Louis/Dressner Selections

Six New Summer 2021 Producer Visits!

A Bunch of 2021 Summer Visits From the Loire and Savoie

How does The New Website Work?

This is very exciting stuff!

Desktop vs Mobile: We know it's 2020 and people use their phones a lot. So we've worked hard on ensuring the site functions well on mobile (especially compared to what it once was). Having said that, desktop is the recommended way of perusing the site. Glossary: At its core, this has always been a website written for wine professionals *attempting* to glean information on the wines we import (and hopefully see a picture of the vigneron's dog). Since the language can be so technical, we've added an <glossary term="glossary" title="1427">interactive glossary</glossary> to the text for those unfamiliar with the baffllingly complex world of wine terminology. Even if you're a seasoned pro, it will frankly teach you a thing or two. And if you'd rather read the content without the glossary, simply head to the main menu bar and turn it off.   Our Wines Section:  In the new "Our Wines" section, we've offered a variety of filter categories for you to explore and discover all the cuvées we import. These filters can be combined together to narrow down results. If you hit a wall, simply erase one of the filters or clear all filters.  Actual Information About the Wines: Speaking of the wines, the number one complaint we would get from customers was the lack of technical information on the wines themselves. It's not a coincidence that we spend the vast majority of our energy focusing on the people behind the wines and their dogs; it's what we dig about what we do. Having said that, 95% of the wines we import now have EXTREMELY detailed technical information, dare I say the most technical anywhere on the internet. Please enjoy now while they are up to date, knowing that half of these will probably be totally wrong by next vintage.  Search: If you know what producer or wine you are searching for, the search should quickly autofill what you need. Go ahead, give it a whirl. Hyperlinks: Everything on the website has a hyperlink now. This means you can easily share a specific producer page, article, wine or filter combination with anyone.  Copy/Paste: If you need to copy/paste anything, the glossary needs to be turned off for the text to paste correctly. Also, if you are going to straight up use our writing verbatim, PLEASE credit us when doing so. Seems obvious but we see it happen all the time.  A Shit-Ton of Written Content: The articles themselves can often be very long, and for this reason we developed a Propriety Pop Up System™ where you can easily scroll through various articles/wines and "pop out" to efficiently look at the rest of the content. We've tried our best to pack as many dog pictures as possible in there, but the digital ink has been spilled: the cumulation of decades' worth of writings from Joe, Denyse, Kevin and Jules is here for you to read. A huge part of the work with this new website was to find better ways to condense and extract essential information you need without getting lost in all that BORING text.  We still think you should check it out. Don't worry, there are plenty of pictures. And you might even find the writing interesting. Or funny. Or both.

