I had to look twice. On a warm June night in a lively Paris bistro many years ago, diners had bottles of Crozes-Hermitage in ice buckets. I found this surprising, because the wines were red and conventional wisdom tells us to serve red wines at room temperature or–among sophisticates–at “cellar” temperature, but certainly not chilled.… Read more
Category Archives: Articles
The Left Bank Bordeaux Cup: The College Bowl of Wine
Hollywood could not have orchestrated the prelude to the Left Bank Bordeaux Cup any better. On a breezy summer evening under a brilliantly blue sky, the judges, guests and contestants assembled on the beautifully manicured lawns outside the cellars of Château Lafite Rothschild, snapping pictures and chatting nervously. … Read more
Mike Grgich: Multi-National Treasure
It’s better to be lucky than smart.
Of course it’s better to be both, like Miljenko “Mike” Grgich. Time after time, he’s been in the right place at the right time, although at the time, neither the place nor the situation seemed appealing.… Read more
The Illusion of Knowledge
Everyone buying and selling wine–wineries, wholesalers, retailers and consumers–does it. We wine writers also fall into the trap. We carefully note the blend of grapes in a particular wine and what oak treatment the winemaker has chosen, as though that gives us valuable information about the wine. … Read more
Port: It’s Not Just for Winter any More
Many years ago, Carmine Martignetti, a friend of mine and head of Carolina Wines, one of New England’s best distributors, remarked to me after a chilly night that marked the beginning of Fall, that the “Port season had arrived.” He of course was referring to the cold months when Port, the uniquely sweet and warming wine made exclusively in Portugal’s Douro Valley, was consumed.… Read more
Does the World Need Another Super Tuscan?
Caiarossa is the new Super Tuscan on the block and the other “aias” should take note. It’s not yet in the league of Ornellaia or Sassicaia, but based on my first introduction to this young estate, it could be soon.… Read more
Chianti Classico’s Gran Selezione: Grand Idea or Grand Mistake?
Chianti Classico producers have been hitting home runs with recent vintages. But they are on the verge of striking out with their new category, Gran Selezione, debuting with the 2010 vintage.… Read more
Vintage Matters…and So Does Ownership
Bruno Eynard, the man in charge at Château Lagrange, the St. Julien estate in Bordeaux classified as a 3rd growth in the Médoc Classification of 1855, was in New York recently to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Suntory’s ownership. To demonstrate the dramatic turnaround at the estate since Suntory, the Japanese drinks company, acquired it, Eynard led a tasting of 19 vintages of Château Lagrange extending from 1959 to 
2010 (plus 5 vintages of Les Fiefs de Lagrange, their second wine, dating from 1990 to 2009).… Read more
Feat of the Feet
Treading the grapes by foot “is fundamental for making Vintage Port,” insists Natasha Bridge, the chief blender at The Fladgate Partnership, the family run company that owns Taylor Fladgate, Fonseca and Croft, three of Port’s best houses. “It may only account for a 3 to 4% difference in quality, but it’s one of the differences between making good and great Port.”… Read more
The Languedoc is Worth Exploring
The Languedoc is undergoing a tremendous transformation. Formerly known as France’s ”wine lake,” this vast area in Southern France that extends in an arc from the Rhône River towards the Spanish border is evolving into one of France’s most exciting wine regions. … Read more
Castilla-La Mancha: The Place for Value
Everyone is looking for value in wine, which I define as a wine that delivers more than the price suggests. Using that definition value can be found in Bordeaux where an $80 wine wows you the way a $120 wine does.… Read more
Thank you, Jacques Lardière
Pierre-Henry Gagey, President of Maison Louis Jadot, set the tone for a dinner honoring the retiring legend Jacques Lardière with the invitation he sent months in advance. The invitation noted that the dinner was to thank Lardière for all he had done for “Burgundy and Maison Jadot.”… Read more
Cremant d’Alsace pops with success
Cremant d’Alsace is France’s go-to sparkling wine. The French consume more of it at home than sparkling wine from any other wine area than Champagne, according to the Conseil Interprofessionnel Vins d’Alsace, Alsace vintners’ trade association.… Read more
Chablis: The World’s Best White Wine for Food
That’s a bold claim, but I think it holds up to scrutiny. The only other contender would be Champagne, but once one takes price into account, the medal goes to Chablis because these wines are so well-priced. Albariño from Rias Baixas, a region tucked away in Galicia in Spain’s northwest, is in the running, except so little is made and distributed that it’s not a reasonable choice. … Read more
