charming, yet with serious tannins that ply the structure and lift the long finish. The fine balance should facilitate longevity. Best from 2024 through 2048. 1,600 cases made.Altesino Brunello di Montalcino Riserva 2015 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £424.07 -
Alvaro Palacios Priorat Aubaguetes 2020 (3x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £692.03 -
Vinous (96)
Full ruby-red. Mineral-accented red and dark berry preserve, incense and exotic spice aromas are complemented by suggestions of licorice and candied violet. Seamless and penetrating on the palate, showing superb clarity to sweet, mineral-inflected black raspberry, cherry cola, spicecake and violet pastille flavors. The mineral quality echoes emphatically on the youthfully tannic, impressively long finish, which shows outstanding energy and floral lift.Alvaro Palacios Priorat Finca Dofi 2018 (3x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £159.23 -
Alvaro Palacios Priorat Finca Dofi 2020 (3x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £159.23 -
Alvaro Palacios Priorat L'Ermita 2020 (3x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £2,168.03 -
Alvaro Palacios Rioja Quinon de Valmira 2020 (3x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £720.83 -
Wine Advocate (97)
From a warm and sunny vintage that produced darkly concentrated fruit, the Tenuta Guado al Tasso 2017 Bolgheri Superiore Guado al Tasso is a teaser and a super pleaser. This is one flashy wine. This carefully calculated blend of 65% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Cabernet Franc and 15% Merlot pours from the bottle with a beautifully saturated and rich color. I double-decanted my sample before writing this review, and the wine's aromas showed immediate harmony and intensity. The wine seduces and flirts with all your senses. This vintage caps many years of study regarding blending: The Merlot is slightly decreased here, and the Cabernet Franc is slowly taking on a more important supporting role. The Petit Verdot that was used as a peppery accent two years ago has now been removed altogether. The results are pliant, seamless and fluid, and that's the big takeaway here. The wine is bountiful, round, supple and full-bodied. Unless you are decidedly not a fan of this style, there's nothing not to love. I had anticipated more tightness in terms of possible hot-vintage tannins, but I am very pleased by the general integration of the mouthfeel. The Guado al Tasso vineyards are located not too far from the sea, at a low elevation of about 60 meters above sea level. The soils are alluvial with a unique mix of limestone clay and sand, with pockets of rocks and are generally known as the Bolgheri Agglomerate. Some 120,000 bottles of this vintage hit the market in February 2020.Antinori Guado Al Tasso 2017 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £574.07 -
Wine Advocate (100)
The 2018 Ausone is a blend of 60% Cabernet Franc and 40% Merlot. Deep garnet-purple in color, rather predictably, the nose is almost completely shut-down on first sniff, taking considerable aeration to begin to reveal its jaw-dropping perfume of ripe black cherries, wild blueberries and plum preserves, leading to suggestions of candied violets, molten chocolate, licorice and crushed rocks with subtle cedar and pencil lead hints. The medium to full-bodied palate (14.5% alcohol) is so tightly wound and nuanced at this stage, it requires a lot of focus unravel all that is going on here. In short: a lot. The ripe, rich, black and blue fruit layers eventually give way to the beautifully cerebral earthy/minerally subtext, carried by fantastically well-knit tension, delivering an incredibly long, foundation-shaking finish. If the earth doesn't move when you drink this, you're probably not doing it right.Ausone 2018 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £4,438.07 -
Wine Advocate (96)
The full name of this estate is Baricci Colombaio Montosoli, and indeed it is one of the protagonists of the celebrated Montosoli vineyard. The Baricci 2015 Brunello di Montalcino is highly distinguished by its mineral side (with marl, marine fossil, schist quartz and Galestro soils), and that is truly the magic of this wine. There is a pungent note of raw grape at first, but it lifts to reveal forest berry, camphor ash and subtle touches of sweet spice. These elements come together like a tightly fitted mosaic. The wine is balanced and fresh, with just enough structure to add firmness and considerable length to its polished mid-weight frame. In fact, mouthfeel is this wine's strongest suit. Acidity is never a problem in Montosoli, located on the north side of Montalcino where day and night temperature shifts play an important role in slow fruit ripening. This warm vintage shows higher extract, but the overall balance allowed Baricci to bottle using very little sulfur (which could account for that little tangy note you get on first nose). The wine went into bottle in July 2019, and 15,000 bottles were made. It was released in January 2020.Baricci Brunello di Montalcino 2015 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £328.07 -
