The Enduring Magic of Cabernet Franc from 1934 Vines

Vielle Vignes Cabernet Franc from Joël Taluau comes from a single plot planted in 1934, so when they say “old vines,” they aren't just joshing around. These are wines that are made with high tannin and high acid to lay down and age in their air-conditioned cellar for decades. These are wines that are crafted to be aged longterm, bottled and then not touched or moved until they're ready to be released. I don't know the story of how Keith found these wines, but we are so fortunate that we have these. Thanks to their singular nature, there's nothing else quite like it in our store.

What I'm Excited About This Week: Absolutely Beautiful Burgundy

We just had another fantastic tasting from Alex Pross, and I really loved the heck out of it. It was all reds from Burgundy, which typically means all Pinot Noir, and this was no exception. I have written before about how much I enjoy tasting a lot of something all at once, and this lineup showcased to me the beauty of this format. We tasted 22 wines, and all of them were unique with their own personalities. Sure, they were all Pinot Noir, but like all truly elegant and luxurious things it's the nuance that makes all the difference. The regional similarities were ultimately trumped by each wine’s more individual qualities.

What I'm Excited About This Week: Nobody Expects the Spanish Inquisition!

I'm sure I've said this before, but I really enjoy a tasting that feels more like a multi-course dinner than just a straightforward tasting. Our Buyer Rachael Ryan really puts together a nice tasting that has this kind of complete feel. We started off last week’s Spanish and Portuguese tasting with the super classic and super delicious Mas Codina Cava Brut Reserva Penedès $13.99, one of my favorite bottles of bubbles when I don’t want to spend the money for Champagne. It’s still made in the traditional Méthode Champenoise and is a delicious clean and crisp style of sparkling wine. It's fantastic.

What I'm Excited About This Week: Day Drinking With David (Staff Edition)

My picks for the week highlight the cool factor in what we bring in as well as some great value. We started with a ready-to-drink infused gin drink called Sweet Gwendoline Fig And Wine Infused French Gin $36.99. It was super tasty and a nice start to the whole thing.

What I'm Excited About This Week: Chablis and a Little Treat!

What a wonderful time to be alive—we have a ton of amazing Chablis right now.

What I'm Excited About This Week: Easy Summertime Italian Wines

This week Orazio Campoli, our Vinum Italicum Magister, introduced us to a beautiful array of very seasonally relevant wines. All of our buyers do such a great job at putting together these lineups for us week after week, often with little themes or goals in mind. This lineup had a lot of wines that have been in our Italian Wine Club, which means that for any Wine Club member, you get a discount on them. These are all reasonably priced wines, and each one that I've featured for you here overdelivers when it comes to a price/quality ratio. There's just so many wines that we carry, and we keep bringing in new products every single day, so it's easy for some of these to get lost—but they're just exceptional and deserve your attention.

What I'm Excited About This Week: G'day Bruce!

This week, one of our newest buyers, Rachael Ryan, took us on a trip through Australia and New Zealand… I was most impressed by Australia this round. Rachael, who lived in Australia for a few years, made her passion for the country and the wide diversity of wines that are grown there palpable.

What I'm Excited about This Week: French Regional Fabulosity

This week, Keith Mabry brought us on a winding little trip through some of the smaller regions that he sources from for his particular buying portfolio. I've talked before about how diverse and varied his regions are, and this staff tasting was a great tour of them.

What I'm Excited About This Week: The Return of Anonymous

For these Anonymous Wine Collective bottles, we've given a pinky promise and staked our reputations on keeping certain particulars under wraps. In return for a little anonymity, we're able to offer incredible pricing on these wines. If these wines were bottled by the original producer, they would sell for 60-70% more. Fortunately for us, the producers had more wine than they needed, and we felt like, gosh that would be an outstanding product to be able to offer our customers. We are extremely fortunate and thankful that our positive reputation has given us access to these wines, and, as more and more of them are released, we hope that you notice the theme of extreme price-to-quality ratios.

Our French Wine Picks for Bastille Day

France is the soul of fine wine, and no day better honors that legacy than Bastille Day. From the regal bubbles of Champagne to the sun-soaked reds of the Southern Rhône, the mineral purity of Chablis to a Médoc sleeper from a banner vintage, today’s newsletter celebrates the glorious diversity of French terroir. Each pick comes straight from the K&L team—Gary, Keith, Alex, and Ryan—offering their top choices to toast la belle France. Raise a glass with us this weekend and discover what makes these bottles so timeless and essential.

What I'm Excited About This Week: Loire Valley Edition

This week Keith Mabry, who probably has one of the most diverse buying portfolios at K&L, poured some amazing wines from the Loire Valley for us. We tasted 26 different wines this morning, done at the usual breakneck pace due to the 45 minutes we have to do the tasting. Now, while I say 45 minutes, we're definitely able to go back to the wines through the day and sometimes even the next day and retaste. This lets us see how they're evolving, so our time with the wine is not merely confined to that quick little jaunt in the morning.

What I'm Excited About This Week

One of the best, and sometimes most challenging, things about working at K&L is our weekly staff tastings. These aren't pleasure cruises that we calmly sail through, taking our time and leisurely enjoying each wine as we ponder possible pairings or accompaniments. These are gauntlets, tests of will and endurance that we charge through, tasting typically 20+ products in just 45 minutes each week. However, from these tastings I always gain amazing insight in that weekly category, and I always get super excited about some of the wines we tasted—and, gosh, I just wanted to share them with you.

K&L Wine Merchants

www.klwines.com