2019 Castellare Chianti Classico Riserva
Tasted 3/17/2026
A perennial favorite! On the nose, sour cherries, oak, vanilla, black olive, balsamic, herbs, smoke. Distinct italian profile. On the palate, crisp high acidity, earthiness, dark chocolate, olive tapenade, salinity, and red fruit. Pairs beautifully with rich tomato dishes and Italian food. Delicious!
92 points
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2020 Hajdu Brobdignagian Syrah Port.
Tasted 3/15/2026
Fortified port-style wine. Aged 40 months in oak barrels. Dark brooding fruit, prunes, oak, sweet vanilla, smoke, clove, cedar, cocoa, charred earth. The mouthfeel is luxurious and unctuous: sweet, rich, oily, mouth-coating, weighty, with high acidity balancing out the sweetness and intensity of this massive dessert wine. Long finish. This is a big rich thoughtful sipper of a wine. Highly recommend!
92 Points
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2022 Chateau La Fleur Perey
Tasted 2/4/2026
Vibrant nose of wild berries, red cherry, dark chocolate, peppercorns, dark licorice, ceder, smoke. The tannins on this wine really stand out here: firm, drying, grippy, mouth-coating. Medium acid. Earthiness, smoke, berries on the palate. Long finish. Great fruit, great structure. A fun, big, enjoyable wine with nice aging potential.
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2024 Chateau Roubine Hippy
Tasted 1/18/2026
Nice nose. Fresh, fruity, floral, candied aromas with some nice minerality. Medium acid. Not overly complex but layered enough to be pleasant, intriguing, and refreshing. A nice showing for rosé.
Only issue with this bottle is that glass stopper used on this in place of a traditional cork is a real pain to open.
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2024 Dalton Pét Nat
Tasted 1/14/2026
A pét-nat, short for pétillant naturel, is a style of sparkling wine where the wine is bottled before alcoholic fermentation is compete. As the fermentation finishes in the bottle, it’s byproduct, C02, is captured in the bottle, thereby giving the wine it’s sparkle. The bubbles in a pét nat are usually on the softer side and are less persistent because only part of the fermentation is captured in the bottle. This differs from the traditional method of champagne making where sugar and yeast are added to a base wine in bottle and then sealed, creating a complete secondary fermentation in the bottle. As pét nats are simply capturing an already started fermentation, they are often brought to market unfiltered with the crown caps still on (champagne bottles also start out with crown caps sealing the bottles for secondary fermentation before the crown caps are removed for disgorgement, dosage, and corking).
This Dalton Pét Nat is a simple wine blended from Semillon and Muscat. It has an intriguing cloudy lemon appearance and it’s bubbles are soft, crisp, and refreshing, offering up simple floral and mineral aromas and a short, light finish. Enjoy this wine well-chilled, on its own, on hot summer day, or as carefree accompaniment to any food or snack.
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Tokaj-Hetszolo
Tasted 11/29/2025
Another stellar showing! I saw one reviewer online noting that this wine is “something elevated to go with your Chinese – with enough complexity to keep it interesting” and while I agree that this wine pairs wonderfully with Chinese (any decent acid-driven white wine, in general, is a great pairing with Chinese), I believe this characterization is somewhat undermining of this great wine. It’s pronouned floral and tropical aromas combined with it’s incredible balance and power instantly command the attention of almost everyone I’ve tried it with. Of course the Muscat varietal is unique in that it’s the only varietal that actually tastes like grapes after it’s been turned into wine. That pungent unmistakable grapiness might be off-putting to some, but if you don’t mind the Muscat flavor profile, this wine is an absolute stunner!
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Chateau Olivier
Tasted 11/29/2025
Not as much fruit on the nose as I recall from my last tasting of this wine. Nonetheless, a splendid nose of stone fruit, freshly cut grass, saline, minerality, passion fruit. Full bodied with rich viscous oily mouthfeel, wet rock, saline, screaming minerality, peaches, passion fruit, cut grass, great acidity and structure with a nice satisfying finish. Very nice!
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Clos Lavaud
Tasted 11/29/2025
Nice nose of raspberry, red cherry, unripe strawberry, herbs, bell pepper, earth, charred oak, with a healthy dollop of dirty old world funk. On the palate, this wine is medium-bodied with medium acid, with nice red and black fruit, earth, black olive, and smoke, ending with a long dirty, earthy finish with flavors of tart red fruit, evoo, and black olives lingering on the palate for minutes. This is a wonderful, layered, and engaging wine offering everything I want in a red Bordeaux. It has become somewhat of a go-to wine for me and it delights every time! Drink now to 2030.
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Chateau Haut-Brisson
Tasted 11/29/2025
Classic Saint Émilion blue and black fruits, dark chocolate, earth, smoke, and herbaceous spice with some subtle leathery tertiery development coming on. Medium-plus body, high acid, with chalky tannins. This wine is perfectly enjoyable, if not somewhat straightforward. Should probably be consumed sooner rather than later while its still vibrant, before it decends into the somewhat less exciting, but not flawed, category of generic aged Bordeaux, which seems to be where its heading. Also, its a little pricey for what it is. Nonetheless, a nice and enjoyable wine that I wholeheartedly recommend! Drink by 2030.