James Suckling (94-95)
This is classically structured with a wonderful finish of extremely polished tannins and an ultra long finish. So much blackcurrant, spice and cedar. Seamless. 70% cabernet sauvignon and 26% merlot, the rest cabernet franc and petit verdot.Batailley 2020 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £259.07 -
Decanter (96)
Rich plum colour. This takes its time to open, is pretty subtle at first, but then explodes in juicy fruit. Clear salinity where you can feel the slate scrape of the limestone terroir, alongside well expressed aromatics with touches of peony flowers. Elegant and succulent. Second vintage with Jean de Cournuaud as technical director. A yield of 46hl/ha. 65% new oak, with a mix of barrels and 20hl casks. 3.77pH. Harvest 18-21 September, with all the Merlots in 3.5 days instead of the usual 11 days (and in fact stretched over one month in 2018), with just 20 minutes from picking to vat. Thomas Duclos consultant.Beau-Sejour Becot 2019 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £328.67 -
Bernard & Thierry Glantenay Volnay Caillerets 2011 (12x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £564.94 -
Jeb Dunnuck (95-97+)
Showing beautifully both times I was able to taste it, the 2018 Château Beychevelle checks in as a blend of 50% Merlot, 41% Cabernet Sauvignon, 6% Petit Verdot, and the rest Cabernet Franc that's aging in 60% new French oak. This ultra-pure, refined, gorgeously layered Beychevelle offers terrific notes of black cherries, blackberries, cassis, violets, and damp earth. Deep, concentrated, and layered on the palate, it has a thrilling sense of purity and elegance as well as building structure. This is the third vintage vinified in the new cellar, and the 2018 represents a selection of 50% of the total production. It hit 14.5% alcohol with a healthy pH of 3.74 and a massive IPT of 81. Hats off to director Romain Ducolomb for another brilliant wine that I suspect will surpass both the 2015 and 2016!Beychevelle 2018 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £518.27 -
Jeb Dunnuck (95-97)
Based on 51% Cabernet Sauvignon, 45% Merlot, and 4% Petit Verdot, the Grand Vin 2020 Château Beychevelle is a stunner that does everything right, offering a monster bouquet of black and blue fruits as well as candied violets, incense, flowers, and toasty oak. A ripe, full-bodied, incredibly sexy wine in every sense, it has a great mid-palate, ripe, velvety tannins, no hard edges, and a great finish. It's one of the more up-front, exotic wines in the vintage and should be accessible with just short-term cellaring.Beychevelle 2020 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £501.47 -
James Suckling (99)
What intense aromas of cherries and raspberries! Then it turns to flowers and orange peel. Roses, too. This is really full and powerful with layers of ripe tannins. It’s super fine-tannined, but shows wonderful length and intensity. A great expression of Lamole in Chianti Classico with ancient vines. Some older than 100 years. Best ever? Superb. Try after 2024 and onwards.Bibi Graetz Colore 2018 (3x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £464.03 -
Decanter (100)
Finely textured, with a nuanced perfume that fills the glass and takes you to the intense underbrush of Tuscany. Succulent and yet savoury, this has a lilting freshness that is overlaid with ripe berry fruits, sage and white pepper spice, and clear minerality in terms of its scraping texture that makes your mouth water on the finish. Feels light and sculpted and yet has an intensity that skewers you to the spot. This is a great wine, with scope and imagination that doesn't want to let you go. Genuinely stands out among the wines of this tasting, and these are a fine array of wines. As with Colore, Bibi Graetz selects only old vines, the youngest 50 years old from five different vineyard sites across Tuscany, all farmed organically. Fermentations in open 225l barrels with natural yeasts and manual punch downs.Bibi Graetz Testamatta 2018 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £445.07 -
Vinous (92)
