The Best of German GGs, Plus the Real Rioja: Weekly Tasting Report (Aug 24-30)

Our past week of tastings of 646 wines focused largely on Europe, with James and the team uncorking the last of their Italian stash before heading to New York for our Great Wines of Italy 2022 confab next week, Senior Editor Stuart Pigott tapping into more of Germany's 2021 vintage and Senior Editor Zekun Shuai taking a deeper dive into Rioja. James also took a side trip to Greece, and he'll give us his vinous Hellenic outlook in next week's tasting report.

In Germany, Stuart was focused on the new crop of GGs in his tastings. This category of single-vineyard, varietal dry wines was introduced with the 2001 vintage, so this is the 20th anniversary of their first release. The producers association that regulates the GGs, the VDP, threw a big party on Aug. 20 to celebrate, and they had good reason to do so.

The GGs have revolutionized the way German wines are perceived around the world, enormously enhancing their reputation and waking the world up to the giant leap in quality dry German wines have made since the last turn of the century. “There's no doubt that Germany's equivalent to the Grand Crus of Burgundy have been a great success, even if some wines failed to live up to the German Grand Cru billing," Stuart observed.

That was also the case with some of the 2021 white GGs that were presented to the world's wine media and top sommeliers in Wiesbaden at a separate sneak preview of the vintage on Aug. 22 and 23, also hosted by the VDP, where Stuart’s assessment was that 2021 was “a very heterogeneous vintage that shoots in all kinds of directions, one of which is lean and tart. Riesling GGs that edged in this direction rated well below the stunning 2019s and the best of the 2020s.” However, Stuart added, “You wouldn't have thought that if you had only tasted the rich and texturally complex 2021 GGs from Heymann-Lowenstein in the Terrassenmosel sub-region of the Mosel.”

READ MORE: THE GOOD, THE GREAT AND THE UGLY: GERMANY’S SCHIZOPHRENIC 2020 VINTAGE

Stuart found all six of these wines from the Terrassenmosel (which, as its name implies, is terraced) to be very impressive, rating the super-mineral and very focused Heyman-Lowenstein Riesling Mosel Uhlen Roth Lay 2021 as one of the stars of the vintage.

The GG sneak preview also brought a great surprise in the form of a breathtaking chardonnay. "With the recent string of excellent vintages, the leading producers of chardonnay in Germany have made considerable progress, but the Bernhard Huber Chardonnay Baden Schlossberg GG 2020 takes this to a new level,” Stuart commented. “I didn't see that coming!”

He also tasted a handful of amazing chardonnays from the grape's Burgundian homeland at an unusual tasting organized by the Gut Hermannsberg winery in the Nahe region that compared their dry rieslings from the 2017 vintage to top white Burgundies.

The best wine at this tasting was the extremely ripe but beautifully proportioned Domaine Jacques Prieur Montrachet Grand Cru 2017.

"Of course, comparing riesling with chardonnay is like comparing apples with oranges," Stuart said, "but if you taste a powerful and austerely flinty white Burgundy like the Domaine Bonneau du Martray Corton Charlemagne Grand Cru 2017 next to the no less intensely mineral and firmly structured Gut Hermannsberg Riesling Nahe Kupfergrube GG Reserve, then you find a very surprising similarity."

RIOJA OPULENCE

In Hong Kong, we wrapped up our tastings of Spanish wines with some opulent offerings from Rioja producer Bodega Contador while moving on to the Languedoc-Roussillon region of southern France to discover some exceptional reds, fortified wines and rosés.

Benjamin Romeo, the winemaker and owner of Bodega Contador, submitted a few powerful and concentrated Riojas that are unabashedly rich and flattering, showing more density and heft than elegance and finesse. Senior Editor Zekun Shuai found them not shy of new oak plushness and extraction – which goes against the latest trend in Rioja of making more drinkable, terroir-transparent wines with less oak, intervention and extraction. Still, there is much to like here.

The Contador Rioja 2020, for one, is plush rather than esoteric and offers a bounty of fruit and oak spice while remaining deep, naturally concentrated and balanced. The production per vine is barely half a kilo, which enhances the intensity and the depth in a densely packed, full-bodied palate with fine, polished tannins. Even though it’s not as intellectual as many of the Riojas and Spanish wines we enjoy today, it travels to the other end of aesthetics with a certain level of ostentation, where the flattering and hedonistic quality in wine shines through.

Romeo, a former winemaker for Artadi, said during a Zoom interview that looks into the future with the wines he makes and is not solely focused on the present. His 2020 vintage clearly demonstrates the potential of these wines through a balanced interplay between concentration and tannin quality. And while the Contador Rioja 2020 will almost certainly be a very pricy bottle when released, the Contador Rioja La Cueva del Contador 2020 looks like a fabulous bargain, with a little less concentration but underpinned by even greater balance.

Romeo said Contador will also soon release its newest wine, the Contador Rioja Alma de Contador 2020 – another powerful and naturally concentrated expression of tempranillo and some garnacha that takes a Bordeaux approach by blending vineyards at three different altitudes.

READ MORE: TOP 100 WINES OF SPAIN 2021

From Languedoc-Roussillon in France, we found some excellent and diverse styles of wines from producers like Domaine de la Rectorie. And from neighboring Provence, there is probably no better example of commitment to a rosé than the Château d’Esclans Côtes de Provence Garrus Rosé 2021. Intense, ample and full-bodied with impressive tension, structure and purity, it’s a consistently serious great rosé.

We also tasted the Deutz Champagne William Deutz Brut Millésime 2013, a vintage marked by elegance and finesse, with extremely fine and woven perlage melted into this attractive, precise and nuanced cuvee. “There is power, even if it is more about finesse and elegance here,” Zekun wrote in his tasting note.

Finally, from Italy, Tastings Editor Jo Cooke reported that Romano dal Forno decided at the last minute to hold back the release of the 2016 vintage of Romano Dal Forno Valpolicella Superiore Monte Lodoletta and Romano Dal Forno Amarone della Valpolicella Monte Lodoletta and release the 2017 vintage in their place.

In top vintages, Dal Forno’s Amarone in particular is a contender for a perfect score. Both the 2017s, from a less favorable vintage in Veneto, show correspondingly less complexity and structure, giving them more fluidity. They are delicious wines that can be drunk much earlier than is normal.

Have a look at all the tasting notes, below, to find out which wines best suit your late-summer desires...

– Stuart Pigott, Senior Editor; Zekun Shuai, Senior Editor

The list of wines below is comprised of bottles tasted and rated during the past week by James Suckling and the other tasters at JamesSuckling.com. They include many latest releases not yet available on the market, but which will be available soon. Some will be included in upcoming tasting reports.

Note: You can sort the wines below by country, vintage, score and alphabetically by winery name. You can also search for specific wines in the search bar.