Articles

9/5/18 - Long before Cabernet appeared in California, or Malbec became the rage in Argentina, or Carménère was planted in Chile (or any other variety of Vitis Vinifera was found in the Western Hemisphere), there was one grape that was widely planted all the way from California to Chile. It goes by many different names, as any grape would which was distributed over such...

8/29/18 - I first met Joy Kull in 2013 when I was in Italy with Kevin McKenna, Jules Dressner, and a small team from Louis/Dressner Selections. I was admittedly surprised to meet someone from America (let alone Connecticut) at a tiny natural wine fair in the middle of nowhere in Italy, but there was of course an explanation! At the time, Joy was working at an...

8/28/18 - The historical importance of Fontanafredda for Barolo cannot be overstated; it’s one of the oldest and largest properties in the region, and one of the first to estate-bottle and market under its own label. This is beautifully related in Kerin O’Keefe’s “Barolo and Barbaresco”, and it’s quite a story, starting with the Kings of Italy, and arriving in the present with the...

8/23/18 - I never got to meet Don Lorenzo Angeles Mondoza, but I had the great pleasure of meeting his daughter, Graciela Angeles Carreño, and being invited to a celebration of Don Lorenzo's life and work at the Real Minero palenque (distillery) a few weeks ago. A day of remembering, a feast, a wild dance party all rolled into one, Graciela was the consummate...

8/21/18 -   We're very proud to be working with the witty and affable Jean-Francois Deu at Domaine du Traginer, and we have just received a new shipment of these delicious wines that belong on your table this season. It's hard to convey Jean-Francois' sarcastic humor (Eben: "I'm going to come to visit you!" Jean-Francois: "Don't worry, I'm not afraid. We have lots of work...

8/16/18 - When you leave the Barolo zone and go southeast the terrain becomes even steeper, higher and more convoluted, and the hills are heavily wooded. Tourists like myself mostly go to visit some fantastic restaurants (da Cesare in Albaretto Torre, Cocinella in Serravalle Langhe, Locanda dell’Arco in Cissone, and da Gemma in Roddino - and I'm sure there are other fine spots that...

8/14/18 - Finally the 2015 Chinon "La Croix Boissée" has joined the other beautiful Baudry 2015s on our shelves! While all the Baudry 2015s show gorgeous fruit and a round and supple structure, we especially love the brilliant (and great value) "Cuvée Domaine" and the perfect "La Croix Boissée."  As the Baudrys say "the 2015s from the slopes and with more clay are very...

8/9/18 - We read again and again about historic wineries (“the family first made wine there in 22 BCE…”) but for the Marchesi di Barolo it’s no exaggeration. The winery was one of the first recorded to focus on Nebbiolo, and it produced wine called Barolo as early as the 1830s (which is very early for Barolo; the wine was said to be very...

8/6/18 - The 2017 vintage has seen yields down across the board for most winemakers in the Mosel and Saar valleys, be it from late frosts in spring, or loss to not-so-noble rot in the fall. The Webers at Hofgut Falkenstein in the Konz valley (Saar) were not immune, with hits to their yields early on from frost. That being said, the rest of the...

8/4/18 - Back when we first opened Chambers St. Wines in 2001, I didn't have any interest in wine. I had yet to meet Marc Olivier, Catherine Roussel, Didier Barrouilet, or Mathieu and Bernard Baudry. Contrary to some assumptions, I didn't grow up tasting any of the Muscadet or Chinon my parents were drinking at the dinner table (thanks Dad!). The first time I took a...

8/2/18 - We're very proud to be working with Jean-Claude Rateau, who was the fourth vigneron in France to convert to biodynamics, beginning with two hectares in 1979. On our recent visit to his spacious cellars outside of Beaune, we were delighted with the purity and minerality of his wines which offer a stark and delicious contrast to the more extracted and manipulated modern...

7/26/18 - We're excited to offer some fantastic wines from Porter Creek Vineyards, located in the Russian River Valley. Now one of the most recognizable AVAs in American wine, George Davis bought his first vineyards in 1977, six years before the area was given AVA status in 1983 and a very long time before the widespread explosion of popularity, planting, and investment that occurred...

7/23/18 - It all started with the Tempranillo. Years ago, I tasted the 'Cauzon' from Ramón Saavedra, and was blown away. Save a handful of impressive aged Riojas and Ribera del Duero wines I'd tried, this was the best Tempranillo I'd ever tasted. It had more lift and acid, and was a little less extracted than many examples from the north of Spain, but...

7/20/18 - Today we're excited to offer you the first commerically available vintages of an exciting and dynamic new voice in Napa wine! Phil Holbrook, and his wife Dani, started Revik Wine Co. with an obsessive focus on non-invasive winemaking practices and a keen interest in the qualities of their specific vineyard sites. In a sense, this is entirely natural. Phil has lived in...

7/16/18 - It's perfectly reasonable to be wary of bearded dudes in Brooklyn making sake. Japan's national beverage has a millenium old tradition, with many breweries being generation-old family businesses. Many producers trade quite intensely on that heritage to tell their story and sell their product. When I first heard about Brooklyn Kura I was pretty skeptical. It seemed like the sort of cultural appropriation...