Daniel Johnnes (https://www.instagram.com/danieljohnnes/) is a true wine hero. He spent four decades in wine and hospitality with Daniel Boulud and Drew Nieporent at New York’s finest restaurants. A true Francophile, Daniel has shared and promoted his love of French wine to all of us. He has received two awards from the French Government and is also James Beard Award winner. At The Grape Nation, we like to say “We Bring Wine to the People”. Well, Daniel Johnnes has become the greatest example of that by way of his wine fetes or festivals, La Paulee, La Fete du Champagne, La Tablee, his Pressoir Wine Experiences, and as an importer.
Jersey born, Bombay raised, Raj Vaidya’s love of Burgundy, Champagne and Rhone wines eventually brought him together with Daniel Johnnes. Raj is a highly accomplished Sommelier and Director of Operations for Pressoir (https://www.instagram.com/pressoir.wine/) . Before Pressoir, Raj worked at the finest wine restaurants in the country including the Ryland Inn, Cru, Gary Danko, and ran the wine program for a dozen years with Daniel Boulud. Raj and Daniel are gearing up for La Fete du Champagne (https://www.instagram.com/lafetenyc/) Oct. 25-28th in NYC, Nov. 3rd and 4th in Houston.
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That’s heritag Ron network.org 15 to donate and enter to win today and make sure you donate before March 31st thank You you’re listening to Heritage Radio Network with more than 30 weekly podcasts Heritage Radio network has something for every food lover learn more at heritag rwork dorg this episode is brought to you by Roberta home of Heritage Radio Network since 2009 learn more about Roberto at robertto pizza.com Well welcome to the grape Nation your weekly wine Journey our guests are Raj vya and Daniel John’s J did that on purpose see if you’re awake um we’re going to talk to Raj and Daniel about wine La fetu champagne Lai LA prir and more we’re going to taste what looks like a big
Treat here the guys brought in a 20-year-old coat Roe which we’ll talk about in a few minutes for our week wine sip I’m your host Sam Ben Ruby stay with us for the great nation on the Heritage Radio Network we bring wine to the people Daniel jonis is a true wine hero
He spent four decades in wine and Hospitality with Daniel belud and Drew necon at New York’s finest restaurants a true Francophile Daniel has shared and promoted his love of French wine with all of us he has received two chalier Medals of Merit from the French government and is also a James Beard
Award winner at the great nation we like to say we bring wine to the people well Daniel has become the greatest example of that by way of his wine Fates or festivals La P La fateu champagne La té his prir wine experiences and also as an importer Jersey born Bombay raised
Singapore all of those who knows all over the place Raj V’s love of burgundy champagne and rone wines eventually brought him together with Daniel John’s no coincidence um Raj is a highly accomplished somier and the director of operations for prir before prir Raj worked at the finest wine restaurants in
The country including even New Jersey the Ryland end crew Gary Dano and and ran the wine program for a dozen years with Daniel belud Raj and Daniel are gearing up for La Fett du champagne October 25th through the 28th in New York City and correct me if I’m wrong
November 3rd and 4th in Houston that’s correct okay so October 25th I think is today so we got to get going all right guys welcome back to the Grave Nation it’s great to have you here um ex I’m excited to have both of you I just want
To warn people that uh because Daniel is in the thick of things he’s going to run out a little early and Raj is going to hang with me we’re talking to Raj and Dan at the Heritage Radio Network Studios in Bushwick Brooklyn at Roberta’s pizza of which we had a little
Delicious before we got the show started so if you hear any burping or anything that’s from the beas thing all right before we talk about the upcoming events which timing wise is really why you know I ask you you guys to come here I want to tap into your wine expertise
Specifically about champagne burgundy and rone 2 um so let’s start with champagne and burgundy both are classic uh wine growing regions and I would say have gone through a lot of change in the last few decades um climate change is now an issue gener ational changes right in
Front of us um the grower movement in Champagne you know is there so let me start with generational shifts and new wineries in addition to new Wineries and wine makers um are you seeing that shift as a significant thing in both regions well well we’re still here
Everybody yeah uh just just want to remind you Sam you’ve done your homework uh thank you for that wonderful introduction for both of us that was great um to answer your question I’m going to say yes but I want to throw you off your uh your program please do I
Want to throw you off a little bit your you know your your your schedule of topics to talk about because I want to start by saying how uh how proud I am to be working with Raj for the last several years came on board and also for the
Rest of our team we have an amazing organization uh with the uh the festivals and prir prir handles restaurant Consulting and uh seller consultation for collectors and uh we have a lot we have a lot going on we have an amazing organization I’m really proud to be uh working with such
Talented people uh some of them live in Boston and in France and bone and even New Jersey and uh it’s really great to to be surrounded by such talent and passionate people so I want to start out by saying that I think after you know we’re done talking anyone who’s attended the events
Or anyone who listens to this podcast and understands what you’re doing realizes it does take an organization and it’s nice of you and I know how important Raj is and Edward and you know handful of people and then everyone else that works with you you um it’s it’s
Nice for you to say that because there’s a lot of moving Parts here you know so it’s it’s thank you for saying that um anything else to that point well I mean you know we as I said we we really cover the world of wine uh French French wine we’re all
Francophiles and uh that starts with me having lived in France and really developed my my palet for French wine um but um you know we touch on all all topics French related French wine related and I have to say that what’s really important to us is the culinary
Angle to what we do also because um we love food we love chefs who love wine and we can’t really appreciate the greatness of wine without great food so we take it very seriously wine is at its best well it shows it shows show food in its best light also
And I started my career wanting to be a chef I gave up on that early on that wasn’t my path uh but I just want to tip my hat to all the chefs who love wine and who collaborate with us it’s really important yeah um I like that and at
Your events the level of chefs is off the charts Raj you know Daniel has declared himself a Francophile is it fair to say early on that was you too or you a little more all over the place in a good way think it’s fair safe to say
Uh early in my career I had of course broader interests as anyone does young and interested in wine it’s such a big world to to try and and become familiar with let alone try and approach Mastery but I started out loving wines from Germany and champagne very early and so
I think uh uh it’s safe to say Franco filia was was already running rampid and I you know I fell in love with burgundy very early uh Daniel had already been promoting it for you know more than a couple decades by the time I was old enough to to start buying and selling
Those talk about Generations well you start you started young and so did I so you know at lunch we were talking about you know I want to talk to you about you know tell my people how they could find values in burgundy and you know new regions and
You know it was clear that you were there before there was any issue about accessibility or unreasonable pricing you know and now we’re here at a point where I mean one of the functions of these festivals is to be able to access and you know taste all these things that
A reasonable price yeah well it’s twofold the access to be able to taste the producers that have become harder to access harder to taste harder to meet with but also to promote the region as a whole I mean right Daniel I don’t know when you first started including in the
Program of Lao the uh the sort of petite wines of burgundy uh by way of the off-grid tasting yeah uh that was that’s long been one of my favorite tastings where we assemble about 100 Wines that are exactly those Discovery uh areas you know not the V Roman but the O coat not
Uh chesan Mor but the Shalon so really bringing those wies to people at one point we used to say yeah that cental bound was like a discovery area now it’s mainstream it’s really good but now you’re talking about even far beyond the O coat and to the djon and I want to
Talk to you about that but I I want to follow up on on two things is there a noticeable generational change like you’ve been in out of burgundy you know walking the vines with people are is that change very noticeable has it been gradual has that time come you
Know is it going to have any different impact on I no change in burgundy I think it’s fantastic there’s so much energy in burgundy today and it’s come with the change of generations of from the you know the father mother the the family to the Next Generation and the next generation is uh
Traveling they’re friends with people in other Regions they’re interested in very very interested in the climate change and how to deal with that in their in their Vineyards uh whether it be organic biodynamic regenerative all kinds of you know attention and I find it an extremely Dynamic region today is there
Still room for besides somebody taking over generationally have you seen new wineries yeah and wine makers pop up that you know impress you I mean that falls under the category you just said where they’re more thoughtful farming practices making good wines the new wineries have to find a way to do it
Because the land is so expensive they cannot buy land in the main Vineyard area of burgundy the coot door and the main appalachi sh Roman but they find ways to do it either they have find investor or they go into the otot regions that are less uh expensive more
Affordable um and uh there’s there’s some fantastic and working with different grape varieties that weren’t as popular such as aligot today Alig Go is is hot so Alig go you would find a little outside of the crew Vineyards of burgundy is it North South Al Corton was
Planted to Ali go it was a more uh laed and appreciated variety historically fell a little bit out of uh favor and generally chardonay would take higher price so uh uh those places which were planted to White were often grafted over or or planted over to Chardonnay post
