Calamin 2016: A Comprehensive Tasting

Despite its recent elevation to the ranks of Grand Cru, Calamin still has a lot to prove. At sixteen hectares it doesn’t yield much wine and among forty-four producers a lot of that is variable. It’s no wonder Calamin is the least understood of all of the Chasselas crus. Calamin has been described as “more robust, […]

Mémoire & Friends: Zürich 2017

This year’s Mémoire & Friends tasting relocated to the slightly outré District 5 neighborhood of Zürich—and the Schiffbau event center—from its usual home in the staid lakefront area. The event even adopted the aura of an alternative wine fair because of it. I quite enjoyed it, except for the hot weather and cramped quarters. But […]

Mémoire des Vins Suisses: Bern 2017

It’s time once again to raid the cellars of generous MDVS members who, each year, invite wine media types, professionals and knowledgeable enthusiasts to taste through a mini-vertical of one of their signature wines. This year’s event was held at the Kursaal Event Center in the lovely capital city of Bern. Kursaal is an impressive meeting space that overlooks the […]

Swiss Grapes: Plant Robert — A Tasting at the Cully Bazar

Even though it’s back from the brink, the grape known as Plant Robert remains endangered and little known. Absent a timely intervention it would have been lost decades ago to urban sprawl — in 1966 the last parcel in existence was condemned to make way for the A9 autoroute. Today its eight hectares are spread […]

A Wine of Note: Blaise Duboux

Plant Robez 2014, Epesses, Blaise Duboux, Lavaux, Vaud (Plant Robert) This relic from another century is actually a local mutation of gamay noir boasting a scant ten hectares extant in a smattering of Lavaux villages. Left for dead as recently as 1966, several prescient growers gathered to plot its resurrection and in 2002 launched the […]