BostonZest

For Our July 2022 Toast We Raise a Glass of Guy Larmandier, Cramant Grand Cru Blanc de Blancs to Great Importers!

Today we will toast all the great wine importers whose work and skill have introduced us to great wines with a glass of Guy Larmandier, Cramant Grand Cru Blanc de Blancs from Neal Rosenthal Wine Merchant.

This is one of the few Blanc de Blanc or all Chardonnay Champagnes we like. We would normally select a Pinot Noir forward Champagne. However, the very fact that this one was from Neal Rosenthal made us try it.

Neal Rosenthal describes it, "From this renowned grand cru in the southern tier of the Cote des Blancs, Larmandier’s Cramant is textbook stuff: beautifully brioche-y, yet with a driving floral elegance and an effortlessly pungent minerality characteristic of Chardonnay grown in a place where it’s truly at home."

When you find a wine you love, turn the bottle around and look at the back label. A few of our favorite importers like Neal Rosenthall, Kermit Lynch, and Oz Wines make it easy by proudly displaying their identification in an easy-to-find fashion.

Sometimes you'll have to hunt for the information. To find great importers you can also ask your local wine mentors. For us, a wine mentor is someone who adds to our ongoing education in all things wine and wine-related.

If someone has a great wine list, they probably have a few importers that they depend on to provide a dependable selection of wines that fit their palate. 

We've also enjoyed half bottles of this lovely Champagne at Select Oyster Bar over the years. It's not always on their list but when it is, we recommend you give it a try.

Trying wines from different places, made with different grapes, and produced by different methods adds spice to our monthly ritual. Since 2007 we have raised a glass of sparkling wine to greet each new month!

We purchased our half bottle at Urban Grape for $42.00

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photos: ©2022 Penny & Ed Cherubino 

On March 1, 2023 We'll Raise a Glass of Raventos i Blanc de Nit Cava

This month we'll raise a glass of Raventos i Blanc de Nit cava. This sparkler certainly qualifies for inclusion in our year of choosing wines associated with great memories and great people. We have a scrapbook of photos of this wine in some of our favorite places. Moreover, we are grateful to four wine mentors for sharing their knowledge of this cava and its history with us.

This is one of many wines we discovered thanks to recommendations from Thomas Fielding and Scott O’Connor, one time owners of Perry's Wine and Spirits in Provincetown. These former restaurateurs chose the selection at their shop like a well-curated wine list. 

Perry's was always a stop on our initial shopping trip when we arrived for a week or two. We also loved their clever "OPEN" and "NOPE" signs. The last we heard, these gentlemen were headed for retirement in Mexico.

Thanks to them, we enjoyed many bottles of this great value wine as we made memories in one of our very special places. We'll think of those times with every sip this month.

Back in Boston

Penny ordered Raventos so often at Select Oyster Bar that the staff would often just ask, "The usual?" Select owner, and another wine mentor, Michael Serpa, told us more about the winery and its history. 

On the other side of town, we learned even more from Alcove Boston owner and long-time wine educator Tom Schlesinger-Guidelli. He likes this wine so much that he offers it in half bottles, 750s, and magnums. We've followed Tom around since his early years as a bartender at Craigie on Main. 

Raventos says, "Five centuries of winegrowing, tradition and family."

Raventós i Blanc is a winery with one of the longest documented winegrowing traditions in the world. The family farm where our wines are now produced has belonged to the Raventós family since 1497. Five centuries working 90 hectares of vines and forest, a dynasty closely associated with the land from one generation to the next. Today, Pepe Raventós, who represents the twenty-first generation of the family, farms 44 plots using biodynamic winegrowing methods and is committed to maintaining the estate of vines, wood and lake as a complete entity. Raventós i Blanc is faithful to tradition and upholds the relationship between man and nature at the very core of its production philosophy."

Trying wines from different places, made with different grapes and produced by different methods, adds spice to our monthly ritual. Since 2007 we have raised a glass of sparkling wine to greet each new month!

We purchase our bottle at Gordon's Wine and Spirits for $24.99.

