CELLAR CLUB JANUARY 2021

January 12, 2021

Written by Rose Friedlander

January 12, 2021

Written by Rose Friedlander

With resolutions in place, the turn of a new year, and the feeling of a brand new year ahead we are going to Try Something New! For those of us who are perpetually hunting for the unusual, the wine and cheese world is a mecca of delight. This month we are expanding our horizons with rarely found but well-loved cheeses, wines, and more. Join us in trying something new this month with these adventurous and unique offerings!

Thank you for being a member of

The Cellar Club, cheers!

Wine Pick #1:

Bodegas Los Bermejos Listan Negro

Maceracion Carbonica 2019

Lanzarote, Canary Islands, Spain

The Canary Islands, Spain’s archipelago off the NW coast of Africa, are home to Bodegas Los Bermejos. It’s a testament to the ingenuity and desire of viticulture that wines from this volcanic, almost alien, landscape exist. Lanzarote, the easternmost of the islands and home to Los Bermejos, lies beneath a layer of nearly inorganic, eruptive ash known as rafe. This necessitates each vine being rooted in carved pits known as hoyos with the result being a vineyard bearing the dimpled appearance of a jet-black golf ball. Oh, and don’t forget the roaring winds coming off the coast make cultivation even more challenging. Yields are ridiculously small and all work is done by hand. Practicing organic, they purchase fruit from like-minded growers (because of these small yields, all-estate fruit would require ownership of the entire island!). Cellar work is minimal to emphasize the unique terroir of Lanzarote. Owner/winemaker Ignacio Valdera’s goal is that his wines are essentially the vinous manifestation of the island. He employs carbonic maceration, which sees most of the fermentation occurring in each uncrushed grape to achieve a primacy of fruit and low tannins and a true typifier of Lanzarote’s austere beauty.

Wine Pick #2

Douloufakis Winery

Crete Femina Malvasia 2017

Dafnes, Crete, Greece

“Yea, and if some god shall wreck me in the wine-dark deep, even so I will endure.”

-Homer

We’re all feeling a bit beset by trials great and small these days and, perhaps, the quality or attribute most needed is endurance. Any cultivator of vines has been only too familiar with this need in their pursuit of transmuting, amid a sea of troubles, the elements of the vineyard into the beloved elixir we call wine. The Greek island of Crete, birthplace of the Malvasia grape, has an epic place in history dating back to the Bronze Age and the Minoan culture that dominated trade in the Mediterranean. It was from here that amphorae of wine found their way into the cups of Pharaohs and Caesars. The Douloufakis Winery, founded far more recently in the 1930s by Dimitris Douloufakis, is today led by grandson Nikolas whose commitment to organic agriculture and wines of transparency has resulted in this compelling white that typifies the best of Malvasia’s seductive aromas and abundant fruit checked by a bracing edge. Please enjoy this taste of Crete which represents the unbroken chain of winemaking stretching back 4,000 years!

CHEESE PAIRING OF THE MONTH:

Spring Brook Farm, Tubby

A big old Tubby wheel of Alpine-style cheese made by Spring Brook Farm and aged at Crown Finish Caves in Brooklyn. The cheese is named for William Bunker Tubby, one of Brooklyn’s most famous architects, and designer of the Pratt Library, the home of Charles Millard Pratt, and the current home of the Brooklyn Ethical Culture building on Prospect Park West. Tubby is washed with salt brine as it ages, giving the rind a tawny hue and imparting a bit of robust beefy funk to the flavor. After aging for one year in the tunnel at Crown Finish Tubby becomes ripe and ready to go! The flavor riffs on Comte - it is firm yet decadently melty on the palate and has grassy and nutty flavors laced with a touch of white chocolate.