Fxur but today uh I think it’s twofold first the the interest in wines that have freshness and brightness you know aligot naturally has higher acidity so St expr higher in that region uh but also because uh there’s a general interest in value in in general most
Aligot uh outside of a handful that are extremely expensive gra yes aligot is a grape yeah talk to me you know about characteristics and in that climate and in those soils it’s suited well right right well generally I just drink M and chal Mar but
Okay I guess I’m the go Drinker at the table I kick him out early just kidding come on Hey listen remember we went to L in 7 and Lola served us at elot from em yes I do remember and I was like I’m not really sure and we ended up drinking two
Bottles of it was well you drank a bottle and a half I had a glass and then when I reached for a second glass which was out of the second bottle it was all gone so when you talk about aligote not every burgundy maker is making aligote there are certain people that are
Specializing it is like one of them syvan P give you a bit of a primer on it uh so aligot still generally planted outside of the main village Premier crew areas of of the co door so you’ll typically see it in the oat coat you’ll see it in the Flatlands on the other
Side of the rout Nasional so uh the the lower rent areas so to speak by no means cheap anymore but still uh historically that was because they were less important places so aligot did find there because you could only sell aligot for so much today it’s kind of interesting because the combination of
The naturally more acid driven pallet of an aligot with the cooler climate in the oat coat at the top of the hill is very refreshing and appealing and compelling to Modern pallets I think and also uh when compared with these warm vintages and and global warming and the effects
It’s had on the region the freshness of aligote has become more compelling I think for like so that it was a grape vary that was overproduced and it was considered very thin and acidic and that’s where the the Cure came from right put a little crem de casses in
There to make it palatable but in fact there are some very old Vine aligot that when they’re treated properly and reable yields make a very compelling wine that’s not an uncommon story in wine there were regions where the grape is pretty good the vines were great and they just made crappy commodity wines
You know whether it was or vietto or you know some of these other places what about so do I make you uncomfortable if I say give me a couple of good aligote producers I will stay away from that if that’s Cas no I think that’s easy uh
Daniel you mentioned me this is a a small Winery Ami as in France uh we we got turned onto it at one of our favorite restaurants which is in 7 Leone uh owned by the bees family and uh as Daniel said he managed it was so delicious that it disappeared quickly uh
It’s imported here in the US and and uh zebra Vine selections your neighbor here in in Bushwick brings it in and the wines are spectacular and they’re a great value uh you mentioned Silvan batai who’s kind of the the to some degree the master or the historic master
Of bringing it to the Forefront especially in Appalachian status he makes a number of single Vineyard wines that are e good that I think are spectacular and still very well priced for the quality of the wine uh and the overall quality of burgundy I would
Point out Pier Mor and mor is making a wine that I I bought absolutely every year I seeked it out amongst the other fancy Appalachians that are sold I’d get an allocation of wines you know Mero barar Mor and I’d say can I please have two cases of aligot cool because it AG
Really well it’s great that he mentions Moray because they’re known for their Mero and their B but Al soal ler gra is fantastic and then others like aligot and other great I mean a lot of people have aligot planted and make it and you mentioned shant shant is
Following the footsteps of Pai uh again this is a a great example of an answer to the question you had about new Wineries and new wine makers uh this domain is relatively new and they’ve had to start out with what they could get their hands on you know they don’t have
Massive funding they can’t buy uh chesna or Mero and so they’re making a series of single Vineyard aligot that are absolutely delicious and really I want to say a couple of things because I’m gonna have to leave answer this question first okay see if it works in when
You’re talking about aligot being good value and some of the new wi makers and you know it grows well there is something like the maone in the mix is that an area where yeah you know are they aligot planted all over that region but also from Ma
And Shalon are absolutely are you going to find values in the Macan that you may not find abut okay so aligote aligot from the Macan other wines from the Mac before you end no but what I want to say what I want to say is that what we do at
Our festivals and at prir events and everything we actively seek out some of these lesser know regions to provide good value young producers who are making great wine uh because the big names that we all love and look for as much as we can sometimes they’re Out Of
Reach uh in the pocketbook but also you can’t find them and we think that it’s important to promote the Next Generation the young producers lesser known Appalachians at all of our festivals we have sections of the program dedicated to that right and we feel it’s really
Important you do have um events that are accessible in price and some of these have 20 30 50 different you know wine makers or options which is terrific I got to let you go in one second but we do a thing we have two minutes you got
To taste the wine oh yeah yeah start pouring it so we do a thing called the wine list every week I’ve done it you know almost 300 times I ask my guest five questions you don’t have time for five questions but Raj I’m going to do the full thing with you and we’ll
Compare it to your last one okay so the question I’m going to ask you of the five is your favorite alltime wine when I asked that question you were the perfect guy because you were the perfect guy because you were in the business you were around collectors you were around
Expensive wines so what was like the most expensive rare ball and wine you ever had I don’t give a crap about that answer anymore the answer I care about is what is that wine today that you look back that had the most impact on you that was a Gateway that changed the way
You thought that still resonates with you is there a wine or two that you can remember either when you were a kid or maybe five months ago there are a lot of wines but when I was just getting into it and what really opened my eyes and my
Palet to it was a ran wine it was a 1976 lamine from gigal and I went into a shop and I was looking for a bottle of wine to bring to a Thanksgiving dinner and uh person recommended it and said it’s a little pricey but maybe You’ like to try
It it was a 76 loline for $30 I said yeah well I know it’s a little pricey but I’m going to go for it and uh you know what it worked really well with the turkey when was this you still remember that it was around 1984 so it’s like
Less than 10 years old yeah was like 82 883 but that’s the point of the question that one you still remember and it was it just was a memorable and then more recently the one that is you know it look Raj and I and the people we work with are like incredibly passionate
Always discovering 1937 Roman Ean not too long ago the one was good wow that was it was still on that note holding up all right so wait quickly on your exit just tell me what we’re drinking you I always ask my guests to bring in a wine that’s representative of what they’re
Doing you’re doing the laté Rome Festival you brought in a 20-year-old coat rotate quickly tell me about the Vintage year the producer and Co Roy well 03 was high everywhere but this is from a producer clusel Rock um the only offic certified organic producer although maybe there’s another certified
Producer of organic it’s the oldest and now there’s a couple yeah um in C root lovely family in VAR up on the northern part and uh this is a cvet called the GRL GRL is one of their larger Holdings uh very high altitude up on the plateau
It always makes a well structured one raaj I opened this earlier just to test it especially from a hot vintage like this always has some tannins but it’s drinking beautifully today it is great absolutely love it and it’s a small producer they started out when I met
Them three and a half hectars now the son is uh Gom is running the domain I think he’s up to like 12 met him at yat and he’s going to be here in a few short weeks all right so that was Daniel jonis we have to let Daniel go because
He’s a very V busy guy Raj is going to stay with us um thank you Daniel I hope to see you this weekend good luck with everything Raj and I are going to talk about the remainder of the events um thank you for coming in um you’re
Listening to the great nation on the Heritage Radio Network we’re going to take a quick break and come back with Raj V this episode is brought to you by robertto home of Heritage Radio Network robertto was founded in Bushwick in 2008 and has become one of the most iconic WR
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At robertto pizza.com okay we’re back uh we just said goodbye to Daniel jonis uh Daniel’s on his way to get things going for Le champagne I’m here with Raj vya Raj before we get into the festivals I want to ask you a few more things about wine um you travel pretty extensively to
Burgundy I mean I follow you on U Instagram and I see all over the place so you see all the dogs I get to play with and all grocery stores I get to go to you and icy do you know icy Lou I do know I you you’re the only two who post
Dogs and Vineyard dogs regularly and you know dogs dogs that obviously you know move you or you connect with all dogs move me and UHS primarily if they’re other people’s dogs of course people don’t deserve dogs um and you also travel which we’ll talk about a little
Later in the show you know with uh scholarship candidates and winners um which is interesting but when you travel and I see you out in The Vineyards a lot a small group of people usually the wine maker the owner talking when they get beyond the immediate thing they’re talking about
Which could be those vines that varietal that plot you know the facing or whatever um I mean what else else is on their mind I mean is climate change what the hell am I doing there over and over again what am I talking about not you
Them what are they you know what are their concerns is climate change something they’re accepting and managing or well there’s Let’s uh speak a bit about you know what I actually do when I go to visit these wineries I think that’s kind of interesting not everybody