Burgundy Update: Tiny 2012 Yields Presage a Pricey Future
“The most expensive vintage ever,” was how Louis-Fabrice Latour, President of the prestigious Beaune-based négociant, Maison Louis Latour, and current head of the association of Burgundy négociants, described the 2012 vintage in Burgundy. “Yields are down by 60% in many areas and we [négociants] are paying growers up to 30% more,” he explained.… Read more
Sicily: Hotbed of Italian Innovation
Winemakers in Sicily bubble with enthusiasm and a sense of discovery the way Etna bubbles with lava and smoke. Three decades ago, Tuscany was Italy’s epicenter of experimentation. It was there that a revolution took place, expelling white grapes from Chianti, demonstrating the stand-alone greatness of Sangiovese, introducing French varieties as fuel for “Super Tuscan” wines, and propelling Brunello into stardom. … Read more
Good Dirt, Yucky Dirt
As I drive around Alexander Valley with Ronald Du Preez, the assistant winemaker at Jordan Winery, he points across the road and exclaims enthusiastically, “That’s really good dirt,” or in an equally emphatic manner, “that’s yucky dirt over there.” He is expressing a paradigm shift in California winemaking philosophy that’s exemplified by Jordan’s now virtually complete transformation from an “estate” winery to one that buys almost all of their grapes from local farmers.… Read more
Negroamaro: Black & Bitter from Italy’s Heel
“Black and bitter.” It certainly wasn’t a name create by a public relations firm. To be fair, Luigi Rubino, President of the Puglia Best Wine Consortium points out the name really means “black and black” from both the Latin (negro) and Greek (amaro) for black. … Read more
Puglia Will Fool Ya
Puglia, the heel of Italy’s boot, is hot, mostly flat, and sun drenched. Italy’s third largest wine producing region after the Veneto and Emilia-Romagna, Puglia accounts for more wine even than Sicily. This is, basically, a recipe for low-quality bulk wine. … Read more
Banfi Does It Again
Earlier this month a $12 wine, Castello Banfi’s 2010 Centine, was voted the best red wine at the Ninth Annual Critics Challenge International Wine Competition held in San Diego.
To be voted best red is a high honor for any wine, but is absolutely extraordinary for one costing twelve bucks. … Read more
Bordeaux’s second wines affordable, exceptional
We Americans don’t realize it, but the Chinese are determining what wine we drink.
They’re not flooding the market with knockoffs or gray-market bottles. Instead, their voracious appetite for big-name Bordeaux has relegated us to buying the leftovers.
Fortunately, there is a silver lining.… Read more
Chablis Short List
One of my goals for Les Grands Jours de Bourgogne, a weeklong series of tastings held in Burgundy every two years, was to learn about the differences between vineyards in Chablis.
It was the ideal setting, a day-long tasting with over 100 Chablis producers pouring over 600 wines, all from Chablis. … Read more
Chablis: The World’s Greatest White Wine Bargain
Chablis has a long history of being misunderstood. The appropriation of this regulated site-specific name to generic white California jug wine–Gallo White Chablis (as if there were red wine in Chablis)–ruined Chablis’ image and cachet for decades. Now, with the movement away from super ripe, buttery, oaky New World Chardonnay and the increasing popularity of “unoaked” Chardonnay, interest in Chablis is making a resurgence. … Read more
A Tale of Two Vintages
Is it hype or is it true? Do 2009 and 2010 represent back-to-back great vintages for Burgundy or is it just another case of the French crying wolf with yet more “vintages of the century?” My vote goes to truth rather than hype, although the two vintages couldn’t be more different.… Read more
2009 Bordeaux: Voluptuous Wines
They’re here! The much-praised 2009 Bordeaux, the region’s priciest vintage, has arrived. Representatives from the Union des Grands Crus de Bordeaux (UGC) were in New York this past week as part of their nationwide tour to give the trade the first comprehensive look at this much-heralded vintage. … Read more
The Scientific Low-Down on High Alcohol Wines
“Officer, the Breathalyzer must be wrong. I only drank two glasses of Chardonnay,” the young woman complained. “How is that possible?” Well, it is possible.… Read more
The Paradoxes of Champagne
Champagne must not have gotten the memo about the French appellation controllée (AOC) laws. They have their own regulations–after all, Champagne is an AOC–but they seem to have originated in Rome or Athens, not Paris.
