I’ve known collectors who love the idea of professional storage, but they’re too afraid to do it because they fear that if anything goes wrong during shipping, they’ll lose every bottle they own. I get it–even though a professional warehouse may be the safest place for your wine, getting a large number of bottles there…
Last summer, I went to a restaurant renowned for its expansive white wine list. I decided to try a flight of German Riesling, and the wines were exactly as I expected–full of life and minerality. When I told the sommelier this, he asked, “Have you ever had Weingut Gesellmann from Austria?” I told him I…
My wine-loving uncle always told me that big Champagne bubbles were a bad sign. He’d say, “You might as well drink a bottle of cheap club soda.” However, researchers are now finding that when it comes to buying the best Champagne, bigger bubbles could be an important factor to consider. Physicist Gerard Liger-Belair recently discovered…
When you think of a Napa Valley cult wine, you probably picture a rich, fruit-forward glass of Cabernet Sauvignon. However, some of the best cult wines of the moment are in fact made from California’s lesser-known Cabernet Franc, a relatively uncommon varietal that’s only been gaining traction on the wine market over the past five…
As a collector, you’re always on the hunt for the next “it” wine, and we want to help you find it. We’ve discovered and compiled the most essential wine trends from the fall quarter that will keep you ahead of the game this year, and we’ve looked into what’s happening in the global wine market,…
The problem with legendary vintages that are more than 90 years old is not whether they’re worth investing in–they undoubtedly are–it’s that finding an authentic bottle becomes more and more difficult every year. A wine like 1928 Mouton-Rothschild combines rarity, old age, and quality, and it’s these factors that make it one of the greatest…
Last spring, a group of French winemakers hijacked five tankers carrying gallons of cheap Spanish wine. They forced the tankers to the side of the road, turned on the their taps one by one, and dumped tens of thousands of liters of generic red wine into the streets. The hijackers destroyed the wine because they…
In 2009, a collector tried a delicious aged bottle of Cayuse from Washington, and immediately signed up for the mailing list. Years later, he finally cleared the list, but his excitement was short-lived. After buying two bottles of 7-year-old Armada and God Only Knows, he found their funky, earthy flavors far too overpowering. The collector…
MENTIONED IN THIS POST: Chateau Petrus Chateau Lafleur Chateau l’Eglise Clinet The words on nearly every collector’s lips this year are “2016 Bordeaux.” I haven’t seen collectors get this excited over a new Bordeaux vintage since the iconic 2009. During the past five years, many of my closest wine loving friends have complained that Bordeaux…
Like a stone thrown into a pond, the ripples of wine fraud impact more than just one collector’s cellar. What happens when a professional wine reviewer can’t tell a fake bottle from a real one by taste? Collectors rely on professional reviews for accuracy, but when these reviews are compromised by fraud, it’s virtually impossible…
It happens to me all the time: I get obsessed with a new varietal, and I buy so much of it that I dig myself into a wine rut. That succulent Australian Syrah I tried last year might put me down the path of Mollydooker, then Torbreck, then Penfolds, and before I realize what’s happening,…
The last time I was in France, I found some surprisingly delicious 2012 Bordeaux in a wine shop on the outskirts of Paris. This was surprising because I’ve listened to collectors and wine critics alike complain about the subpar quality of 2012 Bordeaux, especially the sweet white wines. Uneven flowering followed by mildew made the…