Gets is as lucky as to be able to have access to these people I’m very very aware of how lucky I am in that regard and I I’ll also I’ll quote a a good friend uh in the wine business I sometimes I always describe this to one
Person but he’s told be that he may or may not actually have been the one who said it after the fact so I I’ll leave it vague but one person said to me early early days of my career that they learned a great deal more standing next
To a barrel than they ever did from a book and I love that that sentiment and I couldn’t agree more and and you know this can kind of uh parlay into some of the other things we’re going to talk about but the biggest um takeaway I I
Hope people get when they they ask me about education and and how to increase their knowledge and wine and really get into it especially if they’re professionals is you have to travel to the regions you have to access the people who make the wine you have to get
Comfortable with them and have them get become comfortable with you and then you have the opportunity to understand more about what they do and that doesn’t translate to you know uh people ask me if I take notes when I go to these tastings I almost never do uh if they is
Important if I’m going to a winery for the first time I might write down a handful of notes just to keep my memory jogged you know what some of the techniques are what their their regimens are in terms of farming Etc but for the most part I try and engage in a a
Conversation and I’m genuinely interested in what they have to say and I’m listening and paying attention oftentimes listening intently and trying to translate it myself because my French isn’t very good uh not like Daniels Daniel’s fluent I’m not and frankly he was a bit of a handicap to me for many
Years because I traveled with him I never learned because he would translate for me since gotten a little bit better uh but um what what I take away from that is more that more important information than for example how much new Oak people use or what the function
Of this additive might be or whether they add anything at all you know uh temperature you know yield whole cluster or not all do ask those questions because it’s interesting but it usually is interesting because it leads into a further conversation on their big picture ideas about what wine making is
And that can be very informative in terms of the style of the wine that you’re going to get how those wines are going to evolve now you know you you and I are both been drinking wine for a fairly good amount of time and uh I’m about 20 years plus into the business
Which means that the youngest vintage that I’ve ever tasted from the time it was in Barrel to today is probably vintages from the early 2000s when I first and and you know we’re drinking a 2003 coat root tea I didn’t taste this in Barrel the first time I visited clusel
Was much later but um if I had tasted it in Barrel and I’m tasting it today and I’ve tasted it a number of times throughout my career since then having bought and sold many cases of it in all of the restaurants it’s still so young
20 years is not really that long a Time in the World of wine so uh gaining this information from the wine makers from the hores mouth so to speak teaches me about their what are they worried about what are they thinking about when they made this wine what are they thinking
About the wine in retrospect uh how did decisions that they made at that time affect the way they’ve made decisions in future further uh vintages and what do they think about all that now you know um seeing the evolution of people’s ideas around the wines that they make if
They make it is very interesting it’s not unlike I think asking an artist what they what they’re shooting for when they produce something uh in Visual Arts uh uh but the beauty is it’s actually comprehensible because it it’s pretty simple and Technical it isn’t art it’s
It’s craft right to a great a great extent so that’s what I’m doing uh what I’m asking them can vary immensely you know uh uh I was recently in a winery in Oregon and uh I noticed that there was music playing and I asked the wine maker
Well is there always music playing he said yeah absolutely is it for the vines no this was in Cellar in fact and the wine was already in barrel and he just said I I you know there’s no way that the uh vibrations don’t have an effect
On the wine so I just always play music that teaches me about the way that the guy approaches everything for from the you know it wasn’t the season for farming they were basically waiting for Harvest at the time but uh I I from his uh inclinations about you know music in
The Sellar there’s a lot you can gain in terms of understanding the big picture he’s thinking a little different that’s a lot of where I’m going uh in terms of the kind of questions I ask in terms of understanding the holistic approach of what people are doing in the W do you
Get a chance year in year out to visit the same people yes uh and you’re you’re talking to them about what we just discussed and I would think year to year it changes by vintage alone and the challenges of that absolutely or what else Evolution trying new things or
That that’s absolutely true especially true in the Ronin burgundy where uh Ur in and your out if I’m going to the same producers the biggest reason I’m doing that is because in our work as uh SAS and you know at this point Daniel and I more as consultants to restaurants uh
And to private clients it’s super important for me to be up to speed with uh the wines especially the hard to reach wines you know uh the the top end producers in all of the regions it’s very rare to be able to taste the wines once they’re finished uh before someone
Buys them and so I have access to that it’s important for me to get a sense of them so I can advise the restaurants and the collectors on on how to uh purchase how to you know utilize their resources for their best game um and also uh it’s
Not untrue of champagne but the the fact is when I visit champagne I’m less tasting for the opportunity to understand what to buy as I’m looking for a a data point on the same wines when I’m going back over and over again uh so I can see how the
Evolution works why is that more important it’s important in burgundy also but but you’re focusing more in I’m focusing on that in Champagne but aside from that champagne is such a complex uh Universe rather than a wine explain a little why I I I will I’ll get into it
So uh you know champagne might be the most complex uh Enterprise in the wine business in the wine world of all and I always say a champagne truly represents the best value anyone can imagine in terms of ter of just the uh the energy and the human energy that goes into it
What goes into it right so with the still wine from a place like burgundy uh you I was just there at the Harvest you get the sense that these Vines were planted at a certain point maybe 40 50 100 years ago uh farming has to happen every year for this to continue to
Produce but then given that season uh there’s a certain amount of work in the vineyard throughout the season there’s the work of harvest of you know destemming crushing pressing uh barrowing down etc etc uh until the wine goes into its you know quiet stage and goes through its uh evolution in Barrel
Gets bottled you taste it a couple times it needs to age more in the bottle before it’s drinkable that sounds pretty complex now think about champagne when you have to do all of that but in addition to that you have to do it with very very strict
Rules around the yield and the press the quantity of how things are are uh uh pressed is super important in Champagne these are pre-existing regulations or codes the law exactly the LA right this is the law of champ uh and then you have to see that evolution of the wine prior
To the bottling so be it in Barrel or in tank what have you the bottling usually occurs early in the year after harvest and sometimes a little bit later in the year after harvest depending on the style so there’s additional additionally scores of decisions to be made there
Then you have a second fermentation which still to this day boggles my mind to understand how it’s such a precise process when it’s so complex you have the addition of yeast and sugar you have the production of uh the CO2 in the bottle as the alcohol content goes up
Exactly the right amount or a very specific amount you have the kind of closure that goes uh on top of this wine before it’s completed then you have the finishing of the bottle discouragement uh dose M or not topping up the bottle how how to bring it to Market champagne
In terms of the energy and work that goes into it is so much more mind-boggling than anything else in the wine world and when you think about it in those terms and you look at a60 to $65 bottle of champagne not an inexpensive bottle of wine for anybody I
Mean it’s a lot of money 60 bucks uh but if you’re buying a non-vintage or multi vintage wine from a good producer you know usually you can find something in the $60 range um that it represents tremendous value in my eyes for a delicious wine that’s a pretty much
Ready to drink although it’ll age very well uh B the amount of energy and work that has gone into it is so immense and you compare that for example with 60 bucks spent in bordeau Napa Valley burgundy uh even the rone to some degree although the rone is relatively
Inexpensive uh you’re not getting the same thing for 60 bucks so it’s almost like a a steal in the wine world and of course as a su and a a relatively lazy one I love champagne doubly because it pairs with everything so stay with that because you know you eloquently laid out that
Champagne you know it’s a wine and then it goes through all these you know processes you know and it’s it’s it’s very difficult the problem that I’ve seen and I’ve also seen a change and I want you to talk you know about this is It’s been boxed as a celebratory wine you know
It’s if it’s lucky it’s been boxed as a celebratory wine often it’s just like a celebration not now but ‘ 80s 90s it was a club wine I mean certain bottles were like these status things it didn’t matter you know what you said how it was
Made or the maker it was just you know a cool thing people don’t think about it for food yeah champagne is broken out of that you asked a question earlier specific to burgundy about you know young or new producers and and the change of generation uh although I can’t
Speak much to the change of generation that I’ve seen in Champagne because most of the producers uh that I work with where there are generational businesses have been at the helm for a little while and uh I would say their their predecessor generation they what their focus on was
On producing the best thing that they could sell so now to shift me into the grower movement you we’re speaking of new or family guy that made it for someone else and now decided this is as true for a grower or for a house uh but
