Wines

96 Points! Also yet to be released is the 2019 Barolo Riserva Cerretta Vigna Bricco, which is deep and expressive of this structured vintage and textbook Serralunga power. It’s sanguine and deep with notes of leather, ripe cherries, dark stony earth, sage, and floral perfume. Fabulous all around, it fills the palate with rich, well-defined tannins, gravelly angular texture, refreshing acidity, and savory notes of tea leaf and truffle on the finish. It’s a contemplative wine built to last the long haul over the next several decades. - Audrey Frick, jebdunnuck.com

95 Points! The Elio Altare 2019 Barolo Riserva Cerretta shows some tertiary definition with aromas of sambuca, licorice, tar and campfire ash. But it also has a sweet side from the oak, with dusty cinnamon and dried fruit. It is full-bodied with velvety tannins, closing with a hint of sweet cherry liqueur. - Monica Larner, robertparker.com

Grown, harvested and fermented by the famed Hospices de Nuits, then aged, finished and bottled by the great Emmanuel Rouget in his cellars with his barrels. The cuvée ‘St Julien, Plateaux’, sourced from two different sites in Nuits, offers a deeper, darker hue. This rich wine requires more time to reveal itself and is tauter on the finish and has longer cellaring potential. Rouget's domaine Nuits sells for $300, this one for a little more than half that!

97 Points! This has rich dark-fruit and smoky character with notes of ripe plums, black olives, spices, cocoa and clay-like soil. Some sweet tobacco, too. Full body, layers of fine, polished tannins and a round, creamy texture. Pure fruit with a touch of blue flowers. Rich and complex, yet fresh and delicious. Long and firm with a polished, earthy finish. Really impressive and rather decadent at the end. Le Pin-like. Try after 2025. - James Suckling, jamessuckling.com

98 Points! The 2019 Enclos Tourmaline is a tiny production Pomerol coming from a one-hectare vineyard beside Clinet. It's a rich, powerful, yet incredibly elegant Pomerol that does everything right, offering beautiful cassis and darker cherry fruits, notes of cedarwood, spicy oak, and chocolate, full-bodied richness, silky tannins, and a great finish. It marries opulence with finesse perfectly and is one heck of an impressive Pomerol that can be drunk any time over the coming 25 years or so. Pomerol was one of the standout appellations in 2019, and this shows it. - Jeb Dunnuck

98 Points! More iron, red fruits, tobacco, and obvious minerality emerge from the 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon Stones No. 1, a 100% Cabernet Sauvignon from a site on Pritchard Hill (Montagna). Aged 22 months in new barrels, it’s full-bodied, rich, and powerful, with serious tannins as well as concentration. It needs to be forgotten for 7-8 years if possible. This is serious, age-worthy Cabernet Sauvignon. - Jeb Dunnuck

99 Points! A wine that flirts with perfection is the 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon Stones No. 2, which is all Cabernet Sauvignon from Pritchard Hill. It has a more Mountain vibe in its structure and minerality and gives up lots of red and black fruits, iron, tobacco, and savory, almost bloody aromas and flavors. A monster on the palate, it’s full-bodied, deep, and incredibly concentrated, yet stays balanced, has incredible purity and freshness, and a great, great finish. It needs bottle age, but it’s brilliant juice. - Jeb Dunnuck

99 Points! The 2019 Stones Longitude-Latitude, an even split of Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon, is another deep, rich, layered wine with a beautiful sense of elegance and finesse, no doubt due to the high quantity of Cabernet Franc. Cassis, violets, resinous herbs, and exotic flower notes all define the nose, and it’s pure, seamless, and balanced as they come, with perfect tannins. It too will have over two decades of longevity. - Jeb Dunnuck

95 Points! The 2019 Faugères is one of the most elegant wines I have ever tasted from Silvio Denz's Saint-Émilion estate. Silky, aromatic and super-expressive, Faugères is absolutely exquisite. Crushed red berry fruit, mint, dried flowers and cinnamon are some of the many nuances that open in the glass. There is plenty of the textural richness readers have come to expect over the years, but the 2019 is less over the top than some previous vintages. And that's a good thing. - Antonio Galloni, Vinous

95 Points! A full-bodied red with fine tannins and plenty of plum, milk-chocolate and walnut aromas and flavors. It’s creamy and attractively textured. Rather flamboyant for the vintage. Generous and formed. - JamesSuckling.com

93 Points! The red blend 2019 Pacio Tinto was produced with Brancellao, Merenzao Caíño Longo, Sousón and Mencía grapes that fermented in granite lagars with indigenous yeasts. The wine matured in used 500-liter oak barrels and has a very Ribeira Sacra character, mixing rusticity with elegance, wilderness with restraint. It's medium-bodied with fine tannins, pure flavors and a long, clean finish. - Luis Gutierrez, robertparker.com

93 Points! Plums with orange peel and orange blossom on the nose. The palate is medium-bodied with fine tannins that are polished and curated with lovely tension and texture. Drinkable now but will age nicely. Shows tension at the end. Drink or hold. - JamesSuckling.com

From the winery: I selected clone 548 Chardonnay from Peake Ranch for its tendency towards focused citrus flavors and distinctive minerality. After hand picking at night, the fruit was gently pressed as whole clusters, the juice was settled overnight, then transferred to barrels for a native fermentation. The slow conversion of grape sugars gives complexity and increased mouthfeel. A lengthy primary and secondary ferment was encouraged by occasional stirring of the yeast lees. Like an “old world” Chardonnay from an esteemed vineyard, this wine hid its true qualities for months in the barrel. Allowing the wine to develop gradually before bottling in the spring, after the next vintage, let this late bloomer shine.