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photos: © 2014-2023 Penny Cherubino 

We Toast February 2023 with Colorful, Romantic Memories and Laurent-Perrier Cuvée Rosé Champagne

We have fond memories of enjoying many bottles of Laurent-Perrier Cuvée Rosé Champagne in the flamboyantly colorful Upstairs at The Square in Cambridge. 

We added a bright backdrop to this month's bottle to honor the design of this much-loved and sadly-missed restaurant.

For those who have never seen this space, here's a link to an Eater Boston article with images. As you click through, pause at the photo of the bar where we used to sit alongside the man in the picture. He was almost always there.

Often when we dined, Frank (or "Frank who went to New York," as Ed always calls him) was behind the bar. He was one of those great bartenders who knew the food and the wine and always made you feel welcome.

One day we noticed a bottle of Laurent-Perrier Cuvée Rosé Champagne on the wine menu for less than we had paid in a wine shop. We asked Frank if this was a typo. He consulted the wine buyer and confirmed the price. While that supply or oversupply lasted, we enjoyed great Champagne at sparkling wine prices.

In 2009 we wrote about the food and wine and called this place "a well-rounded favorite." In that article, we also reminisced about the first version of this establishment saying,

"When we first met UpStairs, it was "UpStairs at the Pudding" and was housed in the Hasty Pudding building a few streets over. We adored lunch or brunch on their garden deck. They do have patio seating at the new location, but we must admit we still miss that hidden garden surrounded by Cambridge homes and businesses."

You might have a delightful surprise at either restaurant when the Harvard Krokodiloes streamed into the room and began an a cappella serenade!

Here is what this Champagne house says about this wine:

Grape varietal: Pinot Noir 100% aged an ideal minimum of 5 years.

SENSORY CHARACTERISTICS
"Elegant, with colour changing naturally from a pretty raspberry hue to salmon pink.
A precise nose of extraordinary freshness and a wide range of red fruits: raspberry, redcurrant, strawberry and black cherry. A fresh and sharp attack for this supple and rounded wine. On the palate, it offers the sensation of plunging into a basket of freshly picked red berries."

We purchased our bottle at Gordon's Wine and Spirits for ~$100 with a six-bottle discount.

Trying wines from different places, made with different grapes and produced by various methods, adds spice to our monthly ritual. Since 2007 we have raised a glass of sparkling wine to greet each new month!

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photos: © 2009-2023 Penny Cherubino (Bottle with glass courtesy of Laurent-Perrier)

We'll Toast January 1, 2023 with a Bottle of Champagne Bollinger Special Cuvee

If we were forced to choose a favorite Champagne, it would be Bollinger. We haven't enjoyed a bottle of Bolly for a while and decided to open another year of toasting each new month with the warm memories of past bottles of Bollinger. 

We love the spirit of Lily Bollinger, who managed this great house for many years and established its worldwide reputation. She said, "I drink it when I’m happy and when I’m sad. Sometimes I drink it when I’m alone. When I have company, I consider it obligatory. I trifle with it if I’m not hungry and drink it when I am. Otherwise, I never touch it—unless I’m thirsty." 

We've enjoyed this pinot-forward champagne many times in many places. As we raise our glasses to toast the new year, we'll remember toasting the ocean from a deck overlooking Provincetown harbor.

We've shared bottles with friends at home and on our roof deck. We toasted the reopening of some of our favorite restaurants, on April fool's day 2021. During the past three years, we've raised glasses of Bolly with friends on computer screens because it was not safe to do so in person.

So many sparkling wines remind us of other times and other places. We hope to share a few of these bottles and the stories that made them memorable in the year ahead.

Trying wines from different places, made with different grapes, and produced by different methods adds spice to our monthly ritual. Since 2007 we have raised a glass of sparkling wine to greet each new month!

We purchased our bottle (on sale) at Gordon's Wine and Spirits for $74.99.

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photos: © 2017- 2022 Penny & Ed Cherubino 

We Toast December 1st with Memories of Dining Out and Discovering Champagne Pierre Gerbais at Little Whale!

The latest Champagne to make our favorites list is Champagne Pierre Gerbais Grains de Celles Extra Brut. This year we were able to dine outside until Mid-November. Each meal called for a special celebration since we didn't know when we'd be switching over to takeout at our favorite spots. 