In the past be it uh Growers who are looking trying to produce something they could sell to houses or sell at the market houses trying to produce something that they could sell in the market obviously uh to today having a fairly easy time bringing things to
Market I think that the world of champ champagne has been accepted especially in the big markets of the US and and the Far East uh as a serious wine a lot of cheerleaders you know among them and uh I I think that uh you know Daniel isn’t here to take
Credit for it but I’ll give it to him anyway uh him and Peter had this idea to put together a festival that really brought the whole world of champagne together for the very first time uh you you know the distinction you just GRE Drew between grow Growers and houses is
Not unimportant in terms of the way the structure of the the business is and and the world of champagne but it is unimportant in terms of the quality of the wine it’s there isn’t a side to be picked that Growers are better than houses or vice versa uh that’s pure
Nonsense there’s amazing wine being made from both structures if you will and they both need each other how there are people that do pick sides which based on how you’re presenting it to me is a little crazy because the quality don’t don’t think if it’s not a grower the
Quality to call those people who have a strong preference crazy I just say that they are choosing something relatively arbit that I believe is arbitrary in order to decide what who’s in and who’s out I agree and and the Le champan approach has always been the opposite of
That which is here is the world of champagne in its entirety for you to see for you to taste and to enjoy and to experience and today if someone’s really specifically anti- uh house that’s hilarious to me because all of the top Growers that we uh feature ha all nearly
All of them have some amount of fruit that they’re purchasing or some NEOS on business that they have added on simply because as Growers they weren’t able to buy more enough land or much more land so they’ve had to be able to buy grapes in order to produce more wine there’s
Certainly as we said a market for it today right you know uh producers like Rafael bares has a negoti line of wines and a domain line of wines and continues to grow and the wines are all great good segue you know help me with this because always when I have
Somebody like you so I guess bares checks that box if people are looking for interesting and quality Champagnes but are looking for the value I mean are there certain things they’re going to look for non vintage maybe I mean what where do we go and
Then bring me to a producer or two like I said we’ll put bares up there he’s making great quality to value in that range spectacular and’s he’s a dear friend I’m a big fan I I recognize that but I love the wines before I got to
Love the person even um okay well if you want to have an approach to finding value number one is taste as much wine as possible because very often just because it’s not expensive doesn’t mean it’s not good and and the inverse is definitely true just because it’s
Expensive doesn’t mean that it is good uh don’t ignore small houses because oftentimes they’re non-vintage wine because of the structure of their business is able to offer pretty interesting complexity on account of a lot of Reserve wine which brings you know roundness complexity texture uh whereas it’s harder for either a grower
Especially a young grower young company uh to to produce something with that same uh mount feel that same right character of a champagne and that and here I’m speaking of the non-vintage you know uh call it the the main bottling or the the cheapest bottling um that’s one
Thing to pay attention to in approach uh cly producers I think or Growers that uh that work specific to certain terar you should learn about what you like you know uh there’s champagne’s a big region when wine is being made in a very small part of champagne uh it’s still
Champagne but it has something that’s uh unique in terms of expression so if you get to know certain Growers who make wine in specific Villages and you know that you like them look for other growers in that Village so stylistically but don’t just hunt for style hunt for region that’s yeah
Exactly what aboutt I mean you know there’s Blanc to Blanc which people don’t even know that’s just an all you know chardonay there’s Pino mun Pino Noir I mean that’s that space on my table for each of those styles of wine uh when it comes to the gra variety I
Think most people don’t really uh pay as much attention to what the variety is and more to names like blond BL in terms of style and that’s okay if they know it’s all chardonay that’s great but you know that’s not the most important thing what’s important is that there my point
It’s what my point is more pay attention to what you like take note of it and seek out things that uh that fit in the same category because then you’ll be able to explain your world of what you’re tasting and you’ll find value for sure um I know you’re going to agree
With this but if you’re in a restaurant that you know is good or you like or you have a local wine store that’s more than a commodity store beer and Ice that if you tell those people what you like TR trust your at least some good tries right yeah trust your friendly
Experts uh you know make friends with your friendly local s and your Cav and you’ll get great advice from them for sure and don’t be afraid to try something new yeah try try try try exactly um which is a great thing it’s rare for me to walk into a shop and if I
See a champagne I’ve never seen before it’s very rare for me to walk out of the shop without that bottle because I want to taste as much as possible I’m embarrassed when I go into a restaurant that’s a decent restaurant whether I know the wine person or not and totally
Defer to them I mean you them have work so hard to put a list together whatever the lean is you know whether it’s German wines or burgundy or Bordeaux it’s like you’re doing some good stuff there so what should I drink I mean I I’m never I thought I knew a
Lot in the early days where i’ say oh I want this or that that would embarrass me now so you know lean on that I think that’s a healthy approach yeah and I think you metet better results and again this comes back to education you know the consumer has to educate themselves
The professionals have to be educated to you have to be inquisitive and you want to and you’re G to have to try things and you’ll stumble on some stuff but boy when you hit it you know you’re drinking some good stuff all right um thanks for some uh good Intel on champagne and
Burgundy when we talk about laté a little you know we could uh talk about a couple of Rome wines and follow up on the co Roy all right so let’s let’s get into the wine festivals I think you spend a lot of time on these do getting
There doing them when I say you I mean every you introduced them but let me let me clarify uh the four sort of shall we call them uh platforms uh that you mentioned so Leu Champa which launches today uh is our champagne Festival celebration of the entire region founded
By Peter Liam who’s the world’s formost champagne expert and uh a dear friend and Daniel Jonas um and so next year we’ll celebrate the 10th anniversary of Le which is very exciting I mean all of them are exciting and it’s really grown from being you know a bit of a niche
Festival where we had to convince people that champagne was serious wine to some degree to something that well that was we discussed that before it was either celebratory or in the back now it’s very exciting to most people the festival really has legs it has a huge audience a
Very excited audience we launched sales uh I forget if it was uh August or early early September and effectively sold out the entire New York Festival in a matter of two to three days which was spectacular and very exciting the same thing happened last year and we were in
Los Angeles for the festival so it was a a relatively new market for us and and that that’s very heartening because it means that the is working and one of the other things I absolutely love about lefet is the way that it really brings the region together and brings it uh
Forward in in a unified sense uh there were several you know leaders of SE houses that when they first would come to lefet they would shake a Grower’s hand and now they vacation with them so things have changed over the years and and everyone gets along everyone has a
Great time uh no of course I’m not gonna tell you who uh I’m in ask uh laté which is coming up at the uh end of November beginning of December is our rone Festival so this is a festival that Daniel uh uh first launched in 2019 so
It’s a relatively young festival for us it’s still finding its legs to some degree but um has continued to grow and is a lot lot of fun uh the producers from the rone valley I think really appreciate a spotlight being shown upon them and we excited about them too
Because I think that you know similar to Champagne in terms of uh the quality of the wines and similar to burgundy in terms of the structure of the the small producers and and Tiny Holdings um there’s a lot of character there’s a lot of history there’s a lot of Terre to be
Spoken about in both the North and South and I love to be able to talk about them and bring them to the Forefront they’re incredible food wines they’re especially great you know as we get totally variet than burgundy you know just the whole yes but but there’s there’s some
Similitude in culture which is why it makes s say culture absolutely why are different and that’s why it works so we’re excited about that that uh will launch as I said uh next month uh at the end of next month and the beginning of De for laté nothing’s on sale yet right
Everything’s on sale oh it is s is up with and I’ll run through all of the websites I’m sure you can put them also on on your site afterwards uh La was the original Festival that Daniel started uh next year will be not next year excuse
Me in 2025 will be the 25th anniversary wow which is very exciting and obviously this is the the festival that kind of built the structure for all the rest of them and also built uh a great deal of the following that Daniel’s enjoyed over the years um burgundy is the focus there
No kidding and uh I think that at this point it kind of speaks for itself that many people who come to the Grand tasting say to me afterwards they’re like this is the greatest tasting of that you could possibly have in the US just because you have the producers that
Are really hard to get to I mean you know the rone is maybe the the Proprietors are a little less known champagne they’re perhaps a little more visible uh and bgy they’re a little harder to get to because they make very little wine and they’re very high in
