The New Wine Review Weekly: May 12, 2024

đŸ· A rare visit with a wine legend

May 12, 2024

A VISIT TO LÓPEZ DE HEREDIA

NWR’s Senior Correspondent Jason Wilson recently made it to LĂłpez de Heredia—the Rioja estate that is rightly synonymous with the region—where he met with Maria JosĂ© LĂłpez de Heredia, who represents the fourth generation of the family to run the winery.

Along the way, he nails a key irony behind this producer: it is difficult to find one so universally adored—by the traditionalists as well as the new breed of wine lovers and somms—that so clearly flies in the face of what’s loved in wine right now:

  • “In a way, it’s surprising how revered these wines are among younger generations of wine professionals and enthusiasts. They fly in the face of today’s popular styles. These are certainly not glou-glou or chillable reds. LĂłpez de Heredia still proudly embraces oak—and that oak is mostly American, not French. (“We buy the trees in the Appalachian Mountains,” Maria JosĂ© said.) And LĂłpez de Heredia is not a small, artisanal project either. They produce 350,000 bottles per year.”

  • “People talk about market forces. But no, the market never forces us,” said Maria JosĂ©. “All I want to do is the recipe of my great-grandfather and my grandfather. Maybe that’s boring. But for us, that’s important.”

We don’t have to tell you that her wines are never boring. But for more on his visit—including tasting notes, stunning visuals from the cobwebbed cellars, and the tale behind it all—tap or click here.

DESTINATION: CHAMPAGNE

NWR’s Sarah Parker Jang went to Champagne, and discovered the changes in a region in which hospitality and dining were never really the draw.

“It might sound a little silly to say that Champagne is Paris’s best-kept secret. But Reims is just 45 minutes away by high-speed rail from the city,” she writes. ”In the quiet of the rolling green hills of Champagne, you can enjoy a peaceful night’s rest that makes for a welcome change of pace from the hubbub of Paris. Just don’t sleep on the region’s restaurants and wine bars.”

Thanks to Jang’s awesome article, you won’t—whether you want to experience firsthand the place that proves that “there is no burger joint in the world with a better wine list—period, full stop, end of story,” or the restaurant run by the Selosse family—or any of the other exquisite places to dine and stay that she found.

Want the full New Wine Review experience?

EVERYTHING ON A WHISKEY LABEL THAT YOU CAN IGNORE (AND EVERYTHING WORTH PAYING ATTENTION TO)

“Whiskey labels can get crowded with all kinds of text,” writes Whiskey Editor Susannah Skiver Barton. “Very little of it is required to be there.” Come to her excellent piece to learn, ah, the select reserve of words that sound nice but mean absolutely nothing. And stick around to catch her glossary of terms that actually do mean something—which she’ll give you straight up, and at cask strength.

WHAT YOU’RE MISSING IN OUR SUBSCRIBERS-ONLY SLACK COMMUNITY

  • Enderle & Moll: their Pinots, their skin-contact wine, their MĂŒller-Thurgau—or all of it?

  • What to pair when grilling hearty, smokier fare.

  • The most recent bottle on your camera roll. (No cheating or editing allowed!)(Click here to get full access!)

WINE DEAL OF THE WEEK*

Ready for a springtime splurge? We’ve written about our general obsession for Terroir al Límit’s singular expressions of old-vine varieties. Our Jason Wilson called its 2021 Les Manyes—made from a rare variant whose name translates to “hairy grenache”—“unbelievably complex, with delicate, seamless layers of berry, rose, spice, herb, smoke, crushed stone, etched together by incredible freshness and tension. An extraordinary world-class red.” Quantities produced are, alas, tiny, and prices are quite dear, but the 2021 Les Tosses is available here at lowest-in-the-nation pricing.

AROUND THE WINE (AND WHISKEY) WORLD

â˜č California producers are feeling the squeeze. (paywalled)

đŸŽč Beethoven loved wine. Did it make him go deaf?

🔎 Always read the fine print.

📉 Bordeaux en primeur pricing continues to fall. 

đŸ„ƒ  The latest celebrity whiskey is Canadian.

As always, thanks for reading! See you next week for much more.

Santé!

The NWR Editors

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