If you had told me at the start of 2025 that a single varietal Merlot would be on my Best Wines of the Year list, I’d have laughed. But then Brenntal Merlot, produced by the leading Alto Adige Cantina Kellerei Kurtatsch is not your typical Merlot. A warm climate, cooling breezes and the steep loamy clay soils make for a wonderfully fresh but full on - 15% abv - single vineyard wine. Thanks to Italian wine PR firm Well Comm we tasted through several back vintages dating back 30 years including the still impressive 2009, which makes my list. Smooth tannins supporting blackberry/ blackcurrant flavours on a long palate.
Staying in Italy but moving southwards to Tuscany, Caiarossa was a new name for me, introduced by another Italian PR firm, AB Communications. This biodynamic winery located in Riparbella, not far from the coast, lies on the edge of Bolgheri makes great Supertuscans; the Caiarossa 2021, which makes my list, is delicious showing cassis and tobacco flavours on a rounded palate. No fewer than seven varieties, all grown in the estate’s iron rich soils, although Syrah and Cabernet Franc seem clearly dominant.
Caiarossa was a great gateway to my third choice, in Bolgheri proper and discovered on a press trip run by - yup - yet another excellent Italian wine agency Studio Cru, to visit Tenute Argentiera. Best known for its namesake Argentiera Bolgheri Superiore - made from a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Cabernet Franc, of which we tasted several great vintages (2018 is a stunner) - the standout for me was another wine, the Ventaglio 2020. Made in tiny quantities - which helps explain the northwards of £250 price - this delicious 100% Cabernet Franc shows a complex but moreish palate of blackcurrant and black cherry with eucalyptus and tobacco notes. Very dense, this wine will long outlive most of us.
Staying in Tuscany, the lovely folk at Frescobaldi sent me a bottle of their exceptional Castel Giocondo Brunello di Montalcino 2020 in a special presentation box before Christmas, reminding me of how great a producer this estate is, and how remarkably accessible the 2020 Brunellos are. This is intense ruby red, very layered and complex, with forest fruits, violets and herbs on the nose and palate. It will age beautifully but frankly, with it drinking this well now, why wait?
Much closer to home, Vineyards of Hampshire’s annual fizz fest was a great opportunity to taste through VOH’s eight producers. Some great stuff especially from The Grange, Exton Park and Black Chalk but one clear winner for me - Hambledon’s amazingly complex and adult Premiere Cuvee. Made in tiny quantities, saignee style, from 88% Pinot Meunier, 5% red Pinot and 7% Chardonnay, this represents a serious but welcome departure for the producer, acquired two years ago by Berry Bros and Symington Family Estates, who have invested heavily in the business. Not cheap at £69 but then this is probably the most impressive English wine I have tasted.
I’m not usually one for sweet wines - good Vin Santo aside - but I really loved Domaine Fontanel’s Riversaltes Ambré 2017 bought in from the Pyrenees by Stone, Vine & Sun for the astonishingly good price of £24.95. Made from Grenache Gris and Blanc grown on 60-year-old vines this oxidative style has moved out of fashion, more’s the pity - this is an embracing wine, just 16% with an attractive palate of dried figs and dates.
Hallgarten & Novum Wines’ autumn tasting event had the usual excellent selection from the importer’s wider portfolio, which now stretches to over 1000 wines, including the incomparable Greek selection. Amongst this is what I reckon is the best Assyrtiko on the market, Gaia’s Ammonite, produced from a single 100-year-old vineyard (Thalassina) in Santorini’s prized Megalahori region. Expressive, fresh but complex and unafraid to show its volcanic character, this joins my Top 10.
Lanzarote’s volcanic wines are very different in character and style to those of Santorini (cheaper and simpler perhaps, but none the worse for that) and a visit there this autumn gave me an opportunity to sniff around. The number of producers on the island is now around 30 including such stalwarts as El Grifo - the first - and Bodega La Geria but some of the most amazingly memorable wines are made by Bodegas Los Bermejos which, like the others, work mainly with white Malvasia Volcanica , white Diego and red Listan Negro. I really loved the main wine the Malvasia Volcanica Seco 2024, a rounded, crowd-pleasing fruit driven take on the variety, understandably a best seller around the island. It and other Lanzarote wines can be bought here at https://wineshoplanzarote.com/.
There’s nothing like a once-extinct-but-just-revived grape variety to get the wine writer’s pulse racing so I approached two new wines from iconic Armenian producer Zorah - imported by Liberty Wines - with enthusiasm. The red Sireni Heritage 2020 is made from 80% Sireni and 20% Ararati grape, and the white Chilar Heritage 2021 is from Voskehat and Yeraz (both are produced in tiny quantities - 4,000 bottles each - from these heirloom varieties). The Sireni makes my list: incredibly smooth, with flavours of dark cassis and tobacco. Grapes for the wine came from Nagorno Karabakh, since reoccupied by Azerbaijan with all the Armenian wine-growers expelled, so the current vintage will be the last.
To Italy’s deep south for my last wine. Calabria’s Gaglioppo grape is one of Italy’s Marmite varieties – not unlike Sagrantino, it is difficult to work with and can be overly tannic in the wrong hands. But Librandi – the region’s biggest producer – has tamed it wonderfully in the Duca SanFelice 2022 Ciro DOC Riserva – making a soft, velvety wine with a long finish, medium bodied with a defined herbal and menthol palate that evolves nicely through the wine.
A great wine to end 2025 with. Here’s to 2026.