Demand so uh I know that a lot of people uh really really love that tasting uh and you’ve been there a few times and I know you you’re a fan as well so it’s just you know couple things answer this one quickly Daniel was inspired when he was
In Europe by like a hospice Deone thing or something or something else it wasn’t the hospice debone it’s actually called laal so right which is more of a gathering is a uh every every domain has what they call their po at the end of harvest which is really a harvest
Celebration in November uh in Meo in the village of Meo there’s a larger party uh laal Deo which is actually it’s in like three weeks uh the week of Thanksgiving this year uh and so that was founded and and sort of kicked off by the Leon
Family uh back in the 20s wow and uh today you know it’s a a luncheon on a Monday where producers from the village uh wine Growers wine makers ERS Merchants all get invited they invite their friends they bring bottles from their seller and everyone shares with
Each other our event for La which is you know modeled after that but encompasses all of burgundy not just the village so uh is is intentionally uh a place for sharing and you know it’s a big boo dinner we have great chefs which they don’t always have inmos usually the food
Is a little bit more rudimentary there at the day of the PO uh and uh produc ERS from all over burgundy who bring wines from their Sellers and collectors from all over the US and around the world who bring wines from their Sellers and everyone shares and and has a grand
All time so that that that’s uh a big part of our ethos is bringing together not just an educational opportunity for consumers but VI the tastings or these very special moments with the small dinners that we do specific to certain domains but also to have this sort of
Opportunity to have the wine makers and the collectors and and consumers you know enjoy wine together so last thing I want to talk about is prir there’s a little bit of confusion around what prir is prir is effectively everything we do which isn’t a wine festival so we have
Programming that’s uh ongoing throughout the year we do small tastings we call them up hero we sometimes do small uh seminar style classes uh we do quite a few small dinners and we really love that intimate setting where we actually uh rent out private spaces and
Restaurants in order to do this so we work with a lot of the top chefs in town and we love to bring the business to them as well uh where we’ll do wines on a theme very often where we’ve sourced the wines directly from the domains uh and that’s true for Champagnes
Burgundies rones we’ve done a few pedmont dinners we’ve done stuff with uh wines from Regional France lir so a bit of a wider palette there brir is also year round year round exactly exactly that right uh and we also uh use that platform to house all of our Consulting
Activities so we consult for a group a series of restaurant groups uh helping them uh fine-tune their business from a wine perspective uh and hopefully increase their business from a wine perspective and uh we also do some Consulting work a little bit on the corporate side and some personal
Consulting to help people build their Sellers and things like that so so that’s what prir is uh where does the uh there’s education in that let’s talk about cause I mean you do scholarships and stuff is that through individual events or through prir so that is actually a separate entity
Now so uh a little background on the Som scholarship fund which Daniel uh it was Daniel’s idea and when he started this uh initiative really it was supported by producers in burgundy first only burgundy uh where the wines would be donated or or sold by domains via
Auction uh via our auction partner and uh proceeds from that would you know partially go to the domain and partially go to fund a trip to Burg for wine professionals who have never had that opportunity the reason for it was that Daniel was starting to worry
That because as the prices of the wines especially the top wines began to escalate you know starting around 04 but really like by the the te the the end of the ODS and the teens many wines were well outside of the the reach of many wine professionals even in their
Businesses so they never got to taste the wines at tastings but then they the kind of restaurants they worked in it just didn’t make sense to buy and sell them you know a village Mero used to be attainable for 30 40 bucks wholesale you could sell it for 80 to 90 or $100
Whatever your markup needed to be that became obsolete now Village wines cost hundred plus dollars a wholesale often and so he was really worried that the region was going to fall out of the grasp of the young wine professionals that in the Next Generation and really thought of this as an opportunity to
Once again bring people as a learning opportunity to the barrels rather than the books to connect with the people to understand the cuisine understand the culture and the place and it’s really where you learn everything I think so this progressed we started doing a champagne uh uh scholarship as well uh with producers
Again uh supporting it back then and this was uh not formal at all it wasn’t a nonprofit in any formal sense it was a nonprofit activity that Daniel just did exactly uh in 2021 the end of 2021 we formalized uh a 501c3 and so now the Som a
Scholarship fund is uh its own entity and it’s separate from our for-profit businesses which I described earlier uh it is uh completely staffed by uh volunteers from our company so we have almost no overhead we we pay for a little bit of wine storage and we have
To pay someone to do the taxes and do and keep the books but other than that we have almost no EXP yeah I’m a strong believer in efficient Charities nothing irritates me more than uh you know a charity that has to raise a million dollars to give 100,000 uh and
I understand why some of that has to Cas ,000 CEO running it or something and you know uh they do good work they deserve to get paid for us this isn’t a this isn’t a full-time activity for us either this is something we’re able to put
Enough time in energy into uh and more importantly now that it’s an official charity we’re able to raise funds from outside of the producer because we we already ask a lot of producers in terms of their time in terms of access to Wine access for people to visit them etc etc
So giving uh this opportunity to the American public to support and uh with the tax deduction was very smart I think on Daniel’s part and it’s been a great success uh it’s in I think anybody who loves wine and goes to restaurants uh and and goes to a cevis to ask for
Information about wine or likees somebody else’s opinion totally should support this kind of of an initiative because while it seems maybe from the outside uh frivolous potentially uh what people need to understand is that without having this sort of immersive experience with the producers all wine professionals are basically Brokers and
Maybe they’re passionate Brokers but they’re not connected to the place and they’re not connected to the people who produce it when they are their initiatives their purpose their sense of purpose substantially I’ve seen it many times I’ve been working with Daniel on that initiative long before it became a
A the scholarship fund uh and he involved me in the selection of the scholars from the first from the outset and I I’m very passionate about it I really believe it’s a wonderful opportunity for people to learn and so those people who are listening to your
Show if you’re in the wine business you should absolutely apply so I mean we’re going to go through all the websites and everything there’s a lot but for this specific Ally because we’re talking about it if somebody says why not where do I reach out where do they s a
Scholarship fund is easily googleable It’s s scholarship.org okay so it has its own yeah Somali scholarship the best place to go to find everything just because laal is the easiest name to remember go to la.com and everything else we do is linked in in the top Banner that’s probably the easiest way
To find us all right before we wrap up um you talked about all the festivals and I think everyone has a pretty good feel what I want to talk about for a couple of minutes is sort of the mechanics and there’s a similarity like I’ll set it up for you
All the events have a grand tasting all the events have some kind of you know educational master class uh there’s some very reasonable lunches in dinners and some expensive ones tell me about the common things you know that when you go on on the website we didn’t do justice I
Mean we talked about the tasting in the gala dinner there’s a lot going on during the week just check off everything for me sure so uh why don’t we talk about tet because uh By the time this goes to air right uh I already have a few people but table’s formula follows
In a way it’s very similar we’re trying something a little bit different this year because after all the region isn’t the same and the the feeling doesn’t have to be the same but uh we’re going to do a series of small dinners and lunches uh during the L we’re doing one
Dinner which is not a collaboration with a producer because sadly they said producer is passed but uh we acquired a selection of wines uh from Manny Burke of the rare wine company’s uh collection and he’s going to attend and he’s very passionate about these wines uh from
Noel ver from cornos so that’ll be kind of it’s a very fancy uh occasion and not an inexpensive dinner but uh these wines are very rare now and the sour super unique and rare super special yeah and kind of if you know you know type thing
It it is but at the same time thanks to Manny’s laress to a great extent because he’s uh working with us to keep the price very fair uh although not inexpensive uh you know if you take two any of the two older vintages that are in the tasting you couldn’t buy a single
Bottle of that wine for the price of the dinner and you’ll get to taste you know 14 vintages and listen to Manny talk about them which is maybe worth thetically have the dinner well I’d like to talk about a couple other ones during the top because I think they they’re
Illustrative so we’ll usually have something quite special like that maybe one or two maybe just one we’ll usually have something that’s uh brings everyone to the table in in a bit more oldfashioned sense so during the uh the Tet that’s the Mason the Mason is sort of a a lunchtime celebration very rustic
Food uh Daniel belud Cooks uh for this event and he loves cooking for it because it really takes him back home to Leon uh uh you know a large pot of stew is is sort of the center be we have a handful of producers uh upand comers not necessarily the fanciest Appalachians
But really good honest wines uh that are not very expensive and uh it isn’t a formal wine dinner where you get you know three wines per course the producers will be there the bottles will be on the table people get to pitch in and have a blast it’s a really like fun