Regional Blends Predominate
Elsewhere in France, the most prized and expensive wines come from individual and distinct vineyards. … Read more
Sardinia: Italy’s Other Island
“People can’t find Sardinia on a map,” complained Valentina Argiolas, a member of the family that owns Sardinia’s leading winery. She was speaking literally in describing the fundamental hurdle producers need to overcome to sell their wines. At a recent tasting and seminar of Sardinian wines in San Francisco and again in Japan, she was mortified when the map the organizers projected onto the screen failed to show Italy’s second largest island. … Read more
Our Burgeoning Wine Culture
Despite the economic turmoil, wine consumption in the United States continues to increase. Up only a mere one percent in 2010, according to the Wine Market Council, but that was enough to make us the world’s largest wine market, surpassing France. … Read more
A Simple Strategy for Buying Burgundy
Burgundy produces some of the world’s most exciting wines. Although many, such as those from Domaine Romanée Conti, Domaine Leroy, or Domaine Rousseau are priced in the stratosphere, affordable well-priced Burgundies do exist. But finding them can be like walking through a minefield.… Read more
Krug: How to be the Best
Although Olivier Krug, Krug’s House Director, and Maggie Henriquez, Krug’s President and CEO, both deny it, Krug is the best Champagne in the world. While Krug and Henriquez both agree that Krug is “unique,” they refuse to describe it as “the best.”… Read more
Alcohol levels can make a big difference
“I only had two glasses of wine.”
It’s not an unreasonable amount to drink with dinner, yet how much you feel from those two glasses can vary widely – whether you’re worried about a curbside Breathalyzer or just hoping you don’t feel the effects the next day.… Read more
Beaujolais Renaissance
Six centuries after Philippe the Bold exiled the “vile and noxious” Gamay grape from Burgundy in favor of the “elegant” Pinot Noir, Burgundians are once again embracing the grape in the wines of Beaujolais. The region has long been known primarily for Beaujolais Nouveau, a beverage closer to alcoholic grape juice than wine, but is now undergoing a dramatic change as Beaune-based négociants buy vineyards and identify unique parcels for separate bottlings.
… Read more Location, Location, Location: Port’s No Different
In all the great wine producing areas of the world it is an article of faith that where the grapes grow determines the style and quality of the wine. However, when we think of Port, we tend to forget this fundamental notion.… Read more
China and Wine: We’ve Not Seen Anything Yet
By now most wine lovers have heard that the Chinese are having an enormous impact on the world’s wine market. But the current wave of wine buying frenzy by the Chinese may seem tame compared to the potential tsunami coming in the future.… Read more
Wine culture starting to take hold in China
The scene stopped me in my tracks. There, on the street in the middle of the bustling market, stalls filled with fake Longchamp bags and knockoff Ralph Lauren, was a young Chinese man standing behind a table wearing a portable microphone and hawking vacuum-powered wine-pump openers.… Read more
Under the Radar: Long Island Merlot
Some wine areas are vaguely familiar but not well known or fashionable. Parts of Southern Italy, such as Puglia, fit this category, as do parts of Spain, such as Manchuela. But there are other areas, such as Long Island, that fly almost completely under the proverbial radar, showing up on the “screen” of very few consumers.… Read more
The Alchemy of Wine: A Reason to Cellar
In years past, when marginal weather often failed to ripen grapes adequately, winemakers rejoiced in the relatively rare years when Nature provided ripe fruit flavors. These days, with delayed harvesting, modern winemaking and global warming, it’s easy to get fruit in a wine. … Read more
Not Just Any Port in a Storm
“An overpowering wine,” was how Adrian Bridge, CEO of Taylor Fladgate, described their just released pre-phylloxera Tawny Port, which he dated to about 1855. Labeled Scion, it was overpowering, but not so much in taste–it was rich but vibrant–as much as its origin and its price, about $3,200 a bottle.… Read more
Renaissance in South Africa
“We had to leapfrog the sanctions,” explained Simon Barlow, the affable owner of Rustenberg Wines in Stellenbosch, South Africa, as he described the dramatic transformation of his family’s estate following the democratic elections in South Africa in 1994 that marked the official end of apartheid. … Read more
Malbec: Another Merlot?