From the winery: The first grapes for Fennell Family Wines, the Pinot Noir from Peake Ranch, were just beautiful. Made from two very complementary clonal selections of Pinot: clone 667 provides excellent structure, dark fruits and richness, and clone 115 gives bright red fruits, spice, and high-toned floral aromatics. After hand picking at night, the fruit was destemmed with whole clusters added in layers for complexity. Cold soaking in open-top bins provided slow extraction before fermentation began naturally. Gentle punch downs allowed the tannin profile to build while cooling the warm, fermenting cap. The wine was pressed shortly after dryness and moved to barrels for malolactic fermentation and aging. Bottled after ten months in barrel, this wine has developed well with time in bottle.

93+ Points! Dark depths of crushed plums, black cherries, balsam herbs and dark chocolate form a beguiling display as the 2019 Nero d'Avola Vrucara smolders up from the glass. This is pure elegance, silky and textural, yet full of youthful tension, with tart wild berries and zesty citrus colliding under an air of inner rose. The 2019 is structured with sweet tannins and is dramatically extended, showing hints of brown spice, mocha and clove that linger on and on and on. This is a powerful rendition of Vrucara. - Eric Guido, Vinous Media

92 Points! Darkly alluring, almost smokey in nature, the 2019 Rosso Granomelo tempts the senses with a complex blend of black currants, exotic spice, air-dried meats and crushed rocks. This seems to hover across the palate, lifted and finessed, with rose-tinged red berries that slowly take on a more savory profile as saline-mineral tones form toward the close. The 2019 lingers with impressive length and is potent, blending wild herbs with black fruits and blood orange hints that slowly fade to leave behind a fine web of tannin. - Eric Guido, Vinous Media

99 Points! The 2019 Figeac is without question one of the wines of the vintage. All the promise it showed as a young barrel sample, is all there in bottle, too. Estate Director Frédéric Faye crafted a towering, statuesque Figeac built on vertical energy and a feeling of vibrancy that never lets up. Deep layers of red/purplish fruit, cedar, tobacco, mint and dried flowers are framed by a super-classic expression of structure that keeps things in balance. There is a bit more Cabernet Franc in this year's blend, and that definitely comes through. Readers who can find the 2019 should not hesitate, as it is truly majestic. - Antonio Galloni, Vinous Media

98 Points! The 2019 Château Figeac checks in as 36% Cabernet Franc, 34% Cabernet Sauvignon, and 30% Merlot, and it's another brilliant wine from Frédéric Faye. This deep purple-hued effort offers a beautiful Pauillac-like bouquet of ripe black cherries, cassis, damp earth, leafy herbs, chocolate, and smoked tobacco. It has classic Figeac herbal, earthy goodness (no doubt due to its high percentage of Cabernet) and is medium to full-bodied on the palate, has perfect tannins and flawless balance, all making for a brilliant Saint-Emilion that brings richness and power paired with finesse and elegance. Give bottles 4-5 years, count yourself lucky, and enjoy over the following 30+. - Jeb Dunnuck

98 Points! The 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon Walla Walla Valley Estate has a Mouton-like vibe in its ripe, sexy red and black currants as well as notes of chocolate, tobacco leaf, truffle, and damp earth. Much more broad, round, and expansive compared to the Red Mountain release, it has supple, velvety tannins, no hard edges, and a great finish. It's not far off the heavenly 2018 and will shine for 30 years as well. Readers will love being able to compare these two great vintages over the coming decades. - Jeb Dunnuck

95 Points! These village-specific wines are growing in popularity, and among the various expressions on the market today, this wine from Verduno is really quite special thanks to its highly distinctive floral aromas and its delicate sense of inner balance. A new project being inaugurated with this vintage, the Fratelli Alessandria 2019 Barolo del Comune di Verduno shows a fine, streamlined mouthfeel with polished tones of river stone, crushed rose and licorice root. The aromas are refined and fragile. - Monica Larner, robertparker.com

96+ Points! The 2019 Barolo Gramolere (with 7,000 bottles made) shows a slightly sweeter and riper fruit profile. This wine comes from the village of Monforte d'Alba, which is known for more structured and powerful wines compared to Verduno (where this winery is based), which offers lighter, more floral wines instead. Gramolere shows dark fruit, plum and spice, but it also has a pretty mineral note of rust or iron. However, within this portfolio, this wine may well deliver the longest drinking window. - Monica Larner, robertparker.com

97 Points! A recurrent question with amply aged Italian classic reds like Barolo and Brunello di Montalcino is whether or not the extra ageing stipulations in place for the Riserva categories are truly necessary; it can often seem as if younger versions have the edge on older, 'grander' wines, since they show brighter fruit structures. This 2019 Riserva illustrates the benefits of extra age. It's pale, now, with some gentle bricking at the meniscus; the aromas are refined and harmonious, packed not just with red fruits but with autumnal warmth and oak-copse charm, as if the wine was evoking the landscape in which it came into being. On the tongue, it's still quite grandly structured and clearly has further development ahead; look behind those succulent if ample tannins, though, and you'll find beautifully articulated fruit supported by deft redcurrant acidity. Grand Barolo from this outstanding vintage. - Decanter World Wine Awards

93 Points! In the bottle with the red wax capsule, the Fratelli Serio & Battista Borgogno 2019 Barolo Riserva Cannubi shows a hint of tertiary definition with faded fruit, autumnal leaf and black tea. The wine is finely knit in terms of mouthfeel, and you get a slightly textured effect with granular tannins. Fruit is selected from one part, the Vigna Battista, of the three parcels farmed in Cannubi, with southern exposures on sand, silt and clay. That limestone sand is what adds the special finesse to Cannubi fruit, typically, although climate change has complicated things. - Monica Larner, robertparker.com