Time not expensive and and approaching wine in truly a leonise fashion which is important because that that’s sort of the seat of the the region in the north but I think you see how the the spirit of the cuisine of Leon really connects with the Ron Valley uh so that that
Gives you a couple of examples we often do uh you know a tasting of offgrid for the PO uh which I think is uh it makes sense for the P obviously not for the Tet for example but uh where we talked about you know featuring or highlighting
The sort of less known Appalachians and and producers uh and then we usually have a tasting at the current vintage SO the that’s what you described as the grand tasting uh which is the the name we use for the p and for laett but uh the the concept is the same producers
Bring three to four wines of the current their current offerings and the producer will be behind the table along with an excellent SoMo the function of that is that the SoMo does the pouring while the producer gets to do the talking right and done well that way and so our
Clients get to really interact with the producer get to have a bit more intimate knowledge and get to know them a little bit uh and and see their current range and we have some amazing uh culinary aspects there too always in the tastings we bring in local restaurants we have a
Handful of partners that uh bring you know oysters from the West Coast or caviar for the champagne event it’s pretty impressive it’s a lot of fun it’s it’s well curated every one of them and we worked very hard to get new restaurant not not necessarily new
Businesses but you know uh I was going to say it’s not the same it’s not static you know fancy guy it’s Daniel belo’s always there but like a Daniel Ed or a James O’Brien whove been on the scene for years doing good stuff indeed hopefully we’ll see who listens to this
And see how many angry texts I get from different chefs but this year if you just examples we’re not to the alone you you have a problem you come to me all right well if you come to the T tasting this year you might get to taste dueling
Trines from two different chefs named Daniel I’m just saying I like that that’s a good one um and then we have a A celebratory dinner or lunch so this year the Tet will be a lunch we thought it would be more fun to do the grand
Tasting in the evening and have it be a bit more of a fun atmosphere so it’ll flip flop them exactly they won’t be on the same day the tasting will be in the evening on a on the Friday night and then Saturday we’re g to have our Gaya
Uh during the daytime we’re actually going to do it in Manata so you can imagine a bunch of these country bumpkins from the rone they’re gonna get a heck of a view out of it we’re talking about the rone we’ve talked about uh the Next Generation we’ve talked about
Organic farming we’ve talked about you know you know Daniel history and wine can we talk about this wine because this wine encapsulates so we’re going to flipflop things I do a thing called the wine list where I ask you five questions we’re going to do that and I also do I
End the show with the wine sip the weekly wine sip where we taste evaluate and discuss a wine which is what we’re going to do here because I said bring something that is uh you know a reference to what you’re doing and this is a ran wine and
Like you said as we’re talking people still may hear this go to the website for champagne lafu and there may be one or two things they could still get into I can tell you right now it’s tight um but L is coming up so this wine this is a great example
So every week we taste a different wine on a tell me specifically about this wine the producer vintage year why you brought it so as Daniel said earlier in the show he uh started importing clusel right when they began and so I’ve always known the wines because Daniel imported
Them and the back label on this Magnum says Daniel John his selection from back when he was uh importing the wines uh this is early 2000s um it was for a long time the only practicing and certified organic producer in K Roti K Roti is not known for its history of organic farming
Quite the opposite uh the reason for that the primary reason for that is that it’s so hard to work it’s very very Steep and so uh we eating is extremely difficult animals are not really easy to use or control and so most people just use herbicides in order to you know uh
Take care of things to take care of things uh this was not the approach from the cluel uh the clusel have had a closer connection to uh what they’re putting into the land because they are truly farmers and they they definitely consume a lot of their wine and they
Just didn’t like the feel of it so they they they never use chemicals which is kind of great because their land is extremely wellmaintained um talking about second the Next Generation so not this past spring but the one prior Daniel and I attended the uh the party that the clusel threw for
The retirement of Gom and brigit uh I’m sorry the previous generation uh Gom is the son sorry and he was officially taking over now mind gom’s been making the wine for quite some time and the Tuesday after this party which was on a Saturday we went back to the winery to
Taste and uh brigit who had just retired was sitting uh at a table and doing you know tea rafting for their own Nursery so uh it was just an occasion for a party but it kind of gives you the sense of uh how important it is for a family
Business like that to continue with the Next Generation Um 03 is a it’s a tricky vintage for me in the northern R because there’s some really lovely wies and there’s some really Inky and heavy wines it really is a question of when they were picked and how the wines were made
I never disliked clell’s uh 03s but I also didn’t love the Vintage in general at the time uh I’ve come to realize that actually the best wines just needed time as you can see from this bottle this is a magnum so it still has some tanic character but we’ve been now tasting it
Over the course of about an hour and it’s slowly opened up the tannins are much softer than they were before I double decanted it around 11:00 a.m. and now it’s 1:30 starting to drink pretty well I’ll be finishing it with our team after our first event they left that so
Hopefully when I took another uh taste yeah for sure I’ll make sure of that so 100% sarra in this case of course uh and uh uh I I just think that these wines shows tremendous Elegance while still being a tremendous value uh K Roti is a pretty fancy Appalachian but you know
Compared to with burgundy it’s still for great wine you’re not paying up that much clell for whatever reason possibly because they’re not a tiny producer uh but also I think just because they weren’t on everybody’s radar have never really like reached the Soaring Heights of the gigal ones or even J for example
In the secondary market so you can still buy a current vintage of these ones that’s good uh for a very reasonable price I think and the wines are truly exceptional it’s one of my favorite domains so that’s the 2003 clusel Ro coat Roy what’s the design plus it’s their one of their
Biggest Parcels which is on the top of the crown of the hill in good R so I’m not going to get into the 03 but if I was looking at current vintages better places would have clusel Rog yes yes of course not in huge quantities so they tend to come go come
And go 750 I mean what range are we looking at for grun plus that’s a good question uh I I think it’s probably about a 100 bucks okay maybe a little bit more okay um but a great value you know for that um and that’s the northern
Rome that’s correct um and I didn’t mention this but I post all the info we talked about great on our social media websites um so it sort of has all the aspects of a coat roie but a warm vintage tanic anything they’re doing that differentiates them from other I
Think because of the organic farming uh maybe more lively or well they have the benefit probably having the wine be a little less heavy despite the Vintage the problem with O3 was not just that it was hot but that was so hot that the vegetal processes uh of the the vine shut down
Eventually so they stopped producing sugar and just went dormant because they were overheated when you have organic farming at this level and cover crops uh you also have better water retention despite you know the high elevation and I think that they probably although they it’s hard to believe that they didn’t
Have some hydric stress the vines probably managed it better because of the organic farming so I don’t find um the thing I I dislike in some o3s which is a a Inky sort of syrupy character and I also don’t find the Other Extreme that comes with that uh which is that you
Know those characters come from the alcohol or or the potential alcohol from the heat of the the Vintage but alongside that often times OES have this like vegetal green note from both over ripeness and sugar but under or yeah it’s a finic issue yeah uh I mean that’s interesting in the right way
But you’re saying it’s too much over the top sometimes it can be here I don’t feel like that’s a problem at all they also use whole cluster uh uh cluel has always been a whole cluster house and so that provides I think a little bit additional freshness to the P
Are you know you said earlier that producers are not farming that responsibly because of the region you know using R historically yeah is that changing or it’s still stuck no no it’s very muchang little by little so that’s promising I think a big part of that is a generational change
But also I think for a quality level of wine at a certain point uh you know champagne still it’s a it’s a amazingly small amount of the vineyard area in Champagne is organic I know but it’s growing and growing exponentially and I think the same thing is definitely true
In the rone uh especially in we’re seeing you know uh more people farming organically even if they haven’t been certified i’ pull out and focus on practice and certification are two different things you could be practicing and doing a fine J what’s important is what people are doing that’s more of
What I’m saying all right um before we leave I want to just run the uh winless by you don’t dwell on these answers five questions you you’ve answered them before I feel like I’ve done this several times so you may have done it a few times all right first
Question always is what are you drinking now so what’s in the fridge what are you experimenting with does it tie into the festivals does it tie into seasonality could be beer uh I don’t drink as much beer anymore as I’ve gotten older that’s become harder uh so what are you
Drinking now so right now I’m drinking a lot of champagne but that’s always true that’s not really a seasonal that’s thing now you enjoy it and you’ll always drink it I just I always have been a big champagne Drinker uh by by volume champagne I drink much more