Malbec is the new “black.” Then again, maybe not so new, since the wine from Cahors in south central France, the traditional home to Malbec, was known as the “black wine” in the 13th century because of its power and concentration. … Read more
Gifts for the Wine Lover
Friends and professional colleagues always tell me they shy away from giving me wine. They profess not to know what to give. They say that they don’t want to embarrass themselves with an “ordinary” bottle. Those excuses, and all the others, are silly. … Read more
2009 Burgundies: A First Look
The Bordelais are not the only ones licking their chops as they offer the 2009 vintage for sale. Burgundians too are smiling as they taste their 2009s currently aging in barrels. In the words of Philippe Prost, the technical director at Bouchard Père et Fils, the wines are, “La beauté du Diable,” a French idiom that roughly means “too good to be true.”… Read more
Burgundy: Sorting Out the ‘0 Tens’
“Let’s taste some 0 tens,” was Louis-Fabrice Latour’s invitation as I met him in late September at the imposing Chateau Grancey, the heart of the Domaine Latour estate in the picturesque Burgundian village of Aloxe-Corton where they vinify all the reds from their Domaine. … Read more
In Defense of the Burgundy Négociant
I am always surprised how many experienced Burgundy aficionados, be they sommeliers or just plain passionate consumers, overlook or denigrate Burgundy’s négociants while heaping praise on the growers’ wines. Sommeliers may shun them because of commercial reasons. Négociants’ wines are more widely available and many sommeliers prefer to list wines from small growers whose wines are difficult for diners to find in retail stores. … Read more
Rose Love In Bloom
I’ve been converted. Sort of.
Despite the tsunami of enthusiasm that appears every summer, I’ve never been a fan of rosés, except, of course, for rosé Champagne. The argument for rosé is that they are perfect for summertime because they are not too serious, they stand up to and go with hearty cold salads or grilled fish, and they cut through summer’s heat and humidity.… Read more
Riesling: America’s Favorite Wine Grape?
It’s not of course. Chardonnay still holds that position. But to listen to wine professionals, it should be. … Read more
Ornellaia: An Italian Icon, Part 2
As Axel Heinz, the winemaker at Ornellaia, pointed out, luck played a role in Ornellaia’s success. It was lucky that Lodovico Antinori, Ornellaia’s founder, went to California in search of vineyards because it was there that he met André Tchelistcheff, Beaulieu Vineyards’ legendary winemaker. … Read more
Ornellaia: An Italian Icon
“It was luck,” according to Axel Heinz, the winemaker at Ornellaia, that accounted for the extraordinarily rapid ascent of Ornellaia in the eyes of the world. “It was lucky that Mario Incisa della Rocchetta [owner of Sassicaia] planted Bordeaux varieties when [in the 1940s] and where he did [Bolgheri]. … Read more
Spring Whites
With bright sunshine and temperatures flirting with 80 degrees here in the Northeast, it’s time to put parkas and boots away. Grilled fish dribbled with olive oil and other lighter fare replaces hearty long-simmered stews. To accompany this change of culinary seasons, lively whites will appear in place of those robust reds. … Read more