Steve Tanzer's Best

Best Reds
	2000 Chateau Leoville Barton Saint Julien Bordeaux Blend; Bordeaux;	$199.99
	" Full medium ruby. Knockout superripe nose combines black cherry, licorice and exotic spices. Compellingly sweet, lush and complete, with harmonious acids giving the wine lovely vinosity and extending the flavors. Finishes with lush, dusty tannins and superb persistence. A great vintage for Leoville-Barton." -- Steve Tanzer (94 points)
	2000 Chateau Pichon Longueville Baron Pauillac Bordeaux Blend; Bordeaux;	$199.99
	" Good full red-ruby. Complex nose combines plum, mocha, minerals, tobacco and burnished oak. A bit tight on entry, then expands and explodes toward the back, showing dense, insinuating flavors of black fruits and licorice. Chewy, sharply delineated Pichon-Baron with excellent underlying backbone and broad, palate-coating tannins. An outstanding vintage for this estate." -- Steve Tanzer (94 points)
	2001 Antonio Caggiano Macchia dei Goti Taurasi other red varietal; Other Italy;	$39.99
	"($48) Deep, luminous ruby-red. Intense and persistent aromas of grilled bacon fat, chocolate-covered dried cherries, mint and smoke, with a touch of spicy graphite. Profoundly rich, spicy and dense, with flavors of raspberry jam, red cherry liqueur, black pepper and grilled steak. With its pleasantly chewy extract and silky tannins, this would appear to have great aging potential." -- Steve Tanzer (94 points)
	2001 Chateau Lafite-Rothschild Pauillac Bordeaux Blend; Bordeaux;	$599.99
	" Bright red-ruby. Sexy aromas of raspberry, cedar, coconut, minerals, lead pencil, chocolate and tobacco leaf. Juicy, lively and penetrating, with sharply delineated flavors of blackberry, raspberry and rose petal. Boasts the classic inner-mouth energy of this great first growth, but also grew increasingly silky with extended aeration. Finishes with tongue-coating tannins and superb lift." -- Steve Tanzer (93 points)
	2000 Bruno Giacosa Barbaresco Santo Stefano Nebbiolo; Piedmont;	$109.99
	" Good full red. Captivating aromas of red berries, flowers, minerals, menthol and white truffle; seems quite cool for the year. The wine's penetrating, sappy, sharply delineated red fruit flavors offer uncanny sweetness but retain great freshness and verve. Finishes extremely long, with powerful structure and grip. Very classy Barbaresco, and still an infant." -- Steve Tanzer (93 points)
Best Whites
	2004 Chateau Haut Brion Pessac-Leognan Blanc Bordeaux Blend; Bordeaux;	$199.99
	"(51% sauvignon blanc and 49% semillon) Pale color with a faint green tinge. Deep, brooding aromas of pit fruits, ginger, and beeswax. Huge, silky and voluptuous yet at the same time lively and delineated, with a penetrating exotic spice character. This boasts extraordinary depth of fruit, density of texture and persistence on the aftertaste. While this shows more obvious sauvignon blanc character than Laville Haut-Brion, the gras from the semillon is also quite spectacular." -- Steve Tanzer (94 points)
	1995 Moet et Chandon Dom Perignon Rose Champagne Blend; Champagne;	$429.99
	" Pale watermelon-orange color. Nose dominated by red berry notes of strawberry and raspberry, with hints of earth and minerals; seemed to go into a shell in the glass. Penetrating-verging-on-painful if not yet as complex as some past vintages of this wine, with delicate red berry flavors framed and intensified by the brisk acids of the vintage. Utterly primary, precise rose, with a very long, stony finish." -- Steve Tanzer (93 points)
	NV Krug Grande Cuvee Brut Chardonnay; Champagne;	$139.99
	" Explosive but fine mousse Complex, yeasty aromas of lemon, honeysuckle, wet stone, toffee, hazelnut and caramel. Subtle and creamy on entry, then dense, powerful and youthfully brisk, with flavors of minerals, nutmeg and mace framed by strong lemony acidity. Solid, vibrant, dry and rather backward. Not quite as large-scaled or harmonious as last year's release and a bit more youthfully unevolved." -- Steve Tanzer (93 points)