The 2016 Bibian has a tightly-wound bouquet that demands more coaxing than its peers, eventually revealing pure blackberries, raspberry, cedar and light mint aromas. The oak here is nicely integrated. The palate is medium-bodied with fine tannin, very pure and polished with some classy new oak assiduously blended. This is a classy offering and one of the best Cru Bourgeois that I have tasted this vintage. Tasted at the Cru Bourgeois tasting in London.Bibian 2016 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £123.47 -
James Suckling (100)
Its really hard to imagine how a white Brugundy could be more flinty and minerally than this super-concentrated and super-vibrant Chevalier Montrachet. Lovely aromas of lemon blossom, jasmine, tangerine and nectarine, alongside all the stony stuff. Then comes the staggeringly long finish that is totally pure and precise. From Bouchard’s 2.3-hectare holding, which comprises almost a third of the entire Grand Cru site. Drink or hold.Bouchard Pere & Fils Chevalier-Montrachet Grand Cru 2019 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £1,978.07 -
James Suckling (97)
Very attractive aromas of currants, tile and sandalwood with black and red currants. It’s full-bodied with a tight, dense center-palate that remains closed in and tight. Yet there is underlying seriousness and length to this. Perhaps the greatest Branaire-Ducru ever made. Try after 2026.Branaire-Ducru 2018 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £298.07 -
Wine Spectator (95)
Incredible nose of crushed berries, flowers, spices and nuts. Full-bodied, with velvety tannins and a long, long finish. Powerful and solid. Builds on the palate. Give it time.--'95/'96 Bordeaux retrospective. Best after 2009. -JSCalon Segur 1995 (12x75cl) from a splendid and dry cellar, per attached
Inc. VAT: £1,442.40 -
James Suckling (97)
This is one of the most direct and clear Caros in a long time with blue-fruit, violet and sandalwood aromas and flavors. Crushed-stone, too. Full-bodied, yet tight and contracted with a level of shyness to its strength. The length derives from the excellence of the cabernet. One for the cellar. Blend of 74% malbec and 26% cabernet sauvignon. Try after 2023, but exciting to drink all the same.Caro 2017 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £254.87 -
James Suckling (95-96)
The purity of fruit is so enticing here with strawberries, flowers, lavender and currants. Black earth, too. Some stone and cement. It’s full-bodied with firm, fine tannins. It shows so much cabernet sauvignon character. It’s 68% cabernet sauvignon, 27% merlot and the rest cabernet franc.Carruades de Lafite 2019 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £1,393.07 -
Vinous (98)
Castellare's I Sodi di San Niccolò is the single most overlooked high-end wine in Tuscany today. The 2016 picks up where the 2015 left off. A rush of inky dark fruit, lavender, spice, licorice, gravel, blueberry and menthol builds as the 2016 shows off its exceptional balance and pedigree. Readers will have to be patient, as the 2016 needs a few years in bottle to fully come together. Even so, the 2016 has been nothing less than spectacular on the two occasions I have tasted it so far. In a word: monumental.Castellare I Sodi Di San Niccolo 2016 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £323.27 -
Wine Advocate (98)
The 2018 Malbec Catena Zapata Nicasia Vineyard, from a vineyard planted in Altamira in 1996 from an old massal selection, has contained ripeness, reflecting the less warm vintage (after 2017). The grapes were picked very early but with good ripeness because of the low yields in a very dry year. It fermented in open-top barrels with 100% full clusters and indigenous yeasts and matured in 500-liter oak barrels. It's a balanced and elegant Malbec with some restraint and a very fine thread in the palate, with really fine tannins. It follows the path of the phenomenal 2017, fine and elegant. 12,000 bottles produced. It was bottled in May 2020.Catena Zapata Nicasia Malbec 2018 (6x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £388.07 -
James Suckling (100)
This is really exuberant at this stage with fantastic aromas of honeysuckle, salt, chalk and dried apples and pears. Full body. Dense, vivid fruit with a linear frame of wonderful, energetic acidity. The energy and length just goes on for minutes. Soulful white. Argentina’s answer to Montrachet. Stares you straight in the eyes. Drink or hold.Catena Zapata White Bones Chardonnay 2018 (3x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £260.03 -
James Suckling (98)
A very subtle yet intense White Stones on the nose with stone, bone, lemon-rind and dried-apple aromas that follow through to a full body that is very tight and closed, but shows a compact fruit structure of sliced mangoes and cooked apples. Vivid finish, turning to flamboyant minerality. In reserve still. Better in 2022.Catena Zapata White Stones Chardonnay 2018 (3x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £248.03 -
