Natural, organic, biodynamic, real wine and the people and places behind them

The Schmitt winery has been in the family for over 230 years with Bianka and Daniel working their 16 hectares for the last decade. They work in full biodynamics which…

What do you want to know about wine? Most of our customers want us to send them technical notes (known as fiche techniques). In its starkest form, an FT is…

Luna module Bruno Duchêne hails from the Loire Valley, where his family had a thriving business selling farm machinery. Before starting his career as a winemaker, he was a wild…

Think of a grape variety and you will probably envision it in its most basic iteration. Gamay? Think bubblegum and fruit pastilles. Malbec? Think chocolate. Chardonnay? Think warm buttered toast.…

Epiphanies, as I have written before, tend to coalesce around a single moment. It may be a moment in the immediate present that is so deeply moving, so sensorily involving,…

Ilaria Romano (née Bellotti) has taken over the running of this estate and the wines are as brilliant and energetic as ever. The white wines stood out at this year’s…

Yeah strawberries… not the cheese Pinot Noir? Hardest game in the world, as Archie from The Fast Show might have opined. Or opinoted. Pinot Noir, the eternal seductress, that most…

Christmas comes but once a year, but with shipping delays, US wines seem to arrive every other year. On a wing and a prayer rather than a ship. Rarer than…

  If 2020 was the strangest of all possible worlds, then 2021 was the worst of times. As if that annus horribilis hadn’t left a foul enough taste in the…