The article is not online yet, but October's Washingtonian magazine has an article entitled Ten Must-Have Wines. I'll post a link to the article when it becomes available. Here is the list:

1. Champagne
2. Amontillado
3. Riesling Spatlese
4. Chablis
5. Bourgonge Rogue
6. Casis Blanc
7. Cotes du Rhone Rouge
8. Dolcetto from Piedmont
9. Riesling Auslese
10. Tawny port

Some of these are obviously good choice, and I am not going to quibble with anyone's personal taste, but two Rieslings??? I like Riesling as much as the next person, and would certainly include it on my list of Ten Must-Have Wines, but two different types? This list is designed to be pretentious. It will undoubtedly have Washingtonian readers scrambling to Total Wine and More asking for Amontillado...even though they do not have smoked almonds and Spanish olives (the recommended pairing in the article). Rather than waste your time with that you should develop your own "Ten Must-Have Wines", based on food you actually eat or events you actually attend. My list:

1. Champagne
2. Tawny Port
3. Riesling
4. Cotes du Rhone Rouge
5. Eiswein
6. Bordeaux
7. Meritage
8. Shiraz
9. Chianti
10. Chardonnay (keep a bottle of oak-aged and steel-aged depending on the occasion)

Now, none of these wines are particularly interesting or daring (that is a different list), that wasn't the point of this list. These wines will cover you for just about any occasion from popcorn and a movie to 5-course steak dinner, from Chinese takeout to a rich chocolate dessert.

Of course keep in mind that Don Rockwell gets paid a lot more to write about wine than I do :).