 Even though we will not be doing the public tasting portion of the Insider's Pick until further notice, we will still be offering the wine for purchase with the usual 10% discount on Thursday and Friday. The wines will still be ones we highly recommend, and the tasting notes will still be our own. We will be returning to doing just the one wine on Thursdays and Fridays until further notice. We hope you are able to come by and get some wines to enjoy.
Probably too hot today to think about anything else but a wine that can be served with some serious chill to it. And chill we will, with a lovely Rose from one of our favorite regions in the Loire. Cabernet Franc is king here, and the red wines are phenomenal, but the Roses are underappreciated and sneaky brilliant. The grape is naturally fragrant and polished in texture without a lot of aggressive tannins, and the cooler climate tends to provide a nice spine of acidity that keeps it from feeling too soft and flabby. Olga Raffault is a long standing organic producer from the portfolio of legendary importer Louis/Dressner, and their Rose comes from a mix of several younger/replanted parcels in vineyards used for their single site red wines. Very salmon-y color in the glass, the aromas are full of cherry skin and succulent herbs as well as an almost citrusy or melon peel tone. The palate is rounder and juicier than a similar Provencal Rose but just from a mouthfeel and texture point of view, polished and silky but still very dry and quenching with just a tickle of acidity and crispness to the finish. The palate is crisper straight out of the fridge, but the aromas pop more the longer it's open, so you can find your happy balance as you sip on it over some snacks or light dinner fare.
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 Even though we will not be doing the public tasting portion of the Insider's Pick until further notice, we will still be offering the wine for purchase with the usual 10% discount on Thursday and Friday. The wines will still be ones we highly recommend, and the tasting notes will still be our own. We will be returning to doing just the one wine on Thursdays and Fridays until further notice. We hope you are able to come by and get some wines to enjoy.
This is always one of our favorite domestic Rose wines vintage after vintage, not because it's always trying to be 'the best' or 'most popular', but because it's always bringing something new to the table. Winemaker Andrew Jones is a long time viticulturalist traveling up and down the Central Coast, planting and maintaining vineyards for over twenty years. With such diverse terrain and climate to cover, there are vast numbers of grape varieties to work with that make sense, and many land owners willing to produce something that's unique. Many of the Field Recordings wines will change sources and evolve over time, but the Rose seems to change course almost yearly depending on which fruit suits him the best; a couple of the previous vintages featured Valdiguie, but this year is not on the list at all. The base concept this year is very Provencal, with Cinsault the dominant grape, and the unique player this time is a Spanish grape called Albillo Mayor. In Ribera del Duero and some other Tempranillo based wines this white grape is used in small amounts to help soften the tannins; here the grape brings a little extra acidity the same way Vermentino or Ugni Blanc do in Provence. Bright, quenching watermelon, cherry skin and citrus skin aromas with a little underlying note of dried herbs, very much Provence inspired but with a bit more red fruit. Round feeling in the mouth with a sort of red grapefruit-esque quenching juiciness and a little bit of acidity in the background to keep it from feeling too soft through the finish. A very Euro-centric style of Rose for a domestic producer, great for parties and light Summer dishes.  Even though we will not be doing the public tasting portion of the Insider's Pick until further notice, we will still be offering the wine for purchase with the usual 10% discount on Thursday and Friday. The wines will still be ones we highly recommend, and the tasting notes will still be our own. We will be returning to doing just the one wine on Thursdays and Fridays until further notice. We hope you are able to come by and get some wines to enjoy.
