August 2025 Newsletter Wines
For August's newsletter, we have divided the selection into three parts based on the grapes, and how they've traditionally been treated by winemakers.
Part I: Bulk Varieties
There is a subset of grape varieties in the world that has long been consigned to the margins of the wine menu, vines that produce too many grapes and need no fussing in the vineyards, so they never get the care and attention of famous varieties in the vineyard, nor the fame and adulation of those special grapes. That doesn’t always mean these bulk grapes make bad wine. They are perfectly capable of making excellent wine at a reasonable price. Here’s four of them.
Les Petites Sardines Muscadet Sèvre et Maine Sur Lie 2023 $14
Muscadet vineyards cover the farmland on the south bank of the Loire opposite Nantes, the ancient Breton capital. If ever there was proof of the adage “what grows together, goes together”, it is here, where some of the most fruitful oyster flats in the world meet equally fruitful vineyards that produce the best wine for oysters in the world. Part of this happy couplet can be explained by the presence of Atlantic sea salt. The brine that crusts the rocky shore and permeates the air is also in the oysters and on the grapes at harvest time, giving both food and wine a distinctive flavor. Muscadet makers highlight the comparison by aging wine on the lees (the fleshy bits of the grape) for a few months before bottling. This adds a creamy note to the texture of an otherwise light and powerfully crisp wine; is it a coincidence that the most prized oysters are celebrated for exactly the same texture? In this charming Muscadet, you will also find notes of pear and apple, lemon and lavender alongside plentiful evidence of salt. If no oysters or canned sardines are available, pair with a sharp and fresh brie.
Monticino Rosso Albana di Romagna 2023 $22
It is difficult for us wine merchants to keep up these days. Ten or twenty years ago, we learned about wines like Albana di Romagna, and easy narratives fell neatly into our mental filing cabinets: “(1) First DOCG appellation officially filed in Italy, (2) Obviously someone greased some palms to achieve this, (3) The wine is a generally mediocre, characterless white; not worth your time.” Thus the filing cabinet slammed shut and we didn’t have to think about it for decades. Until now, that is, because we’ve lately been faced with a distressing number of delicious, characterful Albanas di Romagna, and this one from the Zeoli family at Monticino Rosso is the best yet. This wine jumps right out of the glass with aromas of kiss melon, pear, marzipan, sage and salty minerality. The palate is powerful with clean lines like an athlete wearing a Euro-cut suit. Flinty acidity shines on flavors of lime and lemon and peach before the finish comes through, leaving behind a trail of apple blossoms and almonds. Serve this with seafood stews, light curries, and colorful salads.
Les Vignerons d’Estezargues Vin de France Carambouille 2023 $18
Does this easy drinking bottle of Glou Glou-style wine come from a commune of natural wine hippies in Ardeche who make sulfur-free wines from wild vines and shun fancy things like electricity? Not quite. Les Vignerons d’Estézargues is in the thick of Cotes du Rhone’s western quarter, and if they happen to be the Rhone Valley’s best known and respected entirely organic cooperative, that is only part of what makes them great. They also make wonderful Cotes du Rhone along classic lines; even featuring and celebrating single family-owned grower bottlings in their lineup rather than blending all the sites together. But for those days when the thermometer creeps up to 30 (or as we call it: 86), they upend the traditional recipe and make this Carambouille, a ruby red lightning bolt of a wine. Aromas start with the namesake star fruit - or Carambola, for the official english name - strawberry, orange peel, Rainier cherry, and Rhonesque notes of sage and tarragon. The palate is bright and juicy and brimming with prismatic red and orange fruits before gentle sprinkles of garrigue herbs land on the finish. Drink cold when it’s hot outside, with charcuterie, caprese, and margarita pizza.
Franck Balthazar Cotes du Rhone Rouge 2023 $22
When Franck Balthazar returned home in 2002 to take over his father’s vines in Cornas, the stakes were relatively low. Cornas was less important than it is now, a small Northern Rhone village where most growers sold their wine in cask to local restaurants rather than bottling them. Things have changed somewhat since then, but Franck’s methods remain firmly low tech in the vineyard and winery, and his wines are old-schooled, full structured, meaty and savory all the way through. For his (still inexpensive) Cotes du Rhone, he sources organic grapes from a friend in the southern Rhone village of Seguret. The wine stays true to his minimal principles in the cellar, and ages only in used oak. The wine opens with aromas of deep black cherry and blood orange peel, pepper and oregano. The palate is lush and warm with red currants and more orange, with garrigue herbs and spices and pepper. Tannins build slowly towards the finish, making this one suitable for hearty, slow cooked meat dishes, smoky barbecue flavors, and eggplant parmesan.
