This weekend in Northern California, we were honored to host guests from one of our very favorite Bordeaux producers, Château Haut-Bailly. The wines were excellent, the pairing dinner knocked it out of the park, and the company, throughout all, was superb.
Read MoreThis past Friday, K&L hosted our annual Union des Grands Crus (UGC) Bordeaux tasting, featuring the 2017 vintage. It remains one of the great events of any given year and one of the most comprehensive tasting events you’ll find for any given region.
Read MoreThis week, staff members in all three stores were treated to a special winemaker tasting and training with Alfred Tesseron, the man behind the wonderful Pontet Canet estate in Pauillac, Bordeaux, and from the Tesseron family in Cognac. The occasion for his visit was to introduce us to his brand-new project on the other end of the winemaking world—our end of the winemaking world, in fact—Napa Valley. Tesseron is releasing the very first vintage of his Napa wine called Pym Rae, and it is as exceptional as one might expect from this talented, venerated winemaker.
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This coming February will mark twenty years for me here at K&L, and I feel truly blessed as I look back at a great 2019. It was very difficult for me to narrow this list down to just ten most memorable Champagnes, as I have been lucky enough to have had so many great bottles over the last twelve months. Most of the wines on this list I drank, not just tasted, and I am pleased to report that after all this time in the business, my enthusiasm for Champagne has not faded at all.
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This weekend, K&L Hollywood got together for our annual holiday party. And, if anyone has any doubts, let me assure you that K&L knows how to throw a party. But the highlight for me was the penultimate course: a cheese and Sauternes pairing. Sauternes tastes like springtime sunshine when it is young, and like summer afternoons on a hammock when it is aged. It is pure daylight, and it is amazing—and way under appreciated in America. If you pair it with the right foods—especially the right cheeses—the heavens open up and shine down upon you.
Read MoreHere we have our heavy hitters, our high-scoring, critic-darling wines of 2019. The wines in this newsletter are worthy of cellaring, worthy of gifting, worthy of sipping with the greatest gusto and the greatest of friends. Scores might not be all there is to understanding a wine, but you can at least be assured that some very experienced palates highly endorse these bottles.
Read MoreThe last time we had the 2006 Arnauld, Haut-Médoc in stock, I bought a case. I am thrilled that the wine is back in because we have been going through this outstanding Left Bank value a little bit too fast at home.
Read More“I think it’s the 1955. Yes, it’s the 1955.”
We all watched as Bordeaux buyer Clyde Beffa’s jaw dropped. He slowly pulled down the brown paper bag that was hiding the mystery wine he brought with him from California that was in our glasses. Sure enough. 1955 La Gaffelière-Naudes, St. Emilion.
Read MoreYesterday, I got the call from my oldest friend, Henry Hiatt, who manages the Fish Market restaurant in San Jose. His one allocation of fresh King Crab, aired in from Alaska, had arrived. I am very fortunate to have had the chance to enjoy this rare delicacy for several years running thanks to Henry, and after experimenting with Chablis, Puligny, Chassagne, and all manner of white Burgundy and Champagne, we have settled on a pairing that we think works best.
Read MoreMonday night, our founder and Bordeaux buyer Mr. Clyde Beffa threw a party for the Redwood City staff after hours. He fired up two gigantic kettle grills and treated us to some excellent salmon, dry-aged ribeye, and lamb chops from local superstar butcher Pape Meat in Milbrae. He and our master of all operations, Jorge Valencia, cooked up a storm for the twenty-six members of the team who came for the party. Naturally, some corks were popped…
Read MoreWe are always happy to have a visit from our owner Clyde down in LA, and on Friday, Oct. 18th, we had the added bonus of a Clyde-hosted tasting–the first one ever in Hollywood! He poured a suite of Bordeaux wines from the 90s (which, to Clyde, includes 2000 but not 1990).
Read MoreIt was a special treat for the LA team to get to do a Bordeaux tasting yesterday with K&L’s owner/founder/Bordeaux evangelist, Clyde Beffa.
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