Georgie Hindle had big shoes to fill when she took over from Jane Anson as Decanter’s Bordeaux correspondent in 2021. Here she talks about how she fell for the region and what it’s really like working as a wine critic I’ve written this having just finished my second en primeur report for Decanter magazine. Four weeks of…
Andrew Jefford isn’t like other wine writers. Browse his Instagram account and you’ll find not a bottle in sight. Check his Twitter and you’ll find a steady, quiet stream of haiku – or, as he prefers to describe them, “short texts”. These feeds are – like Jefford – gently honest; absent of ego, flash and fanfare. His prose…
Champagne is making a comeback. In 2011, Champagne held just one percent of the total market trade share. By 2018, this number had risen to eight percent. Why is Champagne gaining on the market? In part, the rise is due to a spate of excellent Champagne ratings and reviews from top wine critics. Recent releases like the 2008 Louis Roederer Cristal are receiving perfect scores from notable experts and this is driving up the value of Champagne as a category.
While you can show that certain vintages, labels, or producers are better than others using metrics like tasting scores, price performance, and bottle value, ranking the top-rated California Cabernet is still a subjective process. In this guide, we’ve identified some of the highest quality producers, vintages, and wine labels on the market today. While these rankings are by no means definitive, they are designed to help you gain a better understanding of which wines most collectors find worthwhile so you can add top-quality Cabernet to your collection.
Like a stone thrown into a pond, the ripples of wine fraud impact more than just one collector’s cellar. What happens when a professional wine reviewer can’t tell a fake bottle from a real one by taste? Collectors rely on professional reviews for accuracy, but when these reviews are compromised by fraud, it’s virtually impossible…
Wine seller John Kapon recently reviewed two DRC jeroboams, giving the 1999 vintage a high score of 96. There was just one problem: the wine was corked. Kapon admitted this in his review, but claimed he could taste around the flaw. He wrote, “The quality of the raw materials was clear, present, and dangerous.” But…