Bordeaux 2012: Steven Spurrier's vintage overview
Decanter consultant editor Steven Spurrier gives his early verdict on the Bordeaux 2012 vintage, following the en primeur tastings in Bordeaux.
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Steven Spurrier’s Christmas cellar vintage guide
If you're wondering what wines you should be getting out of your cellar this Christmas, look no further, as Steven Spurrier tells Decanter the best vintages of Burgundy, Bordeaux and Rhone that are perfect to drink this festive season.
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波尔多Bordeaux 2010：现代经典
生产商与评论家一般都很排斥说“迄今最好”这样的话，但是该浓郁、认真、适合陈年的年份几乎可以与1982年甚至1947年相比，在发行价上创下了记录。Steven Spurrier 认为，虽然大家对这一年份赞誉有佳，但聪明人不应专注于一级酒庄，而应该把目光投向佩萨克-雷奥良 Pessac-Léognan 红葡萄酒与白葡萄酒。
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Left Bank - Tasting Notes
Find all the tasting notes for the Left Bank chateaux here.
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Bordeaux 2010: 'A Modern Classic'
An introduction to this year's Bordeaux report by Decanter consultant editor Steven Spurrier...
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Steven Spurrier November 2010 column
Educating Asia
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Steven Spurrier December 2010 column
Every other August my wife and I take off for a two- or three-week drive around France, most of the time staying with friends.
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Steven Spurrier October 2010 column
The Douro’s 2010 vintage will bear witness to the evidence of a revolution in the region’s wine industry from which there will be no return, so positively will it affect this historic region. This sea change, which has been gathering pace this past decade, is based on better vineyard management, the emergence of Douro wines alongside Port, and tourism.
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Official Selection of the Crus Bourgeois du Medoc 2008
Steven Spurrier assesses the Official Selection of the Crus Bourgeois du Medoc, the first listing since the abandonment of the 2003 Classification
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100 Wines to Try before you Die
It’s the connoisseur’s favourite dinner party subject: what’s the best wine you’ve ever tasted? We recruited the world’s top experts to come up with the most awe-inspiring wine list you’ll ever see, of 100 wines to try before you die
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Steven Spurrier September 2010 column: Grenache: the great unsung hero
Eighteen months ago, I was asked by two producers in the southern Rhône – Nicole Rolet of Domaine de la Verrière (which makes the Chêne Bleu brand) at Vaison-la-Romaine and Walter McKinlay of Domaine de Mourchon at Seguret – how the region’s wines could better be recognised and I agreed with the former that the key was the Grenache grape. Thus it transpired that in early June I co-chaired, with French wine critic Michel Bettane, an extraordinary three days devoted to what has been described as the unsung hero of the wine world.
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How to decant
Steven Spurrier explains how, when, what and why to decant...
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Steven Spurrier June 2010 issue column
Although on a much lower score than Michael Broadbent, still at the crease on 397 (see p21), this is my 200th column for Decanter. Time for some reflection. My 100th column, in February 2002, described the tasting held by Louis Jadot at the Hôtel-Dieu in Beaune in 2001 to celebrate Jacques Lardière’s 30 years of winemaking and the magnificent Corton 1911 served at dinner. Since then, Jadot has taken me back to 1865 with another Corton, but what stays with me is Lardière’s statement that ‘wines should always surprise you, for without this capacity they are dead’. Note that he didn’t say ‘pleasantly surprise you’, which is just nearing or possibly exceeding expectations, but ‘surprise you’ – give you something you weren’t expecting.
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Steven Spurrier May 2010 issue column
During the third week of January each year, a dozen or so tasters, predominantly trade but with one or two scribes, meet in the nicely old-fashioned East Anglia seaside town of Southwold to taste more than 200 ‘cru classés and equivalent’ wines from a Bordeaux vintage that is entering its fourth year. Southwold is known to beer and wine drinkers as home to Adnams, founded in 1872.
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Steven Spurrier April '10 Column – Hot on the heels of Primitivo
The last time I was in Puglia, in the heel of Italy, was in August 1965, when I disembarked the overnight ferry from Greece in Bari and drove almost non-stop in my prized Triumph Herald convertible to arrive in Jerez de la Frontera in Spain in time for the opening of the Fiestas de la Vendimia. This time was less hectic: last December, the trip convened by Puglia Best Wine, a newly formed group of five of the region’s principal producers.
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Steven Spurrier January '10 column
In October I led a masterclass in Burgundy for Arblaster & Clarke Wine Tours, a five-day excursion to taste across the appellations and in the cellars of benchmark producers.
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Steven Spurrier February '10 Column
In November, Pierre-Henry Gagey, who joined Louis Jadot in 1985 and took over when his father, André, retired in 1992 after 30 years at the helm, gave a tasting for 24 tasters, including Jacques Lardière, winemaker since 1970, to celebrate the firm’s 150th anniversary. Starting with the reds, as is customary in Burgundy, he said that he had chosen one wine from each of the 15 decades of the company’s existence – not necessarily the best wine from the best vintage, but wines he and Lardière really liked – poured directly after opening with no decanting. The immediate impact followed by the fascinating development in the glass, especially for the last, oldest five wines, was breathtaking.
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Steven Spurrier March '10 column: New discoveries, and Belgian linen
In a world where everything is forever changing, we need people who think differently.’ This was the rallying cry from Jean-Pierre Perrin of Château de Beaucastel at the 38th annual Symposium of the Academie Internationale du Vin (AIV, the now international think tank of 112 members founded by Swiss philosopher Constant Bourquin) in Geneva last December.
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Bordeaux 2006 - Vintage Guide
Steven Spurrier comments on the Bordeaux 2006 vintage in Margaux...
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Blog: Steven Spurrier lambasts France's 'prohibitionist' government
‘Wine is not a sin’ were the opening words from Jean-Robert Pitte, the former president of the Sorbonne University to a wine conference in Italy last week.
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Bordeaux 2008: A Tough Call
On the back of a gloomy summer and an ever gloomier market, it was a vintage that had been all but written off. Some didn’t even bother going to taste it. Steven Spurrier did, and was pleasantly surprised by both the wines and the early news on prices. But can it all be good news?
