Articles

8/27/14 -   Champagne lovers are beginning to care a lot about vintage, which is a testament to the fact that they are viewing Champagne as wine first and foremost. This is refreshing and mildly surprising because the vast majority of Champagne is bottled non-vintage, and it’s widely held that vintage-dated Champagnes should be made only in the best years. On the other hand,...

10/6/2023 Year after year, we fall in love with the wines of Envinate, a collaborative project founded by four winemakers and friends who met while in enology school in Alicante. Roberto Santana, Alfonso Torrente, Laura Ramos, and José Martínez make wines from choice plots in the Canary Islands, Ribeira Sacra, Murcia, and Almansa, intending to express the unique terroirs of each region. They have...

8/25/14 - Rebecca and Peter Work of Ampelos Cellars first grabbed our attention with their unique and lovely Viognier, which puts a cool-climate twist on the variety's trademark peach and floral notes with unusually bright acidity, herbal and mineral undertones, and a refreshing hint of sea salt. When we learned that Ampelos is Santa Barbara County's first certified organic, biodynamic, and sustainable in practice (SIP)...

8/19/14 - (Domaine Louvetrie "Fief du Breil" vineyard) We're happy to acknowledge the fine article on Muscadet by Eric Asimov in the New York Times (Currently on-line, in the print edition this Wednesday) by offering our full selection of these great and affordable wines from our favorite producers. Please note some recent arrivals to Chambers Street, including two young organic growers, Stéphane Orieux and...

8/13/14 - If you think that modern German sparkling wine is but an imitation of Champagne, you are partially right. Formal production began only in 1826, and it was indeed a former employee of Veuve Clicquot who was responsible, one Georg Christian Kessler, who transported the concept to Esslingen am Neckar, just outside Stuttgart. While there is a lot of Sekt that is produced...

8/6/14 - (Domaine Francois Pinon) On the morning of June 17th, 2013, a horrible hail storm slashed through Vouvray, especially the vineyards around Vernou and Vallée de Cousse, home of our friend Francios Pinon. 85% of his crop was lost, and this came after a very small 2012 vintage that produced almost nothing except Pétillant. Many of us had the idea of helping the...

 8/4/14 - (Red, gray, and blue slate from Busch's Marienburg vineyard.) Clemens Busch is in many ways the conscience of the Mosel. He stopped using chemical pesticides, fungicides, and fertilizers in the mid-1980s and began incorporating biodynamic practices in 2005. Those choices placed him at the forefront, if not making him the leader, of the growing cadre of Mosel winemakers moving towards more natural,...

7/31/14 - (Peio Espil (Photo Charles Neal)) A few months ago we placed our twice-yearly order for wines from Peio Espil at Domaine Ilarria. It was a small order, as these fascinating wines have remained largely unknown and appreciated by only a few of our most intrepid customers. We're happy to see in yesterday's New York Times that Mr. Asimov's excellent article on the...

7/23/14 -   The grains used in American whiskey used to be determined by region. If it came from north of the Maison-Dixon line there was little chance of corn mingling with the local rye, wheras in Bluegrass country and further south, corn became the dominant grain – most famously as the main ingredient in Bourbon. Rye and Bourbon are made similarily – both...

7/17/14 - Inevitably, there comes a time in the summer when we find ourselves gazing longingly at our non-Champagne sparkling wine selection, possessed by an epic thirst only quenched by refreshing bubbles. As die-hard lovers of Champagne, it took a bit of a paradigm shift to bring us to reveling in méthode ancestrale or Pétillant Naturel (Pet-Nat) sparkling wines. (Well, some of us have...

7/08/14 -   We first met Cheryl Linns of Delaware Phoenix five years ago. Our friend (and natural wine spokeswoman) Alice Feiring had interviewed Cheryl and tasted her absinthes for a New York Times article, and she insisted that we try Cheryl's spirits. There was a bit of confusion: What is absinthe? Is it legal? Can you make spirits in New York? (Prior to this,...

7/02/14 - (Gray slate in Knebel's terraced Uhlen vineyard) Back in early April we offered these wines on pre-arrival. They are here and they are deserving of all, if not more, of our original enthusiasm. Overall, the wines have a magical grace and poise, an ethereal and delicate brightness that allows the terroir to come through with considerable clarity. However, harvests were not robust—at...

6/17/14 - (Icy Chalk in Vertus.) We have a crop of wonderful new Champagnes in stock in a variety of styles and pricepoints! We have fresh faces, and we have new releases from growers we’ve loved for years. We have rich, shell-y Blanc de Blancs, and we have burnished, vinous Blanc de Noirs. There’s something for everyone! See below for a brief overview of...

6/10/14 - Christian Ducroux makes some of the most delicious "natural" wines of France on his tiny estate in Thulon, above Regnié-Durette. HIs wines have achieved cult status in France and are almost impossible to find there, but happily Christian gives Chambers Street a nice allocation. Monsieur Ducroux is unique, really existing outside of the "commercial" wine world -  a bit unrealistic perhaps but...

6/2/14 -   If you want to bring a gleam of nostalgia to the eye of a person of a certain age, just mention the Chianti fiasco (or fiascho). It’s the flask-shaped bottle, with the bottom covered in straw. We might not be as old as the characters from Mad Men, but many of us of will remember first encountering Chianti at a restaurant...