An Afternoon with Nicolas Joly . . .

An Afternoon with Nicolas Joly



Beaune Imports newest acquisition for California.  Check out my friend Allison Levine's blog posting about her visit to see him at his estate in the Loire.  The wines are arriving later this year.

Interview of me by Eric Guy of Protocol Wine Studio and True Wine Culture podcast . . .

This is a good way to get to know about how I got started in the business and how my business works and will give you a good idea of what I do exactly.

Click "here" to follow the link.

2002 Comte Armand Pommard Clos des Epeneaux

Tasting pretty fantastic right now.  Very dark with lots of mint and root beer in the nose.  Clean and lively on the palate but pretty weighty.  Excellent.

The real rose` season is upon us!

It is boiling out there and the best thing I can think of to cool down is to drink lots of Italian Rosato by the pool.

I have just a few cases left of the following:

Favaro 2013 ROSACHEROSANONSEI Rosato (VdT) 180/15

90% Nebbiolo, 10% Syrah Hand-harvested grapes are fermented at cool temperatures and aged in stainless steel tanks for four months. This wines has great acidity and nice tension that backs up a fullish rosato with nice mineral notes. Aromatics are floral with strawberry and raspberry flavors seasoned with mint.

or the

This is a picture of 2012 vintage.  The 2013 is even better!

Cirelli  2013 Cerasuolo d'Abruzzo DOC 144/12

The Cirelli Cerasuolo d'Abruzzo 2013 is tasting great right now.  Lots of cherry fruit and acidity and a little bit of that salty terroir thing going on, too.  It is also a critter wine, notice the beautiful butterfly, which I am sure is recognizable to all as the sign of freedom and transformation (okay, I am reaching here . . .) but whatever.  The wine is good.

The grapes for this wine were grown specifically to be direct press rose` and that has some advantages.  Lower alcohol and higher acidity would be the most obvious.  And now that the weather is getting really hot, and our rose` season is finally upon us, this is a great wine for those hot days.

Ask for them from your local retailer or email me and I can tell you the best way to get them to your door..

Cheers.

Justin

Trebbiano grapes from Tre Monti . . .

Trebbiano grapes from Tre Monti in Emilia Romagna. Just about to be harvested tomorrow. Vittorio Navacchia says that although so far it has been a rough lead up to harvest, they have worked so hard in the vineyards that it looks like they are going to get most of their grapes in sound condition and ripe. In bocca al lupo per la vendemmia!

Vigna Rio Trebbiano

Vigna Rio

The new single cru Barolo from G.D. Vajra - RAVERA

"It’s a true joy to introduce you to our new single vineyard bottling, Barolo Ravera. Ravera is a superb cru. Located in the southwest quadrant of the Barolo zone, the vineyard runs north to south across Comune di Barolo and Novello. It sits to the west, at the same latitude of Bussia and Ginestra in Monforte d'Alba and Falletto in Serralunga d’Alba. The dominant soil type here is “Arenarie di Diano”: a mix of clay and sands, which is especially rich in iron. This translates into a very vibrant yet dense Barolo that promises a fabulous evolution over time.

Our beautiful block is shaped like an amphitheatre. We have been farming it since 2001 and produced Langhe Nebbiolo until 2008. In 2010, fate and nature smiled on us and we decided that this must be our debut vintage. Only 3,000 bottles will be released from this initial harvest.

Antonio Galloni of Vinous, rated Ravera as an “Outstanding” vineyard, which means, “Sites [that] often produce wines of true personality and class.” - G.D. Vajra

I tasted the wine at VinItaly this year and was blown away.  Maybe it was because it was new, maybe because it was Ravera, maybe because it was 2010 . . . I am not sure.  But for whatever reason, this wine tasted fantastic.

It will be arriving in October and I would like to see how it tastes then.

The passing of Robin Williams . . .

I knew R. Todd Williams (Dr. Toad), Robin Williams' older brother, from the wine business. He used to call on me when I was a buyer at a shop in the Napa Valley a long, long time ago, when he first started his brand Toad Hollow. He was a great story-teller and raconteur and I loved when he came to show his wines because he was just a great guy. We had a laugh and he knew that I was from Marin County and had run across his younger, and "less funny", (according to him), brother a bunch of times growing up. And now he has been dead for many years but is still in my "Rolodex" and since he shared a birthday with a dear departed friend of mine they will forever be linked in my mind and in my heart and I am reminded of him every June 14th when their birthdays roll around.

We all seem to have great stories about Robin Williams, mostly involving his hijacking of people's conversations while on the payphones (remember those?) in the square in Mill Valley (whether we were actually there when the story happened or not is besides the point) and especially enjoyed his stand-up comedy specials on HBO, my favorite being the one from 1982, An Evening with Robin Williams, that was shot at the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco. My 15 year-old friends and I used to watch the video on VHS over and over and over at Todd Roberts' house ( Trevor Davis, Leah Glynn, Liz Carnevale, Brett Smith and who else?) and we could quote bits verbatim for years. My cheeks actually hurt from laughing so hard and I could barely catch my breath.

The last time my cheeks hurt that much from laughing and smiling was in 2002 when I saw him live at Bimbo's as he was trying out material for what would become the Weapons of Self-Destruction tour. It was epic and one of the best live shows I have ever seen.

I did not know Robin Williams as a person separate from his stardom but he has been a part of my life for over 30 years. Whether hearing about him from his dear brother, or watching him on television (in an effort to not swear around the kids, I have taken to saying "Shazbat!" about ten times a day) or in the movies, or live on stage.

He has taught me so much. He comedy informed me socially and politically and was a guide for my teenage years and beyond. If someone were to draw a line in the sand in front of him, he would barely notice it as he leaped over it into overshareland . . . and it was okay. The world didn't end. And I will never forget that. He made it okay to admit your weaknesses and to know that nothing is so bad that it can't be made fun of and made absurd and thus harmless.

He made me laugh so much . . . at him, at the world, at myself. I will miss him.