April 08, 2024
Barrigón
In 2020, after 10 years of making Mezal in Oaxaca, Barrigón founder Xaime Niembo decided to explore the diverse soils of Mexico and create a different delicious beverage…wine! Most grapes are sourced from the organically farmed vineyards on their 14 acre estate in Querétaro with a small supplement from friends in Guanajuato that share the same farming ethos. They make only natural wines, using indigenous yeasts with nothing added, and are bottled without fining, filtering, or adding any sulfur. They call it “Sin Chingaderas” or “wine without any sh*t!”.
Without a dedicated winemaker, the Barrigón team works together to perfect these special offerings. Unfortunately for all of us, they make a very small amount of wine with just over 100 cases of each of the 7 different wines being produced every vintage. You’ll notice the lovable drawings on the labels which represents the “Barrigónes” that are part of the team that make this wine possible, all represented with “big bellies and fun attitudes”. They chose the name Barrigón because it translates to “big belly” and they firmly believe everything that ends up in there should be enjoyable and make you happy. We couldn’t agree more and these wines do just that! In their own words: “We don’t just make wine because we love it, we make it because we love to eat, we love to drink, we love to enjoy ourselves, we love to share and we are endlessly marveling at what each vintage brings to us”.
A lemony, edgy and delicious white, an ultra-fresh crushed pineapple and stone fruited orange, and a light-bodied rosado full of ruby red grapefruit and white pepper spice are now in the shop, just in time for summer. ¡Salud!
-Michelle-
April 01, 2024
Decideret
High school friends Cornelius, Martin and Jakob came up with the idea to make delicious juice in the late summer of 2015. They were at Jakob’s college graduation party gathered around beers at a park, with the topic of discussion being the lack of a local wine tradition and culture in their country of Denmark. An estimated 5,000 tons of apples rot in orchards there every year and this just didn’t sit well with them. With the ethos and vision of natural wine, the three broke into the nearly untapped market making cider and fruit pet-nats, giving this previously forgotten fruit a new purpose.
Their operation grew from gathering apples at nearby parks and in the backyards of friends, making the juice in their parents garages, to a full production facility in Nordhavn, sourcing from some of the best organically farmed fruit in Denmark. Using native yeasts, method ancestrale to achieve natural bubbles, and as little intervention as possible, they’re proving that fruit wines can be as complex as grape wines - and fun too! We’re seeing more and more of these co-ferments of apples, pears, and others with grapes in the market and we’re all for it. They’re vibrant, alive and some are even low ABV so they’re perfect for drinking all afternoon! Skål!-Michelle-March 09, 2024
Wandering Barman
Ever wait too long for a fussy cocktail at a bar on a busy Saturday night, wishing you had ordered a beer instead? Enter: the kegged cocktail. This methodology means that you can get a drink with the same level of complexity, in the time it takes to pull a lever. Brooklyn hospitality veterans Roxane Mollichi, Darren Grenia, and Julian Mohamed opened their Bushwick bar, Wandering Barman, with the intention of bringing the taproom experience to the cocktail world. The team uses their deep botanical knowledge, as well as cutting edge bartending techniques, to create cocktails that can maintain their freshness and vibrancy in the keg — and now, in the bottle.
What are they making?Some of you may be fans of the Wandering Barman bottled cocktails we’ve had in the shop for a while now: Iron Lady, a rose gin drink with grapefruit and a backbone of hoppy bitterness; Socialite, a gin old-fashioned with elderflower and cucumber; and FOMO, a spicy pineapple vodka sling with hatch chile.We’ve just brought in two new stunners from the team that we’re thrilled about. First, Ghosted, a white Negroni with a hint of juniper that is just screaming to be your spring staple. Second (and my current personal favorite), Boomerang, a hickory smoked old fashioned. Drool!Why do we love them?
Wandering Barman makes some of the best canned (or in their case, bottled) cocktails in the game. Making a great ready-to-drink cocktail is tough. Citrus juice, which provides the make-or-break acidity in most cocktails, loses its freshness about twenty minutes after being squeezed. It takes both creative ingredient use, as well as strong scientific acumen, to be able to create a shelf-stable drink that tastes as good as the day it was bottled. Wandering Barman excels on both these fronts.-Sara-February 22, 2024
Heater Allen
In this month’s beer club, we’re highlighting some of the country’s cultiest breweries. One of them is McMinnville, Oregon’s Heater Allen, which makes one of the world’s most awarded, sought-after pilsners. In the late 90s, Rick Allen started home brewing as a way to decompress from his stressful job as an investment banker. Turns out, he had quite a knack for it. In 2007, Rick finally went for it, and opened a truly tiny microbrewery. Accolades started to roll in, culminating in the brewery’s 2022 Gold Medal at the World Beer Cup for the pilsner.
Who are they?
Heater Allen remains a family business. The “Heater” refers to his wife’s maiden name (Rick thinks his wife “should always get first billing”). His daughter Lisa also joined the brewery in 2009, working her way up until she finally became the head brewer in 2017. In November of 2022, Lisa and her partner Kevin Davey (the founder of Portland’s Wayfinder Beer) took over Heater Allen as its new owners and head brewers.
Heater Allen focuses on traditional, Czech-style beers. We have their pilsner and their schwarzbeir (black lager) in the shop right now, and both are incredibly vivid expressions of the style. The hops taste fresh, the malt creamy. Each sip is super satisfying.
-Sara-
February 12, 2024
Elise Dechannes
Who are they/Where are they located?
Elise Dechannes comes from a Champagne producing family in the tiny and very much under the radar appellation of Les Riceys in the southernmost part of the Aube in France. Elise found success in banking before taking over at the family estate in 2008, pursuing her original passion for winemaking and viticulture.
Elise is equally passionate about organic and biodynamic viticulture, with the utmost respect for nature and biodiversity placed at the forefront of her farming. Since her early days, Elise has kept treatments to a minimum, harvested carefully by hand, and plowed with a horse in an effort to not compact the soils, allowing the vines to breathe and absorb the natural nutrients.
What are they making?
The Les Riceys region is known for their unique still Pinot Noir rosés, and while Elise does have one in her range of wines, she specializes in Pinot Noir based blanc Champagnes.
Fermentation and aging happens in a mix of stainless steel, oak, sandstone and clay amphorae. Most are bottled without dosage and are vintage-bottled. Through all of her site-specific wines is something ethereal and wildly complex with an elegance that truly shows the intricacies of this particular place.
Why do we love them?
We’re thrilled to have two of Elise’s Champagnes in the shop at the moment that are considered to be her top cuvée’s. The fist is “Absolue Grès” meaning “sandstone” in French, which achieves its signature freshness through vilification in sandstone amphora. And “Absolue Terre” meaning clay in French, is distinctly different despite both coming from the same parcel, and is aged in clay amphora. They’ve only been available in California for about a year and have already become extremely coveted. Needless to say, quantities are super limited and these go fast. Available now!
-Michelle-