It's the wine so nice, they named it twice! The New York, New York of Italian wine. And like most things on wine labels, the extra details do matter. Gavi is the name of the town and wine region in the southern end of the Piedmont, the most white grape centric in the region, and features the Cortese grape. Cortese is planted fairly liberally across much of Northern Italy, but Gavi is by far the most noteworthy. The commune around the city of Gavi itself has always carried a distinct reputation above their neighbors for outstanding quality, so much so that Gavi di Gavi was elevated from a DOC to DOCG status. While there can be very good producers from other parts of Gavi, the consistency and quality of wines from Gavi di Gavi are hard to beat. Lots of zesty white fruits, melon rind and cool honeysuckle fruit on the nose that gets warmer and a bit tropical as it opens up. The mouthfeel has a bit of weight to it but still feels crisp with acidity, really bringing out the zesty fruits on the palate finishing with a green-edged dry tone. This holds up very well to both lighter and relatively bold fish as well as lightly herbed pork or poultry, or can do well on its own for the more adventurous out there. INSIDER'S PICK: 2020 YVES CUILLERON MARSANNE IGP COLLINES RHODONIENNES 'LES VIGNES d'a COTE' $22.997/7/2022  Even though we will not be doing the public tasting portion of the Insider's Pick until further notice, we will still be offering the wine for purchase with the usual 10% discount on Thursday and Friday. The wines will still be ones we highly recommend, and the tasting notes will still be our own. We will be returning to doing just the one wine on Thursdays and Fridays until further notice. We hope you are able to come by and get some wines to enjoy.
Marsanne is part of the white grape holy trinity in the Northern Rhone alongside Roussanne and Viognier, primarily looked at as the workhorse grape behind the two show ponies. Viognier gets featured more often as a solo variety (most famously in Condrieu), while Roussanne tends to get top billing for its uniquely haunting and exotic aromas that brings such fame to the white wines of Hermitage, St. Joseph, and certain famous examples in Chateauneuf-du-Pape. Marsanne is very popular to grow because it is naturally fuller bodied and easier to grow than the other two, but tends to not age quite as well so it doesn't get featured in the decades old wines that get so famously exalted in poems and novels. Better winemaking technology in recent decades have helped stem many of those aging problems, and in the hands of outstanding producers like Yves Cuilleron they can be quite outstanding. Clean ripe aromas of white fruits and citrus skin with a touch of what is often described as an almond note, which gets more pronounced as the wine airs out. The texture is fairly full and viscous in the mouth with lots of cool acidity and natural tannins giving lots of lengthy dryness to the fruit. The vineyard this wine comes from falls just a handful of meters from the borders of Condrieu and St. Joseph, and really provides loads of value. A terrific food wine with richer seafood and poultry dishes, especially for those that want a Chardonnay alternative that plays with more exotic ingredients.  Even though we will not be doing the public tasting portion of the Insider's Pick until further notice, we will still be offering the wine for purchase with the usual 10% discount on Thursday and Friday. The wines will still be ones we highly recommend, and the tasting notes will still be our own. We will be returning to doing just the one wine on Thursdays and Fridays until further notice. We hope you are able to come by and get some wines to enjoy.
No better way to finish off our Anniversary celebration that with some Champagne, and on top of that we get to celebrate with an old friend. Amazing for us to think that we've been here for the arrival, departure, AND triumphant return of this winery. An independent family producer since 1856, we got to know the current Forny generation very well when a local importer first picked them up in the early 2000s. We were charmed by the brothers Charles-Henry and Emmanuel many times during their visits to the region, tasting their lineup and helping to host dinners, and their wines developed a deeply loyal following for their fantastic quality and value across their breadth of styles. Sadly, for us at least, they could not stay a hidden gem for long and were eventually discovered by a major national importer (Kermit Lynch, who we also love, so you can't really blame them tbh). The last 7+ years the demand has been so much for their wines in the major American markets our wholesaler for Kermit's wines just hasn't been able to get any Fourny. Thankfully that has changed, and we couldn't be more thrilled. These are pure, distinct, and fairly intensive styles of 'grower Champagnes' that showcase the character of the vineyards around Vertus, built with low dosage for a drier character; the purple label Blanc de Blanc is 'Brut Nature', essentially the driest level of Champagne. This is an either/or situation for the Insider's Pick, so you don't have to get both to get the discount. Even if you don't have something Champagne-worthy to celebrate right now, this may be one to get now in case it isn't here when that celebration comes around. These will definitely start disappearing once word gets out they've returned to our area. INSIDER'S PICK: 2017 GREEN & RED VINEYARD PETITE SIRAH TIP TOP VINEYARD NAPA VALLEY $34.996/23/2022  Even though we will not be doing the public tasting portion of the Insider's Pick until further notice, we will still be offering the wine for purchase with the usual 10% discount on Thursday and Friday. The wines will still be ones we highly recommend, and the tasting notes will still be our own. We will be returning to doing just the one wine on Thursdays and Fridays until further notice. We hope you are able to come by and get some wines to enjoy.
