Interesting article on the next big thing in wine.
Looks like the article is behind a paywall (it wasn’t when I first clicked through), but below are the wines which were mentioned.
“Up-and-coming wine stars”
Muchada-Léclapart, Lumière 2018 Vino de España
Muchada-Léclapart, Univers 2017 Vino de España (younger vines)
Verum, Las Tinadas Airén 2018 Vino de la Tierra Castilla
David & Nadia, Swartland — pretty much any wine, red or white
Van Loggerenberg, Graft Syrah 2018 Polkadraai Hills
Van Loggerenberg, Kameraderie Chenin Blanc 2018 Paarl
Clément et Florian Berthier, Terre de Silex 2018 Coteaux du Giennnois
If it is behind a paywall, copying the whole thing here is probably not legal.
I know putting “cult wine” in the subject is more clicky. I think it’s more probably titled ‘exciting new projects’. Many new projects come and go every year that could become the next cult wine. As evidenced by the Keller thread, some will say the wines were always amazing as Jancis notes with Sassicaia. And many others will shrug. It’s a very fickle game that probably has a lot more to do with things like guerrilla marketing and luck than it does quality.
I have a feeling this will depend on your definition of the word cult for wines. if you’re talking secret small project that few have ever heard of but are entirely devoted to: maybe. if you’re talking screagle/DRC where everyone knows the name and wishes they could have them: I have a hard time believing that will happen for a wine from Jerez in my lifetime. not saying I would be sad if it did though.
I’d be skeptical of what she says, along with other “wine journalists.” On a recent wine podcast regarding journalistic integrity, Jancis was outed for serious conflict of interests. Not that some folks on this board don’t have conflicts, but in general, I value the opinions here–especially from deeply knowledgeable people like Tim Heaton and others, for example–far more than any wine publication.
The entire wine industry is pay-for-play. Since there’s no magazine (remember those?) who is going to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to fly a critic around the world and buy hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars worth of product a year, every wine journalist depends on the very people they are supposed to be critiquing to subsidize their work.
The entire wine industry? Or do you just mean the entire professional wine writing industry? (I don’t agree with that, but you may want to clarify what you mean)
The Wine Advocate. It’s the same for Vinous, too. And I’m sure a few others. I believe that Brad Baker, for example, makes a point of purchasing all the wines he reviews. For all the faults of contemporary wine journalism, there is still some independent criticism out there! And I think that it’s quite easy to identify which publications / writers pull punches and which don’t, just by reading the reviews and tasting the corresponding bottles. From my perspective, working in Burgundy and Champagne, the politics is not as complicated as you might imagine, and I am not really afraid of “loosing access” if I publish a negative review. In fact, I’m not hugely concerned about maintaining access to any estate whose wines I don’t admire, and I would imagine that plenty of other writers feel the same way.
I skimmed it and couldn’t find it, so would be curious, too.
As someone who works in the field, I’m as acutely aware of the shortcomings of contemporary wine writing as anyone, but, for all that, I think there’s plenty of good material being produced today. The themes of the interview seemed to be that only the interviewee Don Kavanagh tells it how it is, and that writing about expensive wine is elitist and therefore irrelevant. Which I find a bit over-drawn. Sure, there is a lot of crude “advertorial” wine writing, empty credentialism, and label bias out there; but there is also writing that’s better technically informed, more contextualized, and wider-ranging than anything that existed a decade ago to be found. As a consumer, if you want to learn about places such as the Jura or the Santa Cruz Mountains, or things such as wine redox chemistry or vineyard geology, you are better served today than at any time in history.
I meant specifically the wine writing/critic industry. But it appears that there are some outlets who still try to maintain an arms-length relationship with producers by not accepting travel/lodging/dinners.
When I connected with Eric Asimov about how to submit wines, he responded that NYT only reviews wines that they buy and any submission to Eric is for “his edification” only. Not entirely sure what that means. I did send them some wine, but have no idea if they will ever get reviewed or how it works.
Seems like suspicions of lack of transparency in wine journalism might be an externality from competition among publications. Here in Portugal there is one magazine with a virtual monopoly on the subject; I know the critics’ panel well on a personal, off the record level, and I’ve found there is zero incentive for mollycoddling producers since they’ve already got the market in their hand and it wouldn’t bring any benefit to the table. Funny things can happen with the blind tastings, and these are accepted with curiosity and enthusiasm rather than dread for having lavished praise on a lesser producer or trashed an established one, both of which have happened (although only grades above 14,5/20 are published). Needless to say the wines are sent rather than bought, and accepting courtesies is commonplace.