Wine Advocate (99)
The amazing 2019 White Stones Chardonnay comes from a select group of 27 rows planted on lot I of the Adriana Vineyard, and the composition of those rows is soil with white oval stones covered by gravel. The Adriana Vineyard is planted at an altitude of almost 1,500 meters above sea level, in the district of Gualtallary in Tupungato. The stony soil prevents deep root growth, providing optimum drainage. This soil, which is very poor in organic matter, contributes to the vines' permanent stress conditions. The cool nights allow for very slow ripening, optimal acid retention and low yields. This is always a more austere wine than the White Bones, more mineral and restrained, less aromatic, with great balance, a little higher in alcohol and with very good acidity, rounder and more Meursault than Chablis but still with citrus freshness and pungent flavors and always some spice (curry) because of the aging in barrel with flor. This year, the two whites show a more marked personality, possibly aided by the style of the cooler year but also because the winery has a better understanding of the places. It's still very young and undeveloped; it's drinkable now, but with more time in bottle, it should develop greater complexity. Now the finish shows acidity and salt, which make it very vibrant. 6,600 bottles were filled in May 2020.Catena Zapata White Stones Chardonnay 2019 (3x75cl)
Inc. VAT: £248.03 -
Wine Advocate(Robert Parker) (100)
The 2011 Ermitage Cuvee de l’Oree comes from a lieu-dit known as Les Murets planted with 80- to 90-year-old Marsanne vines. The bouquet offers up scents of Asian spices, lychee nuts, white currant liqueur and peach and apricot marmalade. This stunning, honeyed, flamboyant white is perfection in a glass. Drink it over the next half century.Chapoutier Ermitage De L'Oree Blanc 2011 (6x75cl) Ex-Domaine
Inc. VAT: £1,339.07 -
Wine Advocate (99)
The 2012 Ermitage Cuvee de l'Oree is still firing on all cylinders, sporting heavenly notes of powdered rock, white flowers, honeyed orange blossom, white currants and a saltiness that keeps you coming back to the glass. Full-bodied, voluptuous and decadent, drink it anytime over the coming 2-3 decades.Chapoutier Ermitage De L'Oree Blanc 2012 (6x75cl) As per photos ,1770453
Inc. VAT: £1,226.40
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Aladame Montagny 1er Cru Les Maroques 2016 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £132.00 -
Wine Spectator (97)
Laced with ripe cherry, strawberry, floral, spice, iron and leather flavors, this red is complex and charming, yet with serious tannins that ply the structure and lift the long finish. The fine balance should facilitate longevity. Best from 2024 through 2048. 1,600 cases made.Altesino Brunello di Montalcino Riserva 2015 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £340.00 -
Alvaro Palacios Priorat Aubaguetes 2020 (3x75cl)
In Bond: £570.00 -
Vinous (96)
Full ruby-red. Mineral-accented red and dark berry preserve, incense and exotic spice aromas are complemented by suggestions of licorice and candied violet. Seamless and penetrating on the palate, showing superb clarity to sweet, mineral-inflected black raspberry, cherry cola, spicecake and violet pastille flavors. The mineral quality echoes emphatically on the youthfully tannic, impressively long finish, which shows outstanding energy and floral lift.Alvaro Palacios Priorat Finca Dofi 2018 (3x75cl)
In Bond: £126.00 -
Alvaro Palacios Priorat Finca Dofi 2020 (3x75cl)
In Bond: £126.00 -
Alvaro Palacios Priorat L'Ermita 2020 (3x75cl)
In Bond: £1,800.00 -
Alvaro Palacios Rioja Quinon de Valmira 2020 (3x75cl)
In Bond: £594.00 -
Wine Advocate (97)
From a warm and sunny vintage that produced darkly concentrated fruit, the Tenuta Guado al Tasso 2017 Bolgheri Superiore Guado al Tasso is a teaser and a super pleaser. This is one flashy wine. This carefully calculated blend of 65% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Cabernet Franc and 15% Merlot pours from the bottle with a beautifully saturated and rich color. I double-decanted my sample before writing this review, and the wine's aromas showed immediate harmony and intensity. The wine seduces and flirts with all your senses. This vintage caps many years of study regarding blending: The Merlot is slightly decreased here, and the Cabernet Franc is slowly taking on a more important supporting role. The Petit Verdot that was used as a peppery accent two years ago has now been removed altogether. The results are pliant, seamless and fluid, and that's the big takeaway here. The wine is bountiful, round, supple and full-bodied. Unless you are decidedly not a fan of this style, there's nothing not to love. I had anticipated more tightness in terms of possible hot-vintage tannins, but I am very pleased by the general integration of the mouthfeel. The Guado al Tasso vineyards are located not too far from the sea, at a low elevation of about 60 meters above sea level. The soils are alluvial with a unique mix of limestone clay and sand, with pockets of rocks and are generally known as the Bolgheri Agglomerate. Some 120,000 bottles of this vintage hit the market in February 2020.Antinori Guado Al Tasso 2017 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £465.00 -
