Wine Listings

Owner-winemaker Cecil De Loach (original founder of De Loach vineyards) named this new project for his first career as a San Francisco fireman. Located in the Russian River Valley, this appellation offers vintners many blending opportunities. Hook & Ladder’s oldest vineyards thrive in the cooler section just west of Santa Rosa. Here the morning fog gently blankets Hook & Ladder’s 100-year old vines and allows the pre-prohibition grapes to ripen to full maturity.

The wonderful blue Danube and the stony slopes that line its banks have been home to the Grüner Veltliner grape for more than 200 years. Today, the Veltliner is the most important grape variety of Austria. And this is not a coincidence!

To paraphrase The Mindbenders: “When I’m feeling blue, all I have to do” is pour myself a glass Grüner Veltliner – how can one resist a wine with such a cool nickname: “Gru-Vee?"

Now that the sun in NE has finally deigned to make an appearance, wine lovers are in search of a crisp, cool glass of dry white wine. Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Grigio may quickly spring to mind, but methinks you should try something different & look for a Grüner Veltliner, the ultimate foodie’s food wine that complements the many different flavors of summer fare.

Family-owned Cava producer, Gramona, produces this sensational unoaked, dry white wine. I am truly thankful for the handful of dry, Muscat-based wines making their way out of Spain and over to us. So, enter the crazy-great Gramona Gessami which combines Muscats with Sauvignon Blanc and the merest touch of Gewurztraminer. 

Check out the website which is offered in not just English, but, also, beautiful Catalan. www.gramona.com

Four generations on, Pellegrini Family Vineyards is distinct for being one of the earliest producers of fine Russian River Valley Pinot Noir. Their purchase of such valuable Sonoma land holdings decades ago allows the Pellegrinis to produce a single-vineyard Pinot for which many others would easily charge twice the price. Furthermore, Olivet Lane was one of the first Russian River Valley vineyards to be dedicated solely to Pinot Noir and Chardonnay (now acknowledged as the valley’s rock-star varietals).

Seize this opportunity to taste what the famed Russian River Valley is all about – for a relative pittance!

What an introduction to northeastern French wine! The result of marriages between (shockingly) the Kuentz and Bas families in 1894 (the “s” in Bas is silent), KB is what Alsatian wine is all about - producing wines from virtually all of the cool-climate Alsatian white grape varietals, including from their organically farmed estate vineyards. A blend of grapes known respectively for aromatics and vibrancy (60% Sylvaner, 15% Muscat, 15% Auxerrois, 10% Chasselas), their entry-level Alsace blanc is as neat and intriguing as its constituent grapes.

Rare are white wines that are this versatile! Enjoy summer-in-a-glass with salads, sushi, Asian fare, or sipped solamente on the porch.

Endangered varietals! Wine grapes on the verge of disappearing forever until some wine-loving souls commit themselves to saving, replanting and resurrecting the neglected, the shunned, the banished grapes. Apparently, thus it was with the grape Gros Manseng: a mere 58 hectares in 1958. Fortunately, this grape responsible for at least one outstanding dry Jurancon white, was re-adopted and by 2006, 2800 hectares existed.

The Jurancon region in southwest France hosts a long wine history but it’s the future for wine enthusiasts seeking unoaked, dry, individual white wines. Over-Sauvignon Blanced? Over Pinot Grigio’d? Time to move to this marvelous dry white.

We hold the white wines of France's Burgundy region in imminently high esteem. Even so, we get so used to the Macon sub-region's reputation for producing "value" Chardonnays that we can forget what exciting, refreshing wines the region can produce. Shame on us.

100% Chardonnay (as with 99% of Burgundy's whites), this absolutely lovable, charming wine hails from the "Macon-Villages". It is at once engaging, respectful and friendly, in a sense - yet also bold and confident in what it is: an exquisitely versatile wine. One of very few white Burgundies we'd recommend for sipping on its own as well as to pair with food. Vinified with indigenous yeasts and minimal sulfurs, importer Kermit Lynch describes the wine as “un-oaked, unfiltered, un-buttery.”: a spot-on description.

Think you don't like Chardonnay? Think again. Or, already like Chardonnay? You'll love us for unearthing this treasure. This is classic - white Burgundy 101. Now, study up.

In our last wine guide we featured a delicious Beaujolais from the region's stellar 2009 vintage. This month, we're honing in on one of the region's 13 villages - Fleurie, to be exact. Where our last Beaujolais feature was a lighthearted, fruity number, it's now time to turn to Beaujolais' serious side - for this a serious wine.

The source property of this wine has a history dating back over 1,000 years - the majority of which was spent in the stewardship of the famed Benedictine Cluny Abbey. In fact, this wine simply oozes respect for tradition - right down to grapes crushed by foot (fear not, for all is purified through sweet, beautiful fermentation!).

Each of the four vineyard parcels whence this wine is sourced contributes its own characteristic: from fruit, to body, to tannins, to finesse. The result is a beautifully traditional, deep, dark, complex wine which really deserves to be paired with a fine meal to be fully appreciated - please see food suggestions. In fact, though certainly enjoyable now, we also recommend cellaring some bottles for 2-5 years (or more, if you're patient and curious!) so that you can explore how a well-made Beaujolais can age. Not many Beaujolais at this affordable price point earn this distinction.

A very promising 2011 wine-wise if one of the very first wines I tasted this new year portends future vinous pleasure.  Saint Cosme property, located near the town of Gigondas in the southern Rhone Valley, was formerly a Gallo-Roman villa (and who knows what before that). The property enjoys something like 14 generations of ownership by the family that today bears the name Barruol. Owner/winemaker Louis Barruol enjoys an emerging reputation as one of the Rhone’s finest wine producers.  This fabulous Cotes du Rhone blanc fully supports such a contention. 

Considering that approximately only 2% of Cotes du Rhones produced are white (blanc), I feel even more fortunate to offer this extraordinary example of one (of the fewer).