The Winery Hookstone of Rhône septentrional of Rhone Valley

Disconcerting: I couldn’t forget this bottle for days afterwards. Still can’t. Back in August, wine critic Lin Liu MW (together with her partner Philippe Lejeune of Château de Chambert in Cahors) came to dinner, en route to a short holiday in Provence. One of the bottles Lin brought for us to try together was the 2018 Les Rocheuses, Parcelles No 5 et 6, from Château Le Rey in Castillon Côtes de Bordeaux. It came in a slope-shouldered bottle, not a classic Bordeaux bottle. We tried it with some R ...

Onwards, upwards. The roads get narrower, the corners get tighter. I step out of the car when I finally reach the winery and the air is so much fresher here. I go to take a sip from my water bottle and a gust of wind makes it whistle. I stand with Thomas Jullien and we look over the vineyards. It’s not yet spring, and the vines look little more than sticks. ‘It’s a lunar landscape at the moment,’ he says, as a friend’s flock of 300 sheep has just passed through to graze on every scrap of green b ...

In the first part of this series, see the wines that the Decanter editorial team is most excited about tasting at the Decanter Fine Wine Encounter NYC on Saturday 18th June 2022. Amy Wislocki – Decanter Magazine Editor Cape Landing Blackwood Cabernet Sauvignon, Margaret River 2019 At the end of every year at Decanter, we organise a ‘Wines of the Year‘ tasting. We ask our key contributors and editorial staff to pick out the wines that most impressed them during the year just gon ...