Wine Advocate (100)
The 2018 Ausone is a blend of 60% Cabernet Franc and 40% Merlot. Deep garnet-purple in color, rather predictably, the nose is almost completely shut-down on first sniff, taking considerable aeration to begin to reveal its jaw-dropping perfume of ripe black cherries, wild blueberries and plum preserves, leading to suggestions of candied violets, molten chocolate, licorice and crushed rocks with subtle cedar and pencil lead hints. The medium to full-bodied palate (14.5% alcohol) is so tightly wound and nuanced at this stage, it requires a lot of focus unravel all that is going on here. In short: a lot. The ripe, rich, black and blue fruit layers eventually give way to the beautifully cerebral earthy/minerally subtext, carried by fantastically well-knit tension, delivering an incredibly long, foundation-shaking finish. If the earth doesn't move when you drink this, you're probably not doing it right.Ausone 2018 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £3,685.00 -
Wine Advocate (96)
The full name of this estate is Baricci Colombaio Montosoli, and indeed it is one of the protagonists of the celebrated Montosoli vineyard. The Baricci 2015 Brunello di Montalcino is highly distinguished by its mineral side (with marl, marine fossil, schist quartz and Galestro soils), and that is truly the magic of this wine. There is a pungent note of raw grape at first, but it lifts to reveal forest berry, camphor ash and subtle touches of sweet spice. These elements come together like a tightly fitted mosaic. The wine is balanced and fresh, with just enough structure to add firmness and considerable length to its polished mid-weight frame. In fact, mouthfeel is this wine's strongest suit. Acidity is never a problem in Montosoli, located on the north side of Montalcino where day and night temperature shifts play an important role in slow fruit ripening. This warm vintage shows higher extract, but the overall balance allowed Baricci to bottle using very little sulfur (which could account for that little tangy note you get on first nose). The wine went into bottle in July 2019, and 15,000 bottles were made. It was released in January 2020.Baricci Brunello di Montalcino 2015 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £260.00 -
James Suckling (94-95)
This is classically structured with a wonderful finish of extremely polished tannins and an ultra long finish. So much blackcurrant, spice and cedar. Seamless. 70% cabernet sauvignon and 26% merlot, the rest cabernet franc and petit verdot.Batailley 2020 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £202.50 -
Decanter (96)
Rich plum colour. This takes its time to open, is pretty subtle at first, but then explodes in juicy fruit. Clear salinity where you can feel the slate scrape of the limestone terroir, alongside well expressed aromatics with touches of peony flowers. Elegant and succulent. Second vintage with Jean de Cournuaud as technical director. A yield of 46hl/ha. 65% new oak, with a mix of barrels and 20hl casks. 3.77pH. Harvest 18-21 September, with all the Merlots in 3.5 days instead of the usual 11 days (and in fact stretched over one month in 2018), with just 20 minutes from picking to vat. Thomas Duclos consultant.Beau-Sejour Becot 2019 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £260.50 -
Bernard & Thierry Glantenay Volnay Caillerets 2011 (12x75cl)
In Bond: £444.00 -
Jeb Dunnuck (95-97+)
Showing beautifully both times I was able to taste it, the 2018 Château Beychevelle checks in as a blend of 50% Merlot, 41% Cabernet Sauvignon, 6% Petit Verdot, and the rest Cabernet Franc that's aging in 60% new French oak. This ultra-pure, refined, gorgeously layered Beychevelle offers terrific notes of black cherries, blackberries, cassis, violets, and damp earth. Deep, concentrated, and layered on the palate, it has a thrilling sense of purity and elegance as well as building structure. This is the third vintage vinified in the new cellar, and the 2018 represents a selection of 50% of the total production. It hit 14.5% alcohol with a healthy pH of 3.74 and a massive IPT of 81. Hats off to director Romain Ducolomb for another brilliant wine that I suspect will surpass both the 2015 and 2016!Beychevelle 2018 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £418.50 -
