The 1998 Taittinger Comtes de Champagne Blanc de Blancs ($120 to $150) is a lithe, almost feathery champagne with sprightly citrus fruits, a gentle coating of chalky minerality, and a subtle but firm spine of acidity. Be forewarned: It goes down with dangerous ease. Not at the level of the 1996 Comtes (not many champagnes do), but an excellent bubbly all the same.

The 2005 Pierre Matrot Meursault-Perrières ($65) is destined for greatness but is too young and surly to be opened just yet. Its tangy citrus flavors are sharp enough to scuff your tongue, and the piercing minerality and rapier acidity drive home the point: This needs to sleep in the bottle for a few more years. That said, it is the best Matrot Perrières I've ever tasted and is going to be spectacular once it loses the hard edges.

The 2005 Huet Vouvray Le Haut-Lieu Sec ($25 to $40) is a great dry Chenin Blanc from an epochal year in the Loire. A crisp, refreshing wine marked by notes of lime, honey, and chamomile, punctuated by brisk acidity and a stony minerality. A wine I could happily drink every day.

Dripping with mineral influences, the 2002 Trimbach Riesling Cuvée Frédéric Emile ($50) is a wine to warm the hearts of geologists everywhere. Along with all those rocks, stones, and pebbles, the CFE brims with lime and peach flavors, packs exemplary concentration and structure, and has an endless finish. If sweet, buttery California chardonnays are your thing, you might find this austere, but I think it is brilliant.

The 2006 Vincent Dauvissat Chablis Les Preuses ($85) is another wine that conjures superlatives. It conveys richness but also a certain sinewy quality—a contradiction, to be sure, but a thoroughly toothsome one. Grapefruit, green apple, wildflower, and lanolin on the nose, superb density, balance, and persistence on the palate. An epiphanic chardonnay, a yardstick Chablis.

The 2006 Joh. Jos. Prüm Wehlener Sonnenuhr Spätlese ($40 to $55) opens lush and sweet, but move the wine around your mouth a bit and you'll discover a strong backbone of minerality and green-apple acidity underpinning this typically delicious Prüm, which is only going to improve with age.

The 2003 Taylor Fladgate Vintage Port ($80 to $100) looks to be yet another Taylor legend in the making. A seductive, exotic bouquet redolent of black fruits, dark chocolate, and Middle Eastern spices leads to a silken, ethereal port that is surprisingly precocious but has the stuffing to outlast us all.

The 2005 Beaucastel Châteauneuf-du-Pape ($75 to $90) is very much in the house style: It is a broad-shouldered but exceedingly poised wine, with cool, ripe blackberry fruit and a beguiling whiff of lavender and Provençal herbs. This will keep for years, but it tastes so good right now I'm almost tempted to say to hell with the cellaring.

The 2005 Ridge Monte Bello Cabernet Sauvignon ($145) is still an infant, but the seeds of greatness are manifest. The wine is showing lots of everything at the moment—black currant fruit, tannins, oak—but there's not a hair out of place. The Monte Bello has long been a paragon of refinement and complexity, and the '05 is no exception. It is almost a cliché, but this really is California's First Growth.

Don't let the light color deceive you; the 2003 Giuseppe e Figlio Mascarello Barolo Monprivato ($70 to $90) is an uncharacteristically rich, almost voluptuous example of this wine. That said, it carries the weight impeccably and hits all the classic Barolo notes—cherries, roses, herbs, and tar, buttressed by big, ripe tannins. Drinks surprisingly well now but will age beautifully. Ho-hum, another sublime Monprivato.