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Yaacov Oryah’s The Duke Pontiff
Tasted 11/18/25
Pinot Noir (55%), Syrah (23%), and Grenache (22%). This wine fits winemaker Yaacov Oryah’s MO of experimenting with unconventional blends (and somtimes also, unconventional winemaking processes). Nice nose of red fruits..raspberries, red cherries, charcoal, slate, saline, minerality, smoke. Medium bodied, medium acid, soft gentle tannins. On the palate, more red fruits, saline, earth, smoke. Short finish. Overall a nice red blend, without the typical pushed ripeness found in many Israeli wines. Showing no signs of decline right now but not structured for the longer aging either. Drink now to 2028.
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Domaine du Haut-Montlong Monbazillac (Late Harvest) 2020
Tasted 11/12/2025
Monbazillac AOC, the French appellation where this wine is made, is famous for producing sweet botrytized wines. Wines from this region are typically blends of Semillon, Sauvignon blanc, and muscadelle, which is indeed the case with this wine. Monbazillac is often overshadowed by the nearby and much more famous Bordeaux appellation of Sauternes – also famous for its sweet botrytized wines, which command higher prices and more fanfare.
This wine is a beast! Beautiful deep golden color. Rich, concentrated honeyed aromas, dried apricots, candied nuts, vanilla, oak, dried fruits. On the palate, there’s a nice acidity balancing out the sweetness here, with a rich, full-bodied, weighty mouthfeel. Warmed honey favors, nuttiness, dried fruits, smoke, baking spices, woodiness, liquorice, vanilla extract,…layers of flavor that just go on and on. The finish is long, satisfying, and revealing of more and more flavor. This wine rivals some of the best Sauternes I’ve had, at a fraction of the price. And its Mevushal, so bring it anywhere you’d like! Highly recommend!
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Château Marquisat de Binet Cuvée Abel 2016
Tasted 11/12/2025
Made by winemaker Christophe Bardeau of Domaine Roses Camille, this wine is 100% merlot from Montagne-Saint-Émilion, a satellite of the broader Saint-Émilion appelation in Bordeaux’s Right Bank. It is perhaps the latest release in the kosher market (2016 released in 2025), due to Christophe’s passionate instistance on only releasing a wine for consumption once it’s ready, and his apparent indifference to more practical considerations, such as cashflow or market demand. As such, it has spent a staggering 9 years aging in concrete vats, without any oak influence, offering a pure and complex expression of Right Bank terroir and fruit.
The wine opens with bouquet of musty black fruit, damp concrete, minerality, smoke, wet earth, mushrooms, and spice. On the palate, the wine has soft tannins and bright acidity, with more musty black fruit, saline, rain-soaked concrete, wet pot soil, smoke, minerality, and a satisfying funk, with a nice long finish.
At under $40, this wine is unique and offers great value. A word of caution: this wine most definitely falls into the category of “Dirty French” wines. For those newly exploring wine, or mosty accustomed to “new world” flavors (think California or Israel), this wine might strike you as different. For lovers of French wine, this is a remarkable value, must-try wine, that is ready to drink today!
2019 SHIRAH Carmenere
Tasted 9/5/2025
A single varietal California Carmenere not a wine you come across often! Carmenere is predominantly planted in chili and is far less typical to see from California. It’s described as having similar characteristics to Merlot. This wine starts out with beautiful earthy black fruits on the nose. Pallet explodes with blackberry, black cherry, and charred earth with grippy tannins and nice acidity to balance out the higher alcohol. Well, balanced with a nice lingering finish. Shirah only produced 300 bottles of this 2019 vintage, making it a rare and unusually treat. Well done!
91 points.
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2019 Timbre The Rhythm Pinot Noir
Tasted 8/28/2025
Really nice expressive nose of fresh red fruits, saline, and mineral reality. Nice concentration. Full body and high acidity with red fruit and soft tannins on the pallet. Nice length on the finish. Very nice expression of a New World Pinot. Plenty of life ahead! Well done.
91 Points.
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2014 Chateau La Tour Blanche Sauternes
Tasted 6/2025
Tasted this at Château La Tour Blanche and then again multiple times back home in the U.S. same bottle, brought back – you don’t leave an unfinished bottle of 2014 La Tour Blanche behind. This wine is stunning! Great fresh honey, toast, smoke, spice. A hedonistic sipper with vibrant acidity perfectly balancing out the sweetness. Longer lingering finish of rich honey, dried apple, and apricot that lasts for minutes. Yes, it will last and develop for a very long time if you want to hold it, but it’s so good now. Incredible!
94 Points.
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2019 Alex Rubin Wines Syrah
Tasted 5/2/2025
A charming fruit pie! Best enjoyed slightly below room temperature of 65 to 68°.
90 Points.
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2020 Broad Brush Cabernet Sauvignon X Napa Valley
Tasted 4/14/2025
Full bodied Napa cab, but a little too pushed and quite oak driven. A lot of barrel influence overpowering this fruit forward cab… pronounced Oak, vanilla, ripe black fruit, charred aromas. Too ripe and oak driven, but well done for those who like that style.
88 points.
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2021 Tokaj Hetszolo Tokaji Kosher
Tasted 4/9/2025
Pronounced tropical aromatics of guava, lychee, melon, pear, citrus and peach. Bursting with bright refreshing acidity, residual sugar gives the wine body, a rich and elegant mouth feel and great balance. You can mistake this wine for a full body dry white even though it’s not technically dry. The finish is long and lingering and leaves you craving another taste. This wine is a masterpiece. Highly highly recommend!
94 Points!
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2022 Timbre Winery Rare Groove #7 California Red Blend
Tasted 4/4/2025
Medium body, stale red fruit. A thin, fruit forward, drink now wine. Disappointing experience.
84 Points.