Jeb Dunnuck (95-97)
Based on 51% Cabernet Sauvignon, 45% Merlot, and 4% Petit Verdot, the Grand Vin 2020 Château Beychevelle is a stunner that does everything right, offering a monster bouquet of black and blue fruits as well as candied violets, incense, flowers, and toasty oak. A ripe, full-bodied, incredibly sexy wine in every sense, it has a great mid-palate, ripe, velvety tannins, no hard edges, and a great finish. It's one of the more up-front, exotic wines in the vintage and should be accessible with just short-term cellaring.Beychevelle 2020 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £404.50 -
James Suckling (99)
What intense aromas of cherries and raspberries! Then it turns to flowers and orange peel. Roses, too. This is really full and powerful with layers of ripe tannins. It’s super fine-tannined, but shows wonderful length and intensity. A great expression of Lamole in Chianti Classico with ancient vines. Some older than 100 years. Best ever? Superb. Try after 2024 and onwards.Bibi Graetz Colore 2018 (3x75cl)
In Bond: £380.00 -
Decanter (100)
Finely textured, with a nuanced perfume that fills the glass and takes you to the intense underbrush of Tuscany. Succulent and yet savoury, this has a lilting freshness that is overlaid with ripe berry fruits, sage and white pepper spice, and clear minerality in terms of its scraping texture that makes your mouth water on the finish. Feels light and sculpted and yet has an intensity that skewers you to the spot. This is a great wine, with scope and imagination that doesn't want to let you go. Genuinely stands out among the wines of this tasting, and these are a fine array of wines. As with Colore, Bibi Graetz selects only old vines, the youngest 50 years old from five different vineyard sites across Tuscany, all farmed organically. Fermentations in open 225l barrels with natural yeasts and manual punch downs.Bibi Graetz Testamatta 2018 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £357.50 -
Vinous (92)
The 2016 Bibian has a tightly-wound bouquet that demands more coaxing than its peers, eventually revealing pure blackberries, raspberry, cedar and light mint aromas. The oak here is nicely integrated. The palate is medium-bodied with fine tannin, very pure and polished with some classy new oak assiduously blended. This is a classy offering and one of the best Cru Bourgeois that I have tasted this vintage. Tasted at the Cru Bourgeois tasting in London.Bibian 2016 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £89.50 -
James Suckling (100)
Its really hard to imagine how a white Brugundy could be more flinty and minerally than this super-concentrated and super-vibrant Chevalier Montrachet. Lovely aromas of lemon blossom, jasmine, tangerine and nectarine, alongside all the stony stuff. Then comes the staggeringly long finish that is totally pure and precise. From Bouchard’s 2.3-hectare holding, which comprises almost a third of the entire Grand Cru site. Drink or hold.Bouchard Pere & Fils Chevalier-Montrachet Grand Cru 2019 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £1,635.00 -
James Suckling (97)
Very attractive aromas of currants, tile and sandalwood with black and red currants. It’s full-bodied with a tight, dense center-palate that remains closed in and tight. Yet there is underlying seriousness and length to this. Perhaps the greatest Branaire-Ducru ever made. Try after 2026.Branaire-Ducru 2018 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £235.00 -
Wine Spectator (95)
Incredible nose of crushed berries, flowers, spices and nuts. Full-bodied, with velvety tannins and a long, long finish. Powerful and solid. Builds on the palate. Give it time.--'95/'96 Bordeaux retrospective. Best after 2009. -JSCalon Segur 1995 (12x75cl) from a splendid and dry cellar, per attached
In Bond: £1,202.00 -
James Suckling (97)
This is one of the most direct and clear Caros in a long time with blue-fruit, violet and sandalwood aromas and flavors. Crushed-stone, too. Full-bodied, yet tight and contracted with a level of shyness to its strength. The length derives from the excellence of the cabernet. One for the cellar. Blend of 74% malbec and 26% cabernet sauvignon. Try after 2023, but exciting to drink all the same.Caro 2017 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £199.00 -
James Suckling (95-96)
