Beth Willard

Wine list and tasting notes:

Alta Alella, Mirgin Exeo Evolució+ Brut Nature, Cava 2007
Gold, 95 points
60% Pansà Blanca, 40% Chardonnay
Gorgeous roasted hazelnuts, almonds, baked bread and biscuits set the tone with a permeating lemon and lime freshness besetting the mousse and a crunchy mineral finish. Alcohol 12%

Cherubino Valsangiacomo, deSantJaume Malvasia, Valencia, Spain 2024
Value Gold, 95 points
85% Malvasia, 15% Merseguera
Tantalising pear, apple, apricot and peach aromas underscored by tingling notes of grapefruit, lemon and lime. Bright and crisp with a linear structure and lengthy herbal finish. Alc 12.5%

Bodegas Alvear, Tres Miradas Paraje De Riofrío Alto 3er Año, Montilla-Moriles 2021
Platinum, 97 points
100% Pedro Ximenez
A formidable style, enchanting the nose with fennel, dried almond and herb characters and imbedding the palate with a mineral structure and an intriguing textural grip. Quenching, salivating and saline with swathes of toasted nuts on the finish. Alc 13.5%

Bodegas Valdemar, Conde Finca Alto Cantabria Viñedo Singular, Rioja 2023
Gold, 95 points
100% Viura
White peach, apricot and grapefruit aromas tumble over the glossy sheen of oak that cushions the embracing acidity. Creamy and plush with a piquant finish. Alc 13%

Bodegas Rodríguez Y Sanzo, Palo Norte Verdejo, Rueda 2020
Gold, 95 points
100% Verdejo
Intricately laced with dried chamomile, dried herbs and mace on the nose, with a flourish of delectable lemon peel acidity and a long nutty finish. Alc 13.5%

Bodegas Y Viñedos Verum, Ilusioverum Cdvin Garnacha, Rioja 2022
Gold, 95 points
100% Garnacha
Bedecked with redcurrants, red cherries and raspberries with a sizzling lick of black pepper. Softly structured with supple, plummy acidity and a boundless, spicy length. Alc 14.5%

Vall Llach, Mas de la Rosa Gran Vinya Classificada, Priorat 2023
Best in Show, 97 points
100% Carignan
Priorat has been almost as successful in our Best in Show pantheon as Barolo – this concrete-aged Carinyena is the region’s sixth laureate.  This purity and finesse of this wine makes a convincing case for Carinyena as the pre-eminent variety for Priorat – and, contrariwise, for Priorat as the world’s greatest location for Carignan.  It’s also a plaudit for concrete ageing, whether in egg or otherwise.  The wine is a dark black-red in colour, and the aromas are less fruity than most; it’s one of those wines which seems to smell as much of a landscape as of fruit.  It’s only two years old, yet the ageing has been so successfully managed that it has the seamlessness and harmony of a much older wine.  On the palate, it is refined, graceful and shawl-like, full of lingering dark-fruit intensity but counterbalanced by the wine’s unstrenuous cashmere tannin and insinuating, palate-lapping acidity: extraordinary finesse for a variety often regarded as workmanlike elsewhere. Alc 15.5%

González Byass, Del Duque V.O.R.S, Amontillado, Sherry NV
Best in Show, 97 points
100% Palomino
Like the other Amontillado in this year’s Best in Show, this VORS (Very Old Rare Sherry) Amontillado is formidable.  It’s slightly deeper in colour: a deep orange amber.  Its aromas, too, are fuller and weightier than its peer, reminding the fortunate drinker of antique furniture and generously endowed college libraries – as well as the scents of dry places in high summer, with their warm stones, path-trodden, sun-dried figs and tough, scruffy herbs.  On the palate, it is a little less savagely pure, aerial and vaporising, with more depth and bottom to it; it has dark corners and recesses of flavour, whereas its sibling was all light and air.  Technically, in fact, it has a few grams of residual sugar, though you won’t notice those as the wine’s sheer power of flavour and acid cut more than offset any sweetness.  A remarkable drink; a wine-world reference. Alc 21.5%