A Report From Wine Explorer Diego Samper – Year End Wine Reflections
Dear Matt,
By December, the world gets quieter.
Kitchens smell like cinnamon and wood smoke. People reach for sweaters and old stories. And as the year winds down, I take stock of the bottles that proved themselves.
That is part of the job. Seeing what we offered, what we learned, and what we are already planning for next year. Not the wines with big scores or fancy labels or high price tags, but the ones you would reach for without hesitation if a friend called at midnight and said, bring something good.
Some wines make you thirsty just thinking about them. As I write, I wish I had a glass of each beside me, remembering where I first tasted them.
And what a year.
Wars. A political landscape shaking like an old knee. Inflation. A wine market that moved slower than ever. Every part of getting wine from remote vineyards to your door got more expensive. Freight, storage, packaging. Even the cardboard seemed to ask for a raise.
Tonight, as I sit down with a glass, I am thinking about the bottles that kept me going. The ones worth sharing before the year closes.
Here they are. And here are the wines.
If you called me at midnight… I would bring Tacana Reserva.
Impossible to get. Never in stores. Never chasing scores.
A wine that exists inside this club and the family cellar, passed hand to hand like a secret.
If you know, you know.
If I needed to impress people without overwhelming them… I would take Tacuil Yacuil Malbec 2021.
Two families making wine together. Proof that when ego leaves the room, beautiful things happen. The label by Mariano Cornejo is a tiny work of art.
If the dinner were at an old oak table… I would bring Sunal Icono 2017.
A wine with depth and memory. Four microterroirs at the edge of where vines can grow.
Native yeast. Unfined. Unfiltered.Twenty four months in French oak. Only 6,000 bottles.
If the apartment were tiny and the lighting bad… I would bring Cascina Galarin Crocevia Monferrato Nebbiolo Superiore.
Because it carries all the right things I love about the wine world. Family. Quality. Vision.
They are building something for the future, and the wines are exceptional.
The wine I secretly hope nobody else asks for… is Arca Yaco Finca El Monte.
We were the first to call it. The first vintage.
We tasted it one afternoon at Matias’s place and knew immediately.
Now a store in New York sells it for 400 dollars.
We do not raise our prices. We stick to our principles.
Every bottle that leaves feels like losing a gold nugget.
Top 100 of Argentina. High 90s. We are proud we made the call early.
The bottle that still haunts me… is Télégramme Chateauneuf du Pape.
We offered it in 2019 when we could not afford to cellar more.
It was beautiful. Then prices exploded. A wine spoken of only in the past tense. Long gone.
If you asked for the wine that represents me this year… I would choose Weingut Topf Pinot Noir Stangl HP 2018.
Light. Precise. European in its frame. Austrian roots with a French accent. The winemaker is obsessed with Burgundy pinot noir. After becoming a father and shifting continents, this one carries both delicacy and direction.
If someone who never drinks wine said show me what matters… I would hand them the Raquis portfolio.
A young winery with old vines. A team with real experience. Their winemaker was just named Winemaker Revelation. A perfect way to see how a winery evolves. And since they are just beginning their story, it feels right to begin yours with them too.
If someone invited me to a barbecue and I needed a conversation starter… I would bring Bodega Domingo Hermanos Pachamama.
Rafael makes honest wines for everyday tables and wines of ambition like Pachamama.
Twelve months in French oak give it backbone and character.
People talk when this one shows up.
If it were raining and someone needed comfort… I would bring Chateau Ventenac Cabardes Le Mas.
A wine that does not ask questions.
The last time I saw Olivier Ramé, the winemaker, I mentioned we still had a few bottles.
He laughed, said they do not sell them anymore, and pulled one off his shelf.
We opened it right there.
Those bottles are aging beautifully. We are lucky to hold a handful.
If I wanted to show a club member the wine that surprised me most… I would pour 41 Norte.
It stayed impossibly fresh.
Three years of quiet conversations before I made the deal. When Barry and I tasted the new samples, I felt that rare satisfaction. The Spanish collection this year is something else.
If a wine tasted like a place I traveled in… I would choose Leuta Cortona Merlot DOC.
Cortona is a corner of Tuscany with real magic. A wine that fits into any dinner without asking permission.
If a bottle made me stop and rethink my job… it was Tacana Torrontes.
Our first white wine. Six years of thinking before one year of doing. We worked in an abandoned vineyard and here is the result. From searching wines to helping make one.
And if this were the last dinner of the year… I would bring anything from this year’s Spanish collection. Maybe all of it. Spain proves again that you do not need to break the bank to drink extraordinarily well.
These are the bottles that stayed with me. The ones I reach for when it matters.
And when I look back at everything that happened this year, the miles these wines traveled, the hands that made them, and how they end up on your tables, in your homes, in your stories, that is the real magic.
If any of these bottles speak to you, you know where to find them. They have found a place in our cellar, and sometimes they find a place in yours. You can explore them here…
Let me know what you want. Or let me choose for you.
After a year like this one, sharing these bottles feels like the right way to close it.
Un abrazo,
Diego
P.S. Remember to gift wine. It is a thoughtful gift, and if you are lucky, you get to drink it with the person you gave it to.
