Wine & Spirits - Fall 2022 - 98

TOP 100 WINES
in stainless steel, then ages half of the lot in
amphora and the other half in older French
oak. There's a wildness to this wine, there in
the scents of fraises de bois and fruity woodland
mushrooms, lasting in the sting of acidity.
It's great Burgundy imagined as it once
was, and even as it's completely present in
the contemporary climate. -J.G. § North
Berkeley Imports, Berkeley, CA
BEST CORSICa
95 | Clos Canarelli
$51
2019 Corse Figari Yves Canarelli grew this
wine at his estate in Tarabucetta, at the southern
tip of Corsica, where ocean breezes blow
across the granite hillsides, thickening grape
skins and helping to keep disease at bay in
his biodynamically farmed vineyards. Mainly
niellucciu, with splashes of syrah and sciaccarellu,
it's an intense red in 2019, youthful and
tight, with vise-grip tannins wrapping around
violet-scented fruit. Fermented and aged in
foudres for 14 to 18 months, the wine has a
sense of size without weight, wanting time to
relax in the cellar and fill in the details. The
hints of herbs and red-berry fruit that come
up with air are just the beginning. -T.Q.T. §
Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant, Berkeley, CA
BEST MINERVOIS
BEST PROVENCE ROSÉ
days after opening, opulent in a stand-offish
way. Of course, we opened it years before its
prime-so you don't have to. Better to wait
at least another ten years, or even twenty.
-T.Q.T. § Vintus, NY
BEST HERMITaGE
96 | Domaines Ott
$65
2021 Bandol Château Romassan Rosé ^ Château
Romassan sits at the foot of the hilltop
village Le Castellet, a few miles north of the
Bay of Bandol. The Otts rely on mourvèdre
for the bulk of their rosé (this one includes
30 percent cinsault and 15 percent grenache),
and, though 2021 was another hot summer
here, Romassan's poor limestone and sandstone
soils produced a deeply savory wine.
This pale Bandol seems to have inhaled the
local scrubland and seaside breezes, presenting
that savory edge alongside husk cherry,
grapefruit and pale melon flavors. Firm and
versatile, it would pair nicely with anything
from bouillabaisse to a Niçoise salad; or take
it abroad alongside chicken yakitori. -C.W. §
Maisons Marques & Domaines, Oakland, CA
RHONE: BEST ST-JOSEPH
95 | Château Maris
$22
2019 Minervois La Livinière La Touge
Robert Eden pulls this wine from his biodynamically
tended vineyards in the rocky,
windy highlands of La Livinière. A blend of
syrah with grenache and carignan, it's a wine
you can sink your teeth into, and it responds
with juicy black fruit, spicy and fresh, and
notes of mint, licorice and rose. Vinified in
cement eggs and vats, it retains a sense of
cool, stony clarity that brings light to its
darkness and beams them into long-lasting
fragrance. It's at once firmly structured and
ethereal, a balance that makes it addictive as
well as potentially long-lived. -T.Q.T. § Cordier,
New Rochelle, NY
97 | E. Guigal
96 | Domaine du Terme $30
2019 Gigondas ^ Spectacular Gigondas, this
wine's red-cherry flavors soar on an arc of
cool, fresh acidity. A grounding of garrigue
and ferrous minerality tethers the wine to
the earth, gives it a sense of continuity and
quiet power, but the overall impression is of
fruit at moment of peak ripeness, preserved
with crystal clarity. It's made by Anne-Marie
Gaudin, who farms 27 acres in Gigondas, the
vines around 45 years old and grown without
any chemical inputs. -T.Q.T. § Shiverick
Imports, Los Angeles, CA
$75
2018 Saint-Joseph Lieu-Dit ^ Pulled from the
historic heart of the appellation, where the
vines cling to a steep gneiss-based slope, this
is elegant and firm, almost forbidding in its
polished, well-oaked façade. Those mahogany
tones course along lean, firm lines, the
wine compact and concentrated, a nugget
of dense black fruit wrapped in tannins and
lashed with notes of licorice and spice. The
wine in our bottle remained unchanged for
98
WINE & SPIR IT S
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GERMANY WHITE
BEST MOSEl RIESlINGS
95 | Selbach-Oster
96 | Delas Frères
$104
2019 Hermitage Domaine des Tourettes ^
A blend of fruit from the lieux-dits Les
Bessards, Le Sabot and L'Ermite, this 2019
draws together a picture of the Hermitage
hill in all its grandeur and complexity. At its
center, it's bright and juicy, filled with ripe
berry flavors; around the edges, it's stony
and firm, with herbal notes that accent its
cool reserve. It shows some vanilla and spice
tones from its time in oak (a mix of new and
barrels) but the fruit handles it well, absorbing
it into a warm, rich density of flavor. This
should age well for 20 years or more. -T.Q.T. §
Maisons Marques & Domaines, Oakland, CA
BEST GIGONDaS
$32
2020 Mosel Spätlese Zeltinger Schlossberg
Riesling ^ This feels like happy wine,
joyous in its burst of fresh, vivid flavor. The
vibrant acidity and saline notes make it all
the more mouthwatering, adding tang and
https://mmdusa.net/portfolio/domaines-ott/chateau-romassan-bandol-rose/2021 https://mmdusa.net/portfolio/delas-freres/hermitage-domaine-des-tourettes/2019 https://www.chateaumaris.com/wine/la-touge/ https://www.vintus.com/wines/saint-joseph/e-guigal-saint-joseph-2018/
Wine & Spirits - Fall 2022

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