Than I do any other wine I’d say um I’ve been really kind of excited by uh what this change of season although it’s warmer today and will be for the next few days uh the beginning of autumn I quite like uh dipping back into you know
Orange wines wines with a bit of skin contact that salinity and texture uh and and pretty wide ranging in my Approach there in terms of regionality uh I am not quite at the point France Eastern Europe I mean they’re all yeah a lot of French a lot
More French than others but uh but certainly even Germany uh right but uh I haven’t quite gotten to the rone part of the year yet it’s really when I feel like after daylight savings is when I when I’m like sah time uh but but uh for sure I’ve been drinking a couple of
Different San Josef uh meals of late and you know whenever I get the chance to drink burgundy I do but more often professionally than than personally these those are all good ones um you know I have a seller so whenever I go out to dinner with friends I won’t
Let them bring wine because why would I drink their crap wine so I said don’t bring anything I’ll bring it so I would always bring a white and a red a couple of Reds yeah I do not go out to eat without bringing a bottle of champagne
Instead of the white sometimes a white people Go why’d you bring that and you know what we discussed it’s not just celebr it’s not just it’s a real because you’re a lazy sub you know it goes a lot of restaurants they’re opening with seafood salad you know it goes well with that
Stuff except maybe with the exception of a steakhouse plenty of stuff for it to go in well next week in Houston we’re going to do a salon and delamont dinner at Papa Steakhouse in Houston Texas which is what’s his name still down there Jack Steve McDonald
Is all right let’s move to the next question kind of falls into what we’re talking about go EST question on the list maybe it’s the same as last time maybe not favorite wine and food pairing not what you think is a good one what you like right now I’m really excited by
Coat Roi and you know uh salami Pizza what we just had okay we we’re at Roberto we had a beasting which is basically a margarita with a uh wide cut superpad which is the spicy super sa spicy superada and and honey and honey but hot honey yeah that’s so you have
The heat of the honey the spice and that wine goes perfectly so this o03 Co routin was really good with it the vegetable touch we kind of nailed it at lunch right yeah yeah we did all right all right so you you mentioned this a couple of
Minutes ago and and tell me your comfort level here favorite wine restaurant and our bar now let me set it up and then I’ll guide you through this what places are doing it well what places are you comfortable with what place kind of get it have the vibe the
Selection and everyone may vary this place may be good for just French ones whatever answer that if you want if you feel to answer that that you’ll be exclusive and like you said you’ll get some calls don’t answer it are you comfortable and these are not your favor
These are not in rank give me places that you walk I’m going give you four restaurants two of them in New York and two of them in burgundy perfect uh so let’s start in New York my hands down favorite restaurant is the poor Horsemen uh it’s very I know everybody knows
About it not an uncommon answer on this show not UNC answer well deserved but I think it’s important I think two things are important one is that there’s very rarely a restaurant uh in New York City that can honestly say that they have what I describe as a real seller I not a
Collection of wine they just bought six months ago or two years ago but that I was lucky to be able to produce uh a great program out of a similar seller at restaurant Danielle that’s certainly true of the Four Horsemen the other thing that’s important pointing out
About that restaurant is that it isn’t a wine bar regardless of what you know it began as or what it intended to be it is a restaurant the chef Nick is unbelievably chef and one of my favorite in the world I always have an amazing meal there I can’t speak more highly of
It um a less called Out restaurant I think which I I just had lunch there over the weekend and I’m I’m a really big fan it’s very much a neighborhood feel the restaurant it has wonderful Acoustics you can have a nice loud Neighborhood Restaurant feel while still
Being able to hear each other becomes more and more important uh as I get older and older has a fantastic wine list not a giant wine list uh but small collection super well thought out and has something for you know the very wealthy collectors I sometimes dine with
And for me and my girlfriend when we’re going for a Sunday lunch uh great champagne list and that is Anton’s in the West Village uh uh Natalie Natalie is amazing uh uh I don’t think she’s been spending too much time at the restaurant of late because uh Natalie
And Nick just had their first child right uh who I get to see in the neighborhood we live in the same neighborhood so I see them around from time to time but uh nothing is lost by her her temporary absence in that their staff is truly very personable and very
Warm the food is delicious and it’s a restaurant that feels good every time I leave there I feel great so those are my two answers I’m a fan and nicks food Natalie I met her at Dan kluger’s place she was at luring place for a few years
I met her I think at Marta which was right before she went to she’s a sweetheart and so uh one I’ll drop it down to one how about one restaurant in France that’s worth mentioning because it’s the one place I always go to uh at
Least for lunch is laon if you have the opportunity to visit bone you have to go to deeton uh the the cuisine has a bit of a Japanese bent to it it’s always a very small menu but very well situated the products are absolutely spectacular
They make a Kar you know a fried chicken and I’m notorious for looking for Asian food when I’m in France uh I love that they usually only serve it at night one time I made uh I changed my whole travel plan so I could be there at night to
Have the fried chicken and they didn’t have it on the menu I spoke to Lo the the the proprietor I was like you don’t have the Fried Chicken he said yeah well my chicken guy on vacation and nobody else’s chicken is good enough it just gives a sense their approach to sourcing
But you can always drink super well from Super Natty like hard to find bottles uh that that are you know very sought after in New York and cost hundreds and hundreds of dollars for 60 to 80 EUR there or you can drink you know uh dovat
Or mun for also for super fair prices delicious food wonderful feeling and maybe the best salad in all of France does bone have a bunch of good restaurants or oh yeah restaurant ABS it’s a great restaurant town I forgot I don’t know where it was like champagne
Or Bordeaux is not a great restaurant town or it’s gotten better there’s good restaurants in h uh the rest of the Champagne region it can be a little bit spotty so that’s once you get at a yeah Peter Liam likes to joke that uh the only good restaurant in eper is called
Hira Hira is a North Indian restaurant where we often go for chanam Masala and tia I think I’m asking that because I think I heard Peter tell me that years ago and it’s stuck you know he kind of rolled his eyes when you know we got to
This um but it’s good to hear that all right we asked Daniel this before he left so I’m going to ask you the same question favorite all-time Wine Not the rarest most expensive wine you ever drank but you know you’ve been at this a long time you’ve been exposed to a lot
Of good things look back like I said it could have been six months ago or when you were 16 what was that wine that really made that or wine or two if it that’s becom increasingly hard to answer because of course I’m very lucky I get
To taste a lot of wine and I also get to taste a lot of great wine uh I’ll put out two different wines for two very different reasons one of them is that kind of super fancy bottle because I had it recently uh but it is fancy but it’s
Also peculiar in that it’s not a vintage anybody really knows about I was lucky to serve wine uh recently at a dinner where a bunch of very well-known Burgundian wine makers uh were in attendance uh from the absolute creme DEA creme top domains and uh a bottle of
1940 K deog mu was opened and I’ve had a little experience tasting a couple of different 1940s but like two uh at the at the table the claim was that none of them have ever tasted a 1940 although after the fact I I questioned that of a
Couple of them I think they just either forgot or or played along um but it’s not a vage that people know very much about uh number one is it was probably made uh mostly uh by by ladies who were still at the Domain this is you know the
Height of the war and um interesting difficult time to say the very very least uh in burgundy and in France in general and in addition to that it was a vintage that really isn’t written about probably also because of the time that but also because there wasn’t really a
Market uh and people weren’t buying these wines very robustly after them so the bottle was in unbelievable condition and it really boggled my mind uh I think about it every I had it like two and a half weeks ago I’ve woken up every morning thinking about that bottle wow
Um so so there is a place for old wine when it’s in great condition it could be really moving and it can really make an impression on me um a wine that uh is sort of a the other side of that a totally different approach um that I
Really love uh I I had been going back and forth with a buddy of mine because uh he’s a friend who’s in the wine business he’s been on the show before but he he tends to uh get very excited about wines that he really likes and
Then if he has something that he does like he’s quick to text me especially if he knows I’m a fan and and kind of like give me a hard time about it spec so sometimes producers who make great wine not every bottle of theirs is fantastic
Right it happens uh this year in the summer I uh took my girlfriend to we were in BO and we went to visit Jean Lou DV and it’s funny one of the wines he poured for us amongst the 21s was a a wine that had uh the flaw of mousin you
Know it’s a it’s a bacterial thing and I I I in a very friendly way he’s he’s a good friend and his sweet sweet guy I brought it up in conversation I was like maybe this has a little bit of what they called the gutsu the taste of mouse and
He said yeah probably I can’t really taste that I don’t really have like a Attunement to it uh so it’s possible and I was like okay well that that kind of informs me as to why sometimes some bottles are mousy from from the domain uh this friend of mine called me up and
Told me how much he hated the 2021 domel coner uh from D2 but that’s my wine that I’m talking about today because 21’s an interesting vintage it’s kind of like a little bit of a thinner uh vintage in terms of density in boay uh after a