Part II: Everyday Varieties
These wines are made from grapes that have never been served at the queen’s table, nor have they been officially banned (except one, because it didn’t deserve it and nobody liked that Philip guy anyway). These are the grapes that put their pants on one leg at a time like everyone else.
Matteo Correggia Roero Arneis 2024 $22
Arneis does a lot of heavy lifting in the Langhe. It is the only white variety in a corner of Piedmont where red wine is the overwhelming favorite, but it keeps a place at the table through sheer force of personality. Arneis at its best is like AC/DC in the form of wine, with a proud 1980s era mullet of gardenia and muskmelon fruit, oranges and lemons and acacia blossoms that fly like soundstage sparks, and thunderous rhythmic acidity that keeps everything on the beat. Matteo Correggia inherited a vineyard in Roero in 1985. Whether he was literally listening to Back in Black in the cellar, or simply inspired by the album, he began to do things differently than his father and neighbors. He was one of the first growers in Roero to work organically, to sell his wine outside Italy, and he was one of very few to focus his energy on Arneis. Though he passed away in 2001, his wife Ornella and son Giovanni still make one of the most important wines of Roero, this shocking bright neon flavored power chord of a wine that leaves touches of apple blossoms and flinty minerals behind on the finish. Serve with white pizza or creamy pasta.
JC Somers Laurelwood District Louise Vineyard Pinot Blanc 2023 $21
Jay Somers has been a fixture in the Willamette Valley since he started his first winery J. Christopher in 1996. JC Somers is his second outfit, where he and his wife Ronda Newell-Somers have found more creative freedom to make the sorts of wines they like to drink at home: old-world style wines with a focus on minerality and balance over curb appeal. This single vineyard Pinot Blanc from the Chehalem Mountains has all the focus and minerality we could want, and a heaping helping of fruit too! The nose offers pear butter, saffron, lemon peel and sage. The palate is medium weight, clean cut and refreshingly acidic, and gives flavors of pear and white strawberry and apple sauce, before a salty kick of minerality appears on the finish. This is one of the keenest and best balanced Pinot Blancs we’ve had from the Willamette Valley, and we recommend it with all the chicken, duck, seafood pasta, and creamy textured food you can dream up.
Jean Michel Dupré Coteaux du Lyonnais Pique-Nique Gamay 2022 $21
A wine label doesn’t tell you everything about the wine inside, but sometimes it gives very strong hints. When you see the red-and-white checkerboard rim on this label, that’s a sign that you should pair this snappy red with the sandwiches, charcuterie, and curried chicken salads you find at a sidewalk café. Also, since it’s literally called “picnic” Gamay, it would work just as well on a grassy hillside. Winemaker Jean Michel Dupré made his reputation with century old vines in the Beaujolais crus of Morgon and Fleurie, but he has joined a growing number of winemakers exploring the vines in the hills surrounding Lyon, a city within arms reach of Beaujolais to the north and the Rhone Valley to the south. This easy and inviting Gamay seems to combine the fresh fruit of one with the savor of the other with a nose of, raspberry and black cherry, white pepper, fennel, and dried leaves. The palate gives more cherries and raspberries, fennelly sausage, underbrush, and clay flavors with a light tannic grip and refreshing texture that finishes clear and crisp.
Podere Ruggeri Corsini Barbera d’Alba 2023 $19
Podere Ruggeri Corsini is a relatively new winery, founded in 1995 by Loredana Addari and Nicola Argamante, who left the city behind for a quieter kind of life. Just thirty years later it feels like they’ve been in Monforte d’Alba for generations. Ruggeri Corsini wine feels like the work of an old Piedmont soul. Their Barbera is exactly what it is supposed to be; earthy and luxurious, with a timeless rustic note that tastes like it was in the very first Barbera ever made. It shows aromas of plump cherry and fig, apricot and burnt orange peel over tarry earth. The palate is full, with square tannic shoulders made of rich and stewy black cherry and orange oil, with limestone clay earth, sage and rosemary. If you are a fan of powerfully built, rich and savory wine for your late summer steaks, stews, risottos and barbecues, this is a good one for the wine cupboard.
Part III: Noble Varieties
Throughout history, there have always been grapes that caught the attention of the upper crust. These grapes have enjoyed the attention, finding their way to the very best vineyard sites, tended with painstaking care and destined for bottles set beside fine silver and specific cutlery. These four wines below have all been famous at one time or another – even if it was a couple thousand years ago – but even among this storied set, great values can be found if you look hard enough.
