An exciting new project by American wine broker, author, teacher and longtime German wine champion Willie Glückstern. Sourced only from steep slopes (steilagen) in the Mosel - unlike most of its competitors which come from cheaper flatland fruit - every vintage of this Riesling is seriously mineralic, racy, and dry. Bottled in a whimsical package and only shipped fresh as needed, this is a fabulous value in dry German Riesling. 

BOWLER E-Zine Issue ​3 | ​July 2021: Moselland: Behind the Bunny

Domaine Dumien-Serrette is the type of throw-back, traditional winery that you hope to stumble upon when you are searching for wines from the Northern Rhone (but rarely ever find). We met Gilbert Serrette in 2008. You can imagine our surprise when we walked into the cellar and saw an old basket-press. Our mood, and hopes, immediately rose. It was the same press that had been used by Nicolas’ grandfather and they were still using it to make their wines. 

The wines are made by the Dumien-Serrette family in a tiny cellar that is under the town’s church. They make approximately 1000 cases total per year, not enough to live off of without the supplement of a full-time job. The wines are a throw-back to a style that is found less and less today. Nicolas Serrette, who took over from his father Gilbert in the early 2000’s is making investments in the winery and adding land slowly in hopes to afford working at the winery full-time before he retires.

Nicolas learned how to make wine the old-fashioned way, from his father, Gilbert Serrette and Gilbert learned from his father-in-law, Henri Dumien. The Dumien name can be found mentioned in Cornas as far back as 1515. The Dumien family bought three and a half hectares in 1925, thirteen years before it became an appellation. Most of this land, three hectares, is found in the Patou vineyard, which has primarily granitic soils; the remainder is located in Les Savaux. The vines in Patou date back to the 1920’s, with some exceeding 100 years old. After years of selling in bulk to negociants such as Delas, Chapoutier and Jaboulet, Domaine Dumien-Serrette began to bottle their own wine in 1983.

They own mostly old vines and farming is organic, but not certified. No herbicides or pesticides are used and there is not much of a threat of mildew in the north. The vines are trained into arched two-vine canopies to protect against wind and hail. The Patou vineyard is very steep and Gilbert, in his retirement, but still helping out Nicolas, insists on tending the vines using a special cart he invented which pulls him slowly up the rows while he works.

In the cellar, they generally de-stem half of the fruit. It’s fermented spontaneously in cement tanks. The basket press was finally retired a few years ago in exchange for a very nice gentle vertical press, but thankfully the profile of the wine has not changed. They do not punch down, opting to submerge the cap with a grate for a gentle extraction. After malo, which generally happens before Christmas, the wine is aged for two years in two to seven year old barrels. It’s then bottled without filtration or fining.

In recent years, Nicolas has bought a bit more land, the reason they needed a new press. Serrette now makes Saint Peray, and an IGP Collines Rhodaniennes  Syrah that is just south of Cornas near the Rhone River. In 2023, he added one hectare in Cornas, but the vines don’t have fruit yet. And in 2022, they planted .25 hectare of Syrah in Saint Joseph, first vintage is anticipated in 2025.

The Dumien-Serrette wines are exceptional and in a class of their own. The entire Serrette family came to New York to celebrate Bowler’s 20th anniversary and Gilbert was so impressed to see their wines from their tiny village of Cornas in New York and sold throughout the United States. When he started with his father-in-law in the 1980’s, he never could have imagined this outcome. We are honored to be a part of their story.

Jean Case & her husband Steve founded Early Mountain Vineyards in 2012 in central Virginia. With a strong commitment to the vineyard as well as a fervent expression of place, Early Mountain’s mission is to craft high-quality wines and to support Virginia’s ascent as a world-class wine region. The Early Mountain team farms 55 acres and works with growers of other quality mountainside vineyard sites largely along the Eastern side of the Blue Ridge where the rocky soils, elevation, and slopes grow wines of distinction.

Winemaker Maya Hood White adjusts her winemaking to the vintage, with an approach of fermenting block-by-block utilizing ambient ferments, judicious stem inclusion, and low-intervention winemaking. The élevage for many of their wines includes long lees aging in large-format barrels to build complexity and texture. Renowned for their work with Petit Manseng and Cabernet Franc, Early Mountain approaches each vintage as an opportunity to further hone their winegrowing approach and share their knowledge with the burgeoning Virginia wine community. 

In addition to their vinifera wines, Early Mountain’s Young Wine series elevates hybrid grape varieties (Vidal Blanc & Chambourcin), seeking out quality sites and producing fresh, youthful wines with no additives.

Although you would undoubtedly get a humble, soft spoken reply if you tried to tell him so, Steve Edmunds is one of the greatest winemakers in California and, frankly, the world. This is all the proof you need that the United States can produce incredible wines. Whether we’re talking about his classic Syrahs and Rhône blends or his more recent ventures into Gamay and atypical white blends, this is the real deal. And now, with almost three decades of practice, his wines are as remarkable as ever. He’ll never make a blockbuster fruit-bomb, and critics don’t always give him due attention, but Steve is still out there making the uncompromising wines he always has. The winery started in 1985 when Steve and his wife, Cornelia St. John, bought a few tons of grapes from some old vineyards and produced their first vintage.

The wines were Rhône inspired: Syrah, Mourvèdre, and a Châteauneuf-du-Pape style blend. Over the years Steve has worked with many other varietals but Rhône blends and Syrahs have always been the heart of Edmunds St. John. Little has changed in Steve’s winemaking since that first vintage, he starts with quality fruit from great sites and, preferably, older vines. In the cellar he keeps a light touch, using hand punch-downs and going easy on the oak. For the Rhône reds, Steve ferments them in one to six year old barrels and puncheons; for the whites and Gamay it’s all stainless steel.

The resulting wines, while delicious young, are incredibly age-worthy; they almost seem like they could last forever, growing only more complex and surprising. Even his Gamays and Whites can age for ten years or more with compelling results. They are fascinating to taste year after year; the evolution of just a few years reveal a whole new dimension to a wine you thought you had already figured out. It is remarkable to still be surprised by a winemaker after almost thirty years, but Steve never fails to challenge what we believe we already know. Surprises are an underappreciated quality in wine, and we’re fortunate to have someone out there who hasn’t forgotten that. On some bottles Steve claims to bottle by “Blind Luck and Intuition,” and it’s possible that it’s true. It has, however, been a very long streak of luck and a lot of very good intuition.

www.edmundsstjohn.com