By now, you all must know how we love discovering new sparkling wines. Even if it seems a wine will be out of our comfort zone, we'll try it when it was selected by one of our wine mentors. When we discovered a half bottle of this Champagne on the wine list at Michael Serpa's newest restaurant, Little Whale Oyster Bar, we ordered it even though it was described as "Extra Brut."

Here's What We Learned From the Importer Becky Wasserman:

"Champagne Pierre Gerbais is a fourth generation domaine in the Aube. It is spearheaded today by the 20-something Aurélien Gerbais, a handsome-nerdy-hipster winemaker who is unnervingly self-assured for his age, yet soft-spoken and humble. At Gerbais, there are old vines, organic vineyard management, intelligence, respect, passion, relevance, training and drive enough to take this house to the very top of a small band of visionary champagne makers in the Aube who include Aurélien's friend and neighbor Cédric Bouchard, and the small houses of Marie Courtin, Jacques Lassaigne, Ulysse Collin, Horiot, Vouette et Sorbée, etc."

The blend is unusual at "Pinot Noir (50%), Chardonnay (25%), Pinot Blanc (25%)"

This bottle had a lot going for it. It is Pinot forward, as are many of our favorite sparklers; it has Pinot Blanc, one of Penny's favorite varietals; and it was a Michael Serpa pick, which we consider highly recommended. 

We've not been able to find this wine locally but plan to see if we can repeat our meal of halibut, swordfish, and beet salad with a bottle of Champagne Pierre Gerbais Grains de Celles Extra Brut as takeout from Little Whale today. Remember you can support your favorite restaurants who offer wine to go by occasionally adding a bottle to your order. Let's hope the state continues to allow this option to help restaurants make it through the slow winter season.

UPDATE: Yeah! They had a half bottle on hand! We bought it to recreate our meal. However, Penny was craving the chowder, so we shared the sword, beet salad, and chowder!

We enjoyed our first taste with a bottle at Little Whale for ~$60

Trying wines from different places, made with different grapes, and produced by different methods, adds spice to our monthly ritual. Since 2007 we have raised a glass of sparkling wine to greet each new month!

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photos: ©2022 Penny Cherubino 

We Toast November 2022 and Friendship with Breathless Blanc De Noir

Once again, we'll toast a new month with a bottle of sparkling wine that was a gift from friends. This time it is a bottle of Breathless Blanc De Noir that long-time pals David and Peter brought from California on their recent visit. 

This bottle is from their private stash. As members of a number of wine clubs at nearby vineyards, they have access to wines that may not be available to the public. So while our bottle is from a single vineyard Reserve, we’ve linked to the Breathless Blanc De Noir that you could purchase. 

Over the years, we’ve shared a lot of wine with these guys. They know we love pinot-forward sparklers. They share our love of supporting small family-owned and operated vineyards. They also have excellent taste in wine and live in an area where they can visit nearby vineyards on weekends. We often check with them before we purchase wines from that area. 

Here's what we’ve learned about Breathless Sparkling Wines.

This vineyard is owned and operated by three sisters and honors their mother. 

They say, “Guided by the expert hand of award-winning winemaker Penny Gadd-Coster, the sisters are dedicated to sparkling and still winemaking in the time-honored French method. By employing this méthode champenoise—the traditional second fermentation in the bottle—and using the finest select Pinot Noir, Pinot Meunier, and Chardonnay grapes, Breathless sparkling wines pair beautifully with all of life’s moments, from the everyday to the extraordinary.”

You can learn more about Penny Gadd-Coster’s philosophy and work with the Breathless team in the video below.

Here’s something else we learned from Peter and David. If you are visiting the West Coast and plan to bring back  wine, you might want to choose Alaska Air as your carrier. They offer a deal where you can, “Check a case of wine for free when you fly from 32 West Coast cities.” 

Trying wines from different places, made with different grapes, and produced by different methods, adds spice to our monthly ritual. Since 2007 we have raised a glass of sparkling wine to greet each new month!

