Domaine de la Citadelle Gouverneur Saint-Auban Lubéron has a deep purple color, saturated right to the edge. The nose unfolds with ripe wild black cherries, crushed raspberries, and wonderful secondary aromatics, including dried figs, fresh fennel, and melted dark chocolate. On the palate the wine is all concentration and succulence, with luscious flavors suggesting black raspberry preserves, sweet Provençal herbs, and ripe black olives, all seasoned with buffering graphite minerality and sweet spices (like a great northern Rhône Syrah).

As always at Moore Brothers, this beautiful, handcrafted wine was “SHIPPED AT 56º,” so on a recent Sunday at Josh […]

I’d been thinking a lot about Champagne recently, and in April, Terry and I will attend the annual “Terres de Vins et Champagne” symposium in Aÿ, to taste the new vins clairs of more than twenty small growers, all friends and colleagues of Raphaël and Vincent Bérêche. So their electrifying, mineral-saturated Champagne Brut Réserve seemed like a natural choice to bring to the Farm and Fisherman on a recent Friday, when Sue and I got our signals crossed about what to do for dinner before the orchestra.

The restaurant is only four blocks from the Kimmel. But […]

A recent Sunday at Matyson in Philadelphia. Alongside the grilled berkshire pork rib-eye, with fingerlings, brussels sprouts, leeks, and bourbon jus you see in the photo above, the Lambardi Brunello di Montalcino was as fresh and compelling as any wine you’ll ever taste in Maurizio Lambardi’s own cellar in Canalicchio. – Greg Moore

I’m chagrined to admit that it even though it’s only a short walk from our home in Fitler Square, it was our first visit to Patrice Rames’ terrific Provençal restaurant, Bistro St. Tropez, since spring.

Patrice and I worked together at “Le Bec-Fin” in its glory days, more than twenty years ago (he was badly missed when he left to open “Bistro”). And over the years, Sue and I have celebrated more than few family milestones with him, so I can’t explain why the restaurant had been flying under my radar recently, other than my naturally roving eye, and […]