These top wines with scores north of 90 points have the critics’ stamp of approval. Learn the ins and outs of rave reviews, and you’ll soon be picking out wines like a pro.
The score is just part of the story; what a review says is also important.
THE PRODUCER: Knowing who made the wine can help influence your purchase. Reputation is important in wine, and chances are if you’ve enjoyed a wine by a particular producer, you will like another of their wines.
THE REGION: Where a wine is from is everything. A Shiraz from Barossa will be big with roasted fruit tones, while a Syrah from Crozes-Hermitage will be elegant and peppery.
THE VINTAGE: This lets you know when the grapes were harvested. For all wines, but premium wines in particular, the specific conditions of each vintage will have an impact on quality.
THE GRAPE: Not all reviews (or wine names) will make reference to the grape, but when they do, they reveal a treasure trove of information – you literally know what you are buying.
AROMAS, FLAVOURS & COMPOSITION: Aromas and flavours are usually listed in order of prominence. Every wine style has an expected flavour profile, and reading a note will let you know how typical a wine is and what features distinguish it from its peers.
THE SCORE: A snapshot numerical summation of a critic’s assessment of a wine.
The most popular and widely used scoring system is the 100-point scale first introduced by Robert Parker in the late 1970s. It’s now used by the vast majority of professional wine critics and publications and owes its success to its familiarity and immediacy.
How can two wines have virtually identical scores when there’s a $40 price difference? The answer lies in the wine’s context. They're different wines with different expectations. Even for the same wine, one critic may award a low-priced wine a big score because the wine displays exceptional qualities within its particular price band, while another might score it lower, assigning it a rating that places the wine within a broader stylistic and regional framework that includes the most expensive wines. When looking at a wine’s rating, it’s most useful to focus on what the score and the review together reveal about that specific wine.
Tasting wine is always personal. You may not (yet) know the difference between French and American oak or between ripe and smooth tannins, but you do know what you enjoy. Trust your instincts. If possible, when you've tasted a wine, read several reviews. You’ll begin to recognize critics whose tastes, more often than not, match your own. You can then confidently seek out wines that they recommend, even if you’re unfamiliar with the producer, grape or region.
You put a great deal of effort into making the Thanksgiving dinner just right. The last thing you want to do is roll the dice on the wine. Take the guesswork out of choosing what to serve by going with one of our 90+-point options. They’re all great, but here are a few styles that will really hit the mark.
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