Articles

2/19/15 -  (Los Chorrancos Vineyard, El Tiemblo (photo courtesy of Daniel Ramos).) To the best of our knowledge, Garnacha originated in northeastern Spain's Aragon region, which was the center of the powerful maritime confederacy known as the Crown of Aragon. From the 12th to 17th centuries, the Crown extended from Spain to absorb the Mediterranean states of Mallorca, Sardinia, and Sicily (among others), as...

  2/12/15 - Sweet wines are sadly overlooked, misunderstood, and maligned. Perhaps uncertain of the wines' place at the table, we refer to them as dessert wines, as if to pair with cake or pastry; in truth there can be some inspired pairings. But when the sweetness would serve as a counterpoint to savory cheese, delegating the wine to confections seems a missed opportunity....

 2/10/15 - Excluding some malt Whisky, it’s very unusual to find a vintage date on a bottle of booze. According to the previous owner, everything in this collection was purchased prior to 1990, and most of it well before then. We’ve noted a few bottles that have dated tax-stamps, and there are some with period labels that give a clue to the date of...

2/7/15 - Precursors to rum date back to antiquity with documented examples of drinks made from fermented sugarcane juice in China, India, and Malaysia; however modern-day distillation of this fermented alcohol did not take place until the 17th century on Caribbean sugarcane plantations. The British colonies did not take long to adopt this island spirit, opening their first distillery on what is today known...

1/27/15 - Jean and Chantal Berthet-Bondet do not come from a long line of winemakers. They do, however, know a thing or two about agriculture. The two met in Montpellier as they pursued their respective courses in agronomy, leading Jean to take an assignment as a cooperante (a voluntary role as a researcher in underdeveloped countries) in Nepal working with wild oxen and buffalo,...

1/21/15 - Clos du Joncuas, founded in 1920 by Pierre Auguste Chastan, has always farmed with natural methods and has been officially organic since 1980. Currently run by sisters Dany and Carole Chastan, the estate's Gigondas vines are on slopes below the Dentelles de Montmirail on soils of clay with dolomite and gypsum over the limestone of the Dentelles and average 40 to 90...

1/17/15 - This shouldn’t come as news to anyone who loves white Burgundy, but Pierre Yves Colin-Morey has risen to the top rank of the region’s producers. That they have done so based on the less-than-fashionable appellation of St. Aubin, is in some ways the more notable accomplishment. Considered a rising star over the last decade (though he worked at his family’s Domaine Marc...

1/14/15- Good news seems to be in short supply these days, but the arrival of great new wines from Domaine de la Pépière is certainly something to celebrate. Our friend Marc Ollivier has given us many beautiful wines over the last twenty-five years and he has added two more brilliant Muscadets that belong in your cellar. 2012 was an outstanding but very low-yielding vintage...

1/12/15 - "2012, A beautiful vintage, very fine" says Sylvie Esmonin. "In 2012 we had a tiny harvest. We had a rigorous winter with 15 days below freezing, a variable Spring with a bit of frost, a cool period during the flowering, then coulure and millerandange (poor and irregular fruit set), a bit of hail on June 30th and a summer with a strong...

12/16/14 - The Calvados made by Camut is the Cadillac of Calvados. This might sound like a gimmick or hyperbole, but this 7th generation estate brought Calvados from the bars of Normandy to the most swank, white tablecloth restaurants in Paris. Like good wine, good Calvados starts on the farm and only great quality apples will make remarkable spirits. The orchards at Camut are...

12/08/14 - Armagnac: fiery, outdated hooch from the days of old or under-the-radar value for lovers of rich, terroir-focused spirits? The answer is probably a bit of both. Like the grower Champagne revolution currently taking place on the other side of France, the best Armagnacs come from small farmer/producers or micro-négociants with longstanding contracts with producers who are often too small in scale for...

12/5/14 - Swabia – the southwest corner of Germany – is the birthplace of Schiller and Hegel as well as inventors and industrialists like Gottlieb Daimler and Robert Bosch. There is an old phrase that reflects the somewhat grim natural conditions there: ‘Viel Steine gibts und wenig Brot’ (We have many stones and little bread). The struggle to overcome the region’s historically scarce resources...

12/02/14 - Over the years we’ve approached each of Frank’s new vintages with excitement, suspense and perhaps a grain of trepidation. We first tasted the wines about eight years ago – they were vinous rollercoasters with thrilling loops and dives, but sometimes a bit turbid and showing some volatility. Frank always does things his own way: organic viticulture, native fermentation, no oak influence, and...

11/12/14 - Bourbon, Bourbon, Bourbon. As we enter prime whiskey season, everyone focuses on America’s most famous of spirits, but maybe we should consider other types of whiskey. Heaven Hill’s master distiller Craig Beam is the hero of our story (against expectations, he does not work for the distillery that shares his last name). There are only two recipes for bourbon at Heaven Hill,...

11/11/14 - There is a renaissance in American cider, with new growers and producers working hard to bring it back to its former glory, producers who are going the extra mile to make ciders that speak not only of the variety of apple (there are more than 14,000 varieties in the U.S. alone), but of true terroir. We are proud to feature a pair...