Series of very dense vintages 17 18 19 and 20 where 19 is is got tremendous balance but the other three can be a little awkward they can show more elbows than than you know one necessarily likes and also a little more alcohol which gam is really delightful when it’s fresh
It’s a little less delightful when it get one of the crew or this was the the the Old Vine KU from from the yeah from the CL uh and uh so my friend was saying that he had had an experience of it as being mousy which this wasn’t the wine
That was tasted mousy when I tasted them and so I I have a few bottles of that at home I’ve had great experiences with it prior so I decided I would try it again and uh I opened it it was one of those rare occasions I was entirely by myself
I’d taken the the night off of uh work you know obligations I didn’t have to drink my girlfriend was busy being healthy she went for a run instead and ate a salad and I was like you know what I’m going to drink a bottle of Bo by
Myself this bottle of wine uh was gone in like 40 minutes it was so glov by myself it was so delicious there was no evidence of mouse I’m not doubting my my friend who tasted that but uh it just like imprinted in my head that you know
People can get hung up on specific things but if they can just taste outside of that and just give it some time to evolve maybe maybe it would have blown off I don’t know uh what was really imprinting itself uh in my mind the entire time I was drinking it was
How it ran the gamut of while having this delicacy and this lightness it still had this juiciness this juicy fruit that sat on top of that that very light uh palette boal and game should have a little of that ju I absolutely love it I didn’t mention that when I was
Saying what I’m drinking now because uh I haven’t been drinking as much G as I said I’m gonna post that you know people get I’m a huge fan yeah they get uh Curious and they’re like that sounds like a good story I have to try it all
Right last question you should be able to do this you worked in restaurants you consult you serve a lot of wine recommend to me the best wine around 15 20 22 bucks uh recommend a red recommend a white you can go C category if you think musk day is just the great
You know you can go specific makers you know sisily give me your red pick give me your white pick uh I always say my kids are in their late 20s early 30s they’re not I’ve been listening to your show long enough that your kids have just probably 50 now like when this when
This question first started it was illegal I’m pretty sure they contributing to the delcy funny say you know I’m so redundant but I I need that setup it’s like you can’t show up with the $50 wine if you’re going I feel like I feel like they’ve graduated to the $35
Level personally but I’ll give something give me a red and a white wo that are great values to Quality okay uh I would like to try and not be repetitive but I don’t remember what I’ve answered uh you’ve heard me say mosc for sure uh I
Think that taking it back to shab it’s a a a region that I forget can be so good sometimes uh and you know at the village level uh from a good producer who is farming well you can find some tremendous value there I think of the
Wine the the terar from Buu I think probably is a little higher than that again I’m trying to B Ru I’m trying to graduate your kids to the5 level here uh but uh Broar comes to mind b r o c a r d uh and there’s two labels there the
Domain Brook r or the Julian Brook R those kind of tend to fit in that price range tremendous values very saline delicious salty wines uh it’s shab not chardonay uh even though it is made from chardonay it’s really a wine of place and I think it offers that that
Complexity for Value so the difference if someone if someone ask you what’s the difference between chardonay and chab it’s place it’s chardonay made in shab Chard is an ingred sha that affects that think about shab is the holistic thing Chard is one piece of it but not the
Entirety yeah all right so that’s I back you up on that is red harder for you or red is well to get in the price range again I’m going to try and keep myself from being repetitive I feel certain I’ve mentioned the lir and if I haven’t I should it doesn’t matter
That’s what you believe I’m gonna go with s Joseph I’m coming back into San Josef drinking season soon I don’t remember when the time changes but as soon as it’s dark by five o’clock I’m gonna be ready to drink some SRA so I think that uh if you look at the wines
From Julian S the uh c e c i c i l l o n exactly uh he’ll be at L he will be at L uh he’s a tremendous guy and he makes really delicious wine that’s in tremendous value uh again you know maybe pushing the high end of 25 going to 30
Does he make more than St Joseph yes he does he makes coros he makes prer mitage uh he’s a dynamic young guy him and his lovely wife Nancy are making really really delicious Wines in the Northern rone and I think they’re great Val all right so we wound up with shabi and
We wound up with um sanos sanos two terrific choices as I mentioned I will post as much specifics as you’ve given me um let me do a quick wrap up and then we’re going to have to spend a few minutes on where everyone can get more
Information or access so if you have a question suggestion wine happening or event hit me up at samthe gra.com that’s Sam at theeg Gra nation.com subscribe to the grap Nation Podcast on Apple podcast Stitch your Spotify Google podcasts which I heard is going away or wherever you get your pods
Leave a review if you like the podcast we would appreciate that you can follow us on Instagram at sben Ruby and on xben Ruby you could always reach us on both through the hashtag thee grap Nation we are on Facebook where I’m finding myself spending very little time on I hate to
Say it at the great nation Facebook still exists right um we’ll post uh Raj’s wine list and Daniels wine that he mentioned and the weekly wine sip which was the 20-year-old coat roie on our social media sites all right so Raj how do we approach this the question is to find out more
Information on everything if there’s somebody who says screw it I don’t care if it’s this weekend where do I find out more about leate to Champagne I love Rome wines that’s coming up where do I find out the PA thing I went to Once five years ago these pressire dinners
Lay it out for me well the beauty of uh the modern era is that you don’t actually have to know anything all you have to do is be able to Google and you don’t even have to spell it correctly usually to find us that having been said
If you started any one of our uh web landing pages uh pres. wine p r SS o i rwi NE is a good place to start because that gives you our ongoing programming but also links you to our festivals and the upcoming so singularly that site will get you each
Each of our websites gives access exactly start yeah we could start with that one because the reason I would say start with PIR is there’s stuff going on all the time you may get there and there’s a cool themed dinner two weeks from you know the day you did it to and
All once a year in between between lefu Champa here in New York and after Le champana in Houston next week will be having two very cool dinners here in New York City uh uh which you’ll find on the pressire is Houston a new market for any of these absolutely it’s our first time
Doing left Fett there and it’s very exciting really it’s it’s uh something we we kind of put together last minute in some ways but did somebody like kind of pull you what to some degree yes uh we we were why you doing it here we were
Originally going to do a small popup uh after Le Fett in a different Market but uh it was in collaboration with a partner uh Resort and it didn’t work out that you know kind of came apart uh even though we’ve done a great deal of work
To put together the roster and put the wines in play because you know wine takes a while to get here so as it started unraveling I thought to myself well maybe we should do it somewhere else and Daniel and I and the rest of the team started discussing options I
Walked out of the office uh you know kind of irritated after one of the call the calls that made it very clear that this was not going to move forward and I was walking down the street uh past one of my other favorite restaurants frenette when the chef Aaron bloodhorn
The ex-chef of Cafe blud here in New York who now has blood horn and navy blue in Houston Texas walked out of the the restaurant and him and his operations director Sharie who I also worked with good friends former colleagues we just had a grand old time
You know shooting it and and chatting and then it just struck me a little bit after that I was like what if we go to Houston we’ve been trying to get con you know Daniel and the team did uh an event in Houston in the past uh around La P
Along with one of our partners American Express and it was a big success it’s been some years we wanted to try a new market and we said why not you know uh so we’re going for it we still have tickets available to Houston so if you’re in that part of the country you
Should come visit uh we’re sold out here in New York with the exception of one single ticket for our Ballinger viin fr’s dinner this Friday we’re pretty much completely sold out so if you’re in Houston look for that lé coming up in November y Lao is next year earlier in
The year yes we’ll be in uh the end of February in the beginning of March and that’ll be in Los Angeles all right and if people want to follow you and they like dogs and guys walking around Vineyards where can they find Raj my social media is pretty much uh limited
To Instagram uh it’s funny Daniel forced me to make an Instagram back when I was working at Danielle back in the earlys he said you have to be on social media I didn’t have anything oh you didn’t you weren’t doing much Social I wasn’t I
Wasn’t uh but uh I chose the same as my uh Gmail so r AJ v like Victor I ne rajine rajine Daniel is his name Daniel Jonas j o h nnes and then you can also follow us at all of the brands that we mentioned prir L lé and lafet lett’s
Handle is lafet NYC even though we sometimes do laett outside like you said even if you go to Google and like what’s that thing called the la la do champagne you know they’ll forget it’ll come up you know BL Paulie spelled like Paulie Walnut you know it’ll come up you know
They’ll find it um so that’s where you should go you should check that stuff uh regularly to keep up on the events and certainly to see what pressire is doing um I want to thank my guests Raj vadia and Daniel jonis Daniel had a run out
For joining us on the grape Nation as always thanks to our engineer Armen and everyone at the Heritage Radio Network I’m Sam Ben Ruby and you’ve been listening to the grape Nation the grape nation is powered by simplecast thanks for listening to Heritage Radio Network food radio
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