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino

Photos: ©2022 Penny  Cherubino 

We Toast October 2022 with Victorine de Chastenay Cremant de Bourgogne Brut Rose

This month our toast will be with a bottle of Victorine de Chastenay Cremant de Bourgogne Brut Rose. This was an easy choice since we found it in a favorite wine shop Formaggio South End. This shop offers the best of so many food options, including a small but well-curated wine selection.

This bottle was in the cooler, chilled and ready for an impromptu celebration. It was 100% pinot noir, a favorite with us. It was a pinot noir from Burgundy, one of our favorite sources for this grape. The back label had what we considered a seal of approval, the logo of Skurnik Wines & Spirits, an importer we trust! Since this bottle made it through all those selection gateways and was priced at $22.95, we knew it would be a great value.

Skurnik Wine and Spirits wrote that great value was their reason for importing this wine.

"Not all Crémant de Bourgogne are created equal. We at Skurnik have searched for years for a Crémant de Bourgogne that can deliver the quality and value that the Skurnik name has come to represent. With Victorine de Chastenay, they have found that rare combination. Long an afterthought for many producers in Burgundy, these delicious sparklers come from fruit in the Côtes de Nuits and Côtes De Beaune in Burgundy (a welcome contrast to most Crémant de Bourgognes that are made from fruit in the Mâconnais, Beaujolais, and Côte Chalonnaise). From the complex and refreshing Brut Blanc to the 100% Pinot Noir Brut Rosé, these wines are made completely in tank to preserve the minerality and freshness of the Côte d’Or fruit and are aged on the lees for 20 months before release (the minimum for the appellation is 12 months!). It is rare to find Crémants of such pedigree and quality at a value price and we couldn’t be more thrilled to have you try them."

We purchase our bottle at Formaggio South End for $22.95.

Trying wines from different places, made with different grapes, and produced by different methods adds spice to our monthly ritual. Since 2007 we have raised a glass of sparkling wine to greet each new month!

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photos: ©2020 Penny & Ed Cherubino 

We’ll Toast Friends with a Dr. Konstantin Frank 2019 Sparkling Riesling Nature

This month we’ll raise of glass of Dr. Konstantin Frank Vineyard’s 2019 Sparkling Riesling. We can thank our friends David and Peter for introducing us to this family vineyard from the Finger Lakes region of New York. We also have to thank them for educating Penny about dry Rieslings. She had always avoided this varietal after trying a few versions that were too sweet for her taste. You can learn a lot about wine by sharing it with friends.

Recently the Washington Post featured Dr. Konstantin Frank Vineyard in Dave McIntyre’s article “This 60-year-old winery changed the way America grew grapes.” One of our toasts from this bottle will honor Ukrainian refugee Konstantin Frank for his contributions to winemaking and the education of wine consumers in this country. Another toast will be to the third and fourth generation of his family who operate the winery today.

A second nudge to place an order from this vineyard came when we spotted their dry Riesling on the menu at the Dubliner, where we’ve enjoyed this selection by the glass while lunching with friends.

Here’s what the winemakers say about their Sparkling Riesling Nature 2019. 

“Our Riesling Nature is 100% Riesling from our estate vineyards on Keuka Lake. Secondary fermentation took place in bottle for a minimum of 24 months in our historic underground cellar. The wine is finished without any additional dosage creating a very dry wine.”

“Toastiness comes first, with prominent fruit flavors of crisp red apple, lemon curd, and ginger come to meet up. Driven by its freshness and austerity, the creamy mouthfeel balances the dry, crisp, and bright green apple flavors.”

 

We purchase our bottle directly from the vineyard for $34.99.

We were pleased with every aspect of the transaction. They were offering a quantity discount, so we added three bottles of the dry Riesling and two more of their sparkling wines. The cost of shipping was reasonable. The packaging was sturdy, and our wines arrived promptly as promised.

Trying wines from different places, made with different grapes, and produced by different methods adds spice to our monthly ritual. Since 2007 we have raised a glass of sparkling wine to greet each new month!

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Our Sparkling Resolution is covered in this post : Join Us as We Toast...

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Details:

Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photos: ©2022 Penny Cherubino