MoneyWeek

2012 Barolo, Bricco delle Viole, G.D. Vajra, Piemonte, Italy

I have just published a massive review of three years of my tasting notes covering the two greatest red wine styles in Italy, Barolo and Barbaresco.  The Piemonte Report 2017 (£24.00, www.matthewjukes.com) is 68000 words long and it features 147 wineries and over 850 wines.  I believe that this is the last great region in the world to be ‘discovered’. …
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2014 Post Scriptum de Chryseia, Prats & Symington, Douro, Portugal

The red wines from this historic Port-making estate are utterly fascinating.  This joint venture between Bruno Prats (former owner of Château Cos d’Estournel) and the Symington Family (owners of Graham’s, Dow’s, Warre’s and Cockburn’s) is bearing remarkable fruit.  I visited the estate recently and was astounded at the quality of red wine…
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2009 Château Lafon-Rochet, 4ème Cru, Saint-Estèphe, Bordeaux, France

Bordeaux, as a region, seems to lack the romance of Burgundy and the wildness of the Rhône.  Instead it puts up with empty Châteaux, with their shutters drawn, little joy on the gastronomic front outside of the City itself and relatively uninspiring countryside.  The famous wines are invariably expensive and so many of us look elsewhere for charming,…
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2015 Trinity Hill, Gimblett Gravels Chardonnay, Hawke’s Bay, New Zealand

There is a delicious game that we in the wine trade are invited to play when visiting confident / cocky wineries.  It’s a game of blind tasting and the stakes are always high.  When a winemaker, such as the great Warren Gibson at Trinity Hill, puts his Chardonnay up against a host of massively respected and eye-wateringly expensive white Burgundies,…
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2013 La Violetta, Up! Shiraz, Great Southern, Western Australia

Cool climate Aussie Shiraz is taking the world by storm and this is one of the finest I have tasted.  It was six years ago when I first wrote up a wine from this estate in my 100 Best Australian Wines Report and I still remember the vivid flavour of 2008 La Ciornia Shiraz today.  Up! is cut from a similar cloth with heady, intense, pheromonal appeal…
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2015 Yealands Estate, Single Vineyard Pinot Noir, Awatere Valley, Marlborough, New Zealand

Peter Yealands is apparently a ‘can do’ man.  I have never really understood what this means but he has certainly built a number of very successful companies over the years and his exploits in the wine world are to be greatly admired.  I attended the annual New Zealand tasting the other day and only a handful of tables shone with complete portfolios…
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2015 Côtes-du-Rhône Blanc, Les Gendrines, Domaine Pierre Gaillard, Northern Rhône, France

I promised to keep you updated with rare bottles of Viognier which pass muster on the proviso that you follow my lead and do not deviate for fear of cataclysmic disappointment.  Well, I have a fantastic wine to restore some of your faith in this wayward grape variety.  Gaillard is one of my original ‘Three Musketeers’ – when I visited the Rhône,…
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2016 Whispering Angel, Sacha Lichine, Caves d’Esclans, Côtes de Provence, France

FVD is offering this extraordinary wine en primeur until 28th February and I am told that these prices represent a significant saving on the eventual retail pricing structure for this terrific vintage.  Whispering Angel is the world’s most famous rosé and it has an unenviable task set before it each year – to raise its own bar in order in order…
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2014 Berry Bros. & Rudd Puligny-Montrachet by Jean-Louis Chavy, Burgundy, France

This column is published at the end of the UK wine trade’s annual ‘Burgundy En Primeur week’.  This is our chance to taste a huge range of Burgundies, which are newly bottled and/or still slumbering in oak barrels.  The vintage that was under the microscope this week was 2015 and judging by the early released, generic Bourgogne Blancs and Rouges…
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2013 Deep Woods Estate, Redlands Cabernet / Shiraz, Margaret River, Western Australia

I was delighted to be invited back for a second year in a row to be the international judge at the Royal Adelaide Wine Show, in late September last year, and over the course of a week I managed to taste well over six hundred bottles of wine.  You might be surprised to hear that judging wine at elite wine competitions is an exhausting task, but spending…
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2012 Gigondas, Domaine Saint Gayan, Southern Rhône, France

I ‘live’ in the Southern Rhône over the festive period, particularly when negotiating the multitude of groaning cheese boards and heaving platters of roast beef which I am delighted to encounter on a daily basis.  Classic, meaty, swarthy and unshaven, this Gigglejuice is a heroic concoction seemingly fashioned for Orcs and Ogres to slake their…
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NV Doyard, Cuvée Vendémiaire, Premier Cru Blanc de Blancs, Champagne, France

I travelled up to Wine Rack in Haverstock Hill the other day to run through a range of wines which were being pitched for my various Christmas columns.  It was a pretty good tasting and just before I left, buyer Susan McCraith MW opened a bottle of fizz, on a whim, and it stopped me in my tracks.  You will know that I am horribly cynical about big…
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