Most of the wines that I have offered to date have been serious, complex wines to drink, discuss and age; wines that will broaden your understanding of wine.  But you can't drink that kind of wine every night.  Some nights, you just want an incredibly well made wine that is absolutely delicious and forces you into an ear-splitting grin no matter how bad your day had been.

Enter Michel Guignier.  Michel is a winemaker's winemaker.  Knowledgeable, hard working and focused on making delicious wines that are fairly priced. We're offering a red and a formerly unavailable (in the US) white wine from Macon Villages.

I don't drink that quickly, as many of you can attest,  but I can open a bottle of the 2011 Guignier Morgon "Bio-Vitis" and it will be gone quickly.

Most people who drink wine and talk about it are almost entirely focused on the inherent virtues of the wines they drink.  They often forget that winemaking is a business.  Most winemakers struggle to pay their bills and feed their families.  One of the most difficult decisions that a winemaker has to make is how to sell their wines in each market.

I remember like yesterday the first time I had Chateau Simone. I was meeting a friend at The Modern, which is the restaurant in the Museum of Modern Art in NYC. The wine has always been variable at best in its availability. There was a better chance of never running into it than actually running into it. When I saw they were pouring the 1998 Blanc my eyes lit up like I was on the Nike website. And it was only $15 a glass.

Many of you may think that because I defend natural wine against broadside attacks, that I am a fan.  And I am, of good natural wine.  I am also a fan of wine that is made with techniques that natural winemakers view as horrific.

People who attack winemaking techniques in a broad manner and deride people who drink them are, in my view, not worth consideration by serious wine drinkers.  Having said that, I believe that people who buy wines based on ideology, as opposed to taste, are missing out.

When Sven Enderle, pictured to the right, told me that sentence after I tasted all of his 2011 and 2010 Pinot Noirs, I was blown away. I'm sure you can figure out that making wine is hard and just because one wants to make wine does not mean one will be successful at it. Sven Enderle flipped that on its head and then some.  

I went to Germany last summer with one of my chief goals being finding the next generation of great German pinot noir makers.

Perhaps, more than any other wine region in France, Champagne is the hottest. The grower movement started 10-15 years ago, but in the last five or so years, the reputations of grower Champagne producers including George Laval, Jerome Prevost and Vouette & Sorbee have been cemented as the top grower talents.  It is my belief that Vouette & Sorbee ranks in the top 5 grower champagne houses.

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