The purity of fruit is so enticing here with strawberries, flowers, lavender and currants. Black earth, too. Some stone and cement. It’s full-bodied with firm, fine tannins. It shows so much cabernet sauvignon character. It’s 68% cabernet sauvignon, 27% merlot and the rest cabernet franc.Carruades de Lafite 2019 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £1,147.50 -
Vinous (98)
Castellare's I Sodi di San Niccolò is the single most overlooked high-end wine in Tuscany today. The 2016 picks up where the 2015 left off. A rush of inky dark fruit, lavender, spice, licorice, gravel, blueberry and menthol builds as the 2016 shows off its exceptional balance and pedigree. Readers will have to be patient, as the 2016 needs a few years in bottle to fully come together. Even so, the 2016 has been nothing less than spectacular on the two occasions I have tasted it so far. In a word: monumental.Castellare I Sodi Di San Niccolo 2016 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £256.00 -
Wine Advocate (98)
The 2018 Malbec Catena Zapata Nicasia Vineyard, from a vineyard planted in Altamira in 1996 from an old massal selection, has contained ripeness, reflecting the less warm vintage (after 2017). The grapes were picked very early but with good ripeness because of the low yields in a very dry year. It fermented in open-top barrels with 100% full clusters and indigenous yeasts and matured in 500-liter oak barrels. It's a balanced and elegant Malbec with some restraint and a very fine thread in the palate, with really fine tannins. It follows the path of the phenomenal 2017, fine and elegant. 12,000 bottles produced. It was bottled in May 2020.Catena Zapata Nicasia Malbec 2018 (6x75cl)
In Bond: £310.00 -
James Suckling (100)
This is really exuberant at this stage with fantastic aromas of honeysuckle, salt, chalk and dried apples and pears. Full body. Dense, vivid fruit with a linear frame of wonderful, energetic acidity. The energy and length just goes on for minutes. Soulful white. Argentina’s answer to Montrachet. Stares you straight in the eyes. Drink or hold.Catena Zapata White Bones Chardonnay 2018 (3x75cl)
In Bond: £210.00 -
James Suckling (98)
A very subtle yet intense White Stones on the nose with stone, bone, lemon-rind and dried-apple aromas that follow through to a full body that is very tight and closed, but shows a compact fruit structure of sliced mangoes and cooked apples. Vivid finish, turning to flamboyant minerality. In reserve still. Better in 2022.Catena Zapata White Stones Chardonnay 2018 (3x75cl)
In Bond: £200.00 -
Wine Advocate (99)
The amazing 2019 White Stones Chardonnay comes from a select group of 27 rows planted on lot I of the Adriana Vineyard, and the composition of those rows is soil with white oval stones covered by gravel. The Adriana Vineyard is planted at an altitude of almost 1,500 meters above sea level, in the district of Gualtallary in Tupungato. The stony soil prevents deep root growth, providing optimum drainage. This soil, which is very poor in organic matter, contributes to the vines' permanent stress conditions. The cool nights allow for very slow ripening, optimal acid retention and low yields. This is always a more austere wine than the White Bones, more mineral and restrained, less aromatic, with great balance, a little higher in alcohol and with very good acidity, rounder and more Meursault than Chablis but still with citrus freshness and pungent flavors and always some spice (curry) because of the aging in barrel with flor. This year, the two whites show a more marked personality, possibly aided by the style of the cooler year but also because the winery has a better understanding of the places. It's still very young and undeveloped; it's drinkable now, but with more time in bottle, it should develop greater complexity. Now the finish shows acidity and salt, which make it very vibrant. 6,600 bottles were filled in May 2020.Catena Zapata White Stones Chardonnay 2019 (3x75cl)
In Bond: £200.00 -
Wine Advocate(Robert Parker) (100)
The 2011 Ermitage Cuvee de l’Oree comes from a lieu-dit known as Les Murets planted with 80- to 90-year-old Marsanne vines. The bouquet offers up scents of Asian spices, lychee nuts, white currant liqueur and peach and apricot marmalade. This stunning, honeyed, flamboyant white is perfection in a glass. Drink it over the next half century.Chapoutier Ermitage De L'Oree Blanc 2011 (6x75cl) Ex-Domaine
In Bond: £1,102.50 -
Wine Advocate (99)
The 2012 Ermitage Cuvee de l'Oree is still firing on all cylinders, sporting heavenly notes of powdered rock, white flowers, honeyed orange blossom, white currants and a saltiness that keeps you coming back to the glass. Full-bodied, voluptuous and decadent, drink it anytime over the coming 2-3 decades.Chapoutier Ermitage De L'Oree Blanc 2012 (6x75cl) As per photos ,1770453
In Bond: £1,022.00
