Reorder Your Favorite Wines

The 2006 Valenciso Rioja Reserva tantalizes the nose with savory scents of dark woodland berries, black cherry, mulberry, sandalwood, cinnamon, and more. On the palate, layers of complex, soft, silky fruit flavors lend polish and panache to the wine’s substantial underpinning, which will allow the 2006 Valenciso Reserva to age gracefully for a decade or more. Valenciso’s Reserva strikes a perfect balance between fruit and structure, which has earned this offering the accolades of all major wine critics, including Wine Advocate.

The 2009 Sassolino is a rich, complex Super Tuscan-style blend of both considerable fruit and firm structure that proudly pays homage to winemaker Alessio Carli’s Tuscan heritage and re-affirms Pietra Santa’s unequivocal success with Sangiovese. Sassolino exhibits an enticing bouquet and luscious flavors reminiscent of cranberry, Bing cherry, and plum infused with hints of anise and wood smoke. Full, but polished, it fills the mouth with crushed berry and spice flavors, a smooth texture, and a long, lingering finish.

From one of the finest and most consistent producers of Verdejo comes the vibrant 2011 Nidia Verdejo, exhibiting a vibrant bouquet and flavor: a mélange of orchard fruits and citrus infused with clean mineral tones. Delicate, savory flavors emerge and carry over into the wine’s smooth, racy frame, allowing Nidia’s Verdejo to deliver substantial mouth feel, yet remain crisp and refreshing. Medium-bodied but long on varietal character, this is one easy wine to drink. It’s both ethereal and savory, all at the same time.

Morgadío’s 2011 Albariño Rías Baixas comes across as both brilliant and precise, exhibiting sophisticated fruit flavors and pinpoint minerality. Dry, pure, and beautifully scented, it exudes an aroma of freshly picked apples and pears and fills the mouth with fresh, racy flavors before finishing crisp and bracing. This is a wine for people who appreciate a truly dry, statuesque white wine of breed, flavor, and noble bearing that will continue to develop in bottle for at least another year or two.

Sergio Gomba’s 2008 Querciola Barolo combines elegance and prodigious power. The result is a classic, long lived Barolo of tremendous depth. The 2008 Querciola is extraordinarily deep in color, and with extended aeration the wine blossoms in the glass, presenting the scents and savors of wild berries, forest woodlands, and aromatic herbs. Great fruit is layered into strong ripe tannins, which makes for a balanced, polished, and complete Barolo that will offer outstanding drinking for up to two decades.

Bodegas Gormaz’s 2011 Ribera del Duero Tempranillo more than lives up to the estate’s growing reputation for delivering delicious, fruit forward wines. This old vine Tempranillo sports a dark, captivating robe of regal purple, but even more enthralling is the wine’s voluptuous bouquet, which is resplendent with the scents of ripe dark berries, spring woodlands, and wild herbs. Richly fruity and loaded with flavor, this youthful, opulent and ripe offering fills the mouth, making it a true pleasure to drink from start to finish.

Château Barreyre is one of the finest petits châteaux in Bordeaux and 2009 was one of the finest vintages in Bordeaux on record, so our tasting panel’s expectations were high. The 2009 Château Barreyre did not disappoint, offering a bold aroma of cassis and ripe red berries, deftly laced with enticing floral tones. Balanced and superbly structured, with plush ripe tannins that will allow for further maturation (if you have the patience), each sip brings a complex mix of nuanced flavors reminiscent of black cherry, cedar, and vanilla.

Bright and radiant like the Campanian sun, FiaGre offers a thoroughly captivating bouquet, which is as alluring as the scent of the sea and as fresh as a splash of sea spray. Add in hints of acacia flower, clove, and quince and it will be difficult to take your nose out of a glass of FiaGre. Yet, the best is yet to come. Caggiano’s 2011 FiaGre explodes in the mouth with the brisk flavors we found so mesmerizing in its bouquet. Clean, long flavors fill the mouth and tingle on the tongue, before exiting with a flourish.