You’ve probably heard the term “volcanic wine” thrown around lately. As in, “I only drink volcanic wines these days,” from your hipster friend, or “I heard about this volcanic wine from Etna called Susucaru from Action Bronson, but I can’t find it anywhere,” from about a million followers of Action’s Vice show, F**ck That’s Delicious.
Jair Tellez, chef/owner of the progressive Laja Restaurant in Valle de Guadalupe (Mexico’s wine country), is the guy behind Tecate-based Bichi, the only known natural winery in Mexico. A few years ago, he decided to make the kind of wine he wanted to pair with his food, and began resurrecting old vines in Baja to make delicious, authentically-made wine from grapes suited to Mexico’s hot, dry climate – with awesome label art (bonus!).
I love the way natural wine critic Alice Feiring describes Aligoté: “the much maligned other white grape of Burgundy, which a few brave and romantic vignerons slave to elevate to greatness.” One of those is Pierre Morey, the former winemaker at Domaine Leflaive (very famous Burgundy producer), who maximizes the grape’s capacity for complexity and terroir transparency with this biodynamic Aligoté bottling from his family’s vineyards in Meursault.
One of my favorite styles of wine is the light, zesty, low-alcohol white, commonly hailing from coastal Portugal, Italy or Spain. I’ve taken to calling this delightful category “Delicious Water”. Clocking in at less than 12% alcohol, DW wines are super food-friendly but are also amazing without food. In the park. On a sunny day. So refreshing. Yum… This old-vine […]
The popularity of wines from Mount Etna, the very active volcano in Sicily’s north-eastern corner, has exploded in the last few years. It is now one of the Italy’s hottest wine regions, and the darling of sommeliers around the world, for good reason. The volcanic soils, high altitudes and pre-phylloxera vineyards create wines of intense minerality, pure, bright fruit, and lightness of […]