EXPLORE

harvest report 04.01.2022

2021 Harvest Report from Alain Girard

After a series of solar <glossary term="Vintage" title="1109">vintages</glossary>, 2021 was a return to the Central <glossary term="Loire Valley" title="602">Loire</glossary>’s DNA: fruit and freshness. In the vines: Once again, winter 2020/2021 was very mild. After a relatively cold January, February temperatures crept up and the second half of the month felt like Spring. It was also raining almost daily. March was more of the same, leading us to anticipate the first <glossary term="Bud" title="206">buds</glossary> appearing in early April. In less than eight days, the weather went from summer to winter. A mass of cold air traveled throughout France from April 4th to the 8th, bringing negative temperatures throughout the country. This exceptional period of <glossary term="Frost" title="1135">frost</glossary> is the most severe in 30 years. While it’s not unusual to have episodes of <glossary term="Frost" title="1135">frost</glossary> in early April, the fact that it happened a week after what was essentially a winter heat wave was very bad for the vines. Followed by more rain and snow, the impact is important. We can’t yet predict how much of the crop was compromised but we know it’s going to be bad. As if April <glossary term="Frost" title="1135">frost</glossary> wasn’t bad enough, the negative temperatures continued through May: the bottom of the <glossary term="Coteau" title="345">coteaux</glossary>, which had been spared in April, are now damaged (though this episode is much less impactful than in April). Overall May was rainy and cool. These conditions made for a slower vegetative cycle; the work surround bud break becomes interminable and under unpleasant weather. T Then everything started growing: the vines and grass. It’s very hard to maintain good work. Protecting the vines was also challenging as there is heavy <glossary term="Mildew" title="1137">mildew</glossary> pressure. The rains are constant, the chance to intervene short and access to certain <glossary term="Parcel" title="760">parcels</glossary> becomes more and more difficult. The weather was stressful for the vines and those who cultivate it. We did have one positive aspect to June: <glossary term="Flowering" title="1179">flowering</glossary> took place from the 14th to the 18th under perfect weather conditions. At least one essential part of the vines’ cycle took place under optimal weather. But July would also be complicated: the rain stayed constant and we only had “summer" weather from July 18th to the 23rd. In these conditions, <glossary term="Mildew" title="1137">mildew</glossary> continued to be a very present threat along with <glossary term="Oidium" title="737">odium</glossary>. Though we put in a valiant effort, some <glossary term="Parcel" title="760">parcels</glossary> are still negatively impacted by these fungi. The <glossary term="Veraison" title="1396">véraison</glossary> took place in the middle of August during a period that made us hope we were getting past the bad weather that had stuck with us since April. But we weren’t so lucky! The temperatures remained low and this meant <glossary term="Maturation" title="639">maturation</glossary> took a long time. Still, we could feel the vegetative cycle come to an end. Maturation: For the grapes' <glossary term="Maturation" title="639">maturation</glossary>, we once again faced unseasonably low temperatures and rainfall. It’s strange because on average the temperatures were normal but we saw very unusual dips. This of course slowed down <glossary term="Maturation" title="639">maturation</glossary>. The sugars are accumulating slowly and the <glossary term="Acidity" title="71">acidity</glossary> is preserved. In this sense, the weather is positive for the <glossary term="Aromatic" title="120">aromatic</glossary> and <glossary term="Phenols" title="784">phenolic</glossary> ripeness. And while the constant rain meant that the berries were getting nice and plump, it also created an environment ripe for <glossary term="Botrytis/Noble Rot" title="181">botrytis</glossary>. The Harvest: We got off to a slow start and began picking on September 27th. The weather during <glossary term="Harvest" title="521">harvest</glossary> was nuanced. It’s good for the aromas and <glossary term="Tannin" title="1010">tannins</glossary> but the <glossary term="Botrytis/Noble Rot" title="181">botrytis</glossary> pressure remains a threat. First Impressions of the Vintage: The grapes’ <glossary term="Maturation" title="639">maturation</glossary> took place under cooler meteorological conditions than the last few  <glossary term="Vintage" title="1109">vintages</glossary>. 2021 feels like it conforms to what people expect from the Central <glossary term="Loire River" title="603">Loire</glossary>. The whites are showing a nice <glossary term="Aromatic" title="120">aromatic</glossary> expression. Notes of fruit dominate: citrus but also peaches and other white fleshed fruit. In some cases there are notes of spice and others have a subtle vegetal quality. Depending on when they were <glossary term="Harvest" title="521">harvested</glossary>, their balance varies from tender and fresh to mineral tension. The reds are equally seductive with their fruit (cherry, raspberry, cassis). The <glossary term="Extraction" title="433">extraction</glossary> was in accordance to what the <glossary term="Vintage" title="1109">vintage</glossary> gave us, and the <glossary term="Tannin" title="1010">tannins</glossary> are measured and qualitative. A <glossary term="Malolactic Fermentation" title="622">malolactic fermentation</glossary> will bring the roundness the wines need. In the end, it was a very unpredictable <glossary term="Vintage" title="1109">vintage</glossary>…

producer 22.05.2019

Julie Balagny