Domaine du Pas Saint Martin Saumur Blanc La Pierre Frites 2024 $21
The reputation of Chenin Blanc from Saumur is rising so quickly that we’re tempted to declare it the equal of Savennieres and Vouvray, the heralded cornerstones of Loire Chenin Blanc. If it hasn’t happened yet, thanks to iconic growers like the Foucault brothers at Clos Rougeard, Arnaud Lambert, Romain Guiberteau, and Antoine Sanzay, it will very soon. Before that happens let’s enjoy stunning values like this one from Laurent Charrier at Domaine du Pas Saint Martin. This organically farmed wine is reliably great every year, but this vintage is simply stunning. Aromas of asian pear, white strawberry and peach come with a note of sandy earth that puts visions of beachgrass in our eyes. The palate is low in alcohol, shimmering with acidity and sunshine-bright flavors of lemon and apple. Fresh herbs bloom on the finish and as the wine warms up, but at any temperature it finishes clean and refreshing, with citrus zest and wet stones. Chenin Blanc like this is almost endlessly versatile, but simple and freshly seasoned chicken dishes come to mind first.
Poggio delle Baccanti Campania Greco 2023 $19
Campania is quietly one of Italy’s best regions for white wine, and one of the reasons for this bounty is the Greco grape, native to the mountains of Irpinia and the village of Tufo. This wine is what happens when Greco takes a vacation to the beach. The La Mura family, Two Raffaeles, a Paolo and a Giovanni, make a range of biodynamically farmed, naturally made wines on the Sorrento Peninsula, just over the mountains from Amalfi. If you have had Greco di Tufo before, you will love the aromas of orange cobbler, tangerine, pineapple and asian pear, all dashed with a bit of sea salt wafting off the Bay of Naples. The palate is just as lush with ripe tangerine, key lime and strawberry mixed with slate-like minerality. Like many of the best Campanian white wines, this one has a creamy texture tempered by vigorous acidity. If you haven’t had Greco before, this would be an excellent place to start. Pair with lemon pasta, anchovies, scallops, or prosciutto.
460 Casina Bric Mesdi Vino Rosso 2023 $18
Gianluca Viberti looks towards the old traditions of Piedmont to make his wine at Casina Bric. Scion of the famous Viberti house, 460 Casina Bric is his own independent project, named for and planted on the highest elevation vineyard in Barolo, with an average altitude of 460 meters. He farms his grapes sustainably and interferes as little as possible in the cellar, to produce unadorned but elegant and complex Nebbiolo. His Barolos are excellent, but in another nod to tradition, he makes this simple, hearty Vino Rosso from his own vines and ages it in wood, then cement, then glass bottle for a total of 18-24 months, depending on the vintage. He does not charge very much for this Nebbiolo, even if it whispers Barolo in every glass. The nose gives ripe black cherries, tobacco, clay and violets, anise and balsamic reduction. The palate has Nebbiolo’s close cropped tannins, with flavors of cherry and orange oil and rich marled clay that stays fixed all the way through the finish. This is crazy good value, all that’s missing in this Piedmont classic is the label.
Akutain Rioja Alta Cosecha 2022 $22
Juan Peñagarikano sold cooling equipment to wineries in the 1970s. In the course of doing business he spent time in the cellars at La Rioja Alta and CVNE, talking with winemakers. He fell naturally into the wine business, planting a vineyard in 1975 and the stable next door which he converted into a winery shortly after. From the beginning, Akutain has been a small batch operation, and the vines are all at very high elevation, from 400 to 700 meters. When they age their wines in American oak, it’s well used American oak that doesn’t dominate the fruit flavor. For this entry level Cosecha – first made by Juan’s son Jon – they use only fiberglass for both fermentation and elevage before bottling. The pristine pure fruit shows through in technicolor aromas of black cherry, blackberry, and blackcurrant, with notes of black soil and orange zest and a hint of smoked meat. The palate is filled with cherries and currants and cranberry tart, with dried herbs and orange oil mixed with gentle tannins. Dusty fruit lingers on the finish, suited for bites of pulled pork, risottos and meaty paellas.
The Winemaker's Barrel: Ruby Vineyards
Begging your pardon for the pun, Ruby Vineyards is one of the undiscovered gems of the Willamette Valley. Based in the Laurelwood District of the Chehalem Mountains and home to some of the valley’s oldest vines – some over 50 years old – Ruby wines are always full of character but carefully balanced, and some of the best values we know of! Come by Saturday afternoon to meet winemaker Mariclaire Costello and taste their latest releases.
Ruby Vineyards Willamette Valley Gamay Rose 2023 $22
Ruby Vineyards Laurelwood District Chardonnay 2021 $29
Ruby Vineyards Willamette Valley Gamay 2023 $22
Ruby Vineyards Laurelwood District Pinot Noir 2021 $25