For fans of California wines. Green & Red represents an important bridge between the historic and modern, from the pre-WWII era family vineyards to the explosion of Napa Valley 'Wine Country' after the 1976 Judgement of Paris wine tasting. Founder Jay Hemingway was a sculpture professor at U.C. Berkeley in the 60s, and part of the blooming culture of that era that also included an appreciation for local food and wine. In 1969 he purchased a property in the hills of Chiles Valley above Lake Hennessey, at one time part of an 1880s era vineyard called Rancho Catacula but at this time long overgrown and forgotten. Although a single vine from those original plantings still remains, Jay planted new parcels of Zinfandel and Petite Sirah to produce their first commercial vintage in 1977. Their success with the varieties also helped to inspire renewed passion for the old vineyards that had survived for so long and could still be rescued, bringing now-famous friends in like Robert Biale, Joel Peterson (Ravenswood) and Larry Turley into the wine world. Zinfandel is the most prolific and popular variety, Petite Sirah is the backbone of many great blends, and on its own the inky tannic character will put some hair on your chest (even if you don't want it sometimes). There's only two acres planted in the Tip Top Vineyard, one of their first and highest elevation vineyards, so getting some of this is a real treat. Rugged and darkly spiced, this wine has a long track record of evolving over time into a refined, well structured wine similar in texture to a fine Cabernet but with a wilder red berry and Californian spice to it. Open it now if you aren't patient enough, and plan to give it a LOT of decanting time to tame the tannins and get at the room-filling aromas and inky fruit, and enjoy your taste of history.  Even though we will not be doing the public tasting portion of the Insider's Pick until further notice, we will still be offering the wine for purchase with the usual 10% discount on Thursday and Friday. The wines will still be ones we highly recommend, and the tasting notes will still be our own. We will be returning to doing just the one wine on Thursdays and Fridays until further notice. We hope you are able to come by and get some wines to enjoy.
This is a great wine we get the privilege to feature, not just because of the quality for the price or the distinct character, but because it is truly important for what it means to the identity of the region. The Boca wine region was at one time one of the most important in the northern Piedmont, on par with its neighbor Gattinara and considered the equal of Barolo and Barbaresco. After World War II, the rural agricultural economy was gutted by the next few generations moving to Milan and other industrial centers looking for jobs. As recently as the 1990s there was less than 50 acres of vines remaining in the entire appellation. The group that started Le Piane sought to revitalize Boca at its lowest point, first purchasing about 2 acres of one of the oldest remaining stands of Nebbiolo, then slowly buying other parcels and replanting new ones. This wine represents the classic regional 'field blend' using Nebbiolo, Vespolina and Croatina; because of their early work preserving original parcels, they also have a site of rare mixed varieties interplanted and harvested together used in the blend as well.It's a fun bit of mystery to see on the wine breakdown '15% of 9 other grape varieties and also white grapes'. Because of that uniqueness this is a wine that is all but impossible to replicate. Loads of savory dark fruits with unique aromatics of dried spice and tobacco alongside slight whiffs of citrus and white fruits, very fine tannins with a soft rustic flavor, this isn't a blockbuster type but subtly beautiful. A tasty pairing with gamey or mushroomy meats and pastas.  Even though we will not be doing the public tasting portion of the Insider's Pick until further notice, we will still be offering the wine for purchase with the usual 10% discount on Thursday and Friday. The wines will still be ones we highly recommend, and the tasting notes will still be our own. We will be returning to doing just the one wine on Thursdays and Fridays until further notice. We hope you are able to come by and get some wines to enjoy.
