Among Chablis' Grand Crus, Les Clos is the undisputed king. Les Clos is as powerful and densely mineral as Chablis gets. It is Chablis at its most statuesque, dazzling and complex. All of its power and sea shell minerality are married to supreme elegance. 

1999 is one of the great vintages of the 20th Century - and Bouchard's l'Enfant Jesus is nothing short of a full-scale, epic powerhouse of a wine. At 13 years, this is still young. Seriously, this is a bottle that will age, easily, for another 20, 30+ years.

Prüm's Gold Capsule Auslesen are the best of the best - different in quality, rarity and price from the regular Auslesen. With Prüm the Gold Capsule indicates Auslesen made from the top parcels, the best grapes... these are the last stop before one heads into the otherworldly (again, both in terms of rarity and pricing) Prüm dessert wines - BAs, TBAs and the like.

If there were any doubt that Theirry Allemand is one of the greatest winemakers working today, this ends the conversation. He just nailed it with his 2008 Chaillots.

Thomas Haag has a masterpiece in this wine: The 2009 Helden GG is ever so linear - straight as an arrow and just as penetrating with rocket ship peach and apricot, a crisp edging of salt and lime zest, weathered slate and stone.

Valentini's Cerasuolo - what they call rosé in Abruzzo - dramatizes this. It's a rosé that has the power and palate presence of a red wine and yet, has the sleek mineral spine and freshness of a white wine.

In Chinon, in the hands of Baudry, Chenin Blanc becomes something that would have immediate appeal to lovers of dry Nahe Riesling and of 1er and Grand Cru Chablis.

There's Chenin's layered complexity, but it's disciplined into a wine that's tightly wound and linear. There's a saline minerality; a chalky texture that grips your palate.

In the spring/summer, it's impossible to walk down the rambling streets of Vienna's first district without spotting armies of bottles of Gelber Muskateller on the tables. In Grinzing, the picturesque wine-suburb on the northern edge of the city, you can almost smell the wine, the perfumes filling the air as you walk down the street.

The late Edoardo Valentini was not a man to give away his secrets.

And the world desperately wanted them...

He was able to take Abruzzo's duo of normally undistinguished wines, Trebbiano d'Abruzzo and Montepulciano, and raise them to cult status, to being mentioned in the same breath as the world's great wines.

This is the sort of wine that you should go deep on and bury in your cellar. Clos des Mouches' reputation for aging is awe-inspiring. Allen Meadows has written recently about being floored by both the 1945 and 1949 Drouhin Clos des Mouches Blanc.

Clos des Mouches was one of the first vineyards purchased by Joseph Drouhin in the 19th century. Time has revealed this to be a brilliant move. Clos des Mouches is a star of Drouhin's vast portfolio - right there with Griotte-Chambertin and Musigny.