Along with the special case pricing we do during our Anniversary Special, we like to break out a few nicer than usual wines to feature in the Insider's Pick, some extra-special treats that usually wouldn't show up here. In the case of this wine, it's also one that is a little closer to our hearts. Not everyone may prefer the style of Sauvignon Blanc that comes from the Loire, but Sancerre is without a doubt very singular within the region. It is one of the most distinct lessons in the concept of terroir, one of the first places where many learning about wine (myself certainly included) said 'Wow, there is definitely something going on 'here' that just isn't happening anywhere else around it.' And I can honestly say that, in the entire time that the Wine Warehouse has been open, there has been MAYBE 2-3 vintages of this wine that we have not had in he store. MAYBE. This is a Sancerre icon (along with Vatan and the two Cotat brothers) , with family roots as growers back to the 14th century and vineyards on the premium chalky slopes of Chavignol. Short of the rare and expensive single site bottlings from the best producers, this is as true as you get in Sancerre; vibrant, tingly on the palate with loads of white fruits and hints of chalky dustiness, mouth-filling yet completely refreshing. A perfect special occasion wine for this time of year.  Even though we will not be doing the public tasting portion of the Insider's Pick until further notice, we will still be offering the wine for purchase with the usual 10% discount on Thursday and Friday. The wines will still be ones we highly recommend, and the tasting notes will still be our own. We will be returning to doing just the one wine on Thursdays and Fridays until further notice. We hope you are able to come by and get some wines to enjoy.
The weather is starting to mandate a little extra Rose action, which works out just fine as more and more excellent ones finally start making their way into the marketplace. Provence is of course one of the signature regions in the world for Rose, and once the Cannes Film Festival and Monaco GP get into full swing the Rose flows more freely than the water. Lots of good stuff, but as always lots more very ordinary stuff as well, so you should still make sure you're buying from good producers. Figuiere is a moderate sized organically run estate in the sub-district of La Londe, and their Mediterranee line comes from nearby contracted growers; technically the Mediterranee IGP covers a mighty wide area and can make for very nondescript wines, but this is true Provencal Rose in every aspect. Super clean and fresh with bright acidity that pops on the nose with aromas of peeled citrus and strawberry leaf, quenching on the palate showing lots of mouth-watering flavor with almost a hint of salinity to the finish. Classic character that delivers great value, and while we are rarely suckers for a label........c'mon, this literally screams for poolside enjoyment.  Even though we will not be doing the public tasting portion of the Insider's Pick until further notice, we will still be offering the wine for purchase with the usual 10% discount on Thursday and Friday. The wines will still be ones we highly recommend, and the tasting notes will still be our own. We will be returning to doing just the one wine on Thursdays and Fridays until further notice. We hope you are able to come by and get some wines to enjoy.
Many choices of Rose to be had for Memorial Day, wanted to offer one out that may not get as much recognition as it should at first look. A lot of people would look at this label and think 'Cassis? Like Creme de Cassis? Must be sweet.' That famously sweet blackcurrant liqueur was created originally in Burgundy, while this dry Rose comes from the Mediterranean Coast near the town of Cassis. So no relations there. If anything, Cassis has the most in common with its neighbor Bandol just to the East, with a similar port and amphitheater-style hills surrounding the city, framed by one of the largest bluffs on the coastline. The soil in Cassis is heavier with limestone than in Bandol, which has made it more attuned to making white wines and Roses. Quality here is consistently higher than most Cotes de Provence out there, there just aren't that many producers so we don't 'know' them as well as we should. Fresh strawberry and citrus skins on the nose, crisp almost to the point of showing some salinity on the palate with lots of quenching watermelon and cherry skin coming through, and a lengthy refreshing finish. This will stand up to lots of foods because of the body and fresh acidity, as well as be super refreshing chilled down on its own. |
The Best of the Best.We offering free tastings on these wines in the store every Thursday and Friday, and a 10% discount off the retail price through the duration of the day. Come on by and give them a try! Archives
July 2022
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