Staff Favorites - Gary Westby

Gary Westby
Gary Westby  | Send Email  |   Subscribe to My Sommelier Service
I started at K&L in February of 2000, after 4 years of working down the street for another retailer, and although I take care of the Champagne buying here at K&L, I love to drink wine from all over the world. I prize authenticity in wine, and love representative examples of many different styles, whether it is a spicy dry creek zinfandel or a mineral driven Manzanilla. I almost always drink my wine with food, and am drawn to food wines rather than the softer styles that are good for drinking on their own. My wife Cinnamon and I cook a lot of Italian & French food at home, and my list of wines reflects those food choices. I also love value, at every price point, and can't stand "prestige" labels that under deliver in the bottle. I love honest wines for the table. If you love good wine to go with your good cooking too, I think that by joining my personal Sommelier list you will be treated to a wide variety of wines that represent a strong value for money at what ever price range you feel comfortable with. Give it a try!


Reviews

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2000 Daniel Ginsburg "Cuvée Sous Bois" Brut Champagne
Review Date: 4-23-2013
A slab of pate, a loaf of bread, a bottle of 2000 Daniel Ginsburg Cuvee Sous Bois Brut Champagne is all that was needed to make a spectacular evening! This rich bottle has all the flavor to stand up to the most flavorful pate, and all of the snap to refresh after each decadent bite. So far, this is on my short list of top Champagne experiences for 2013... Don't miss it!
Top Value! Drink from 2013 to 2030
Price: $49.99 Add To Cart

2002 Bruno Michel "Cuvee Millésime" Brut Champagne
Review Date: 4-19-2013
One of the top wines tasted on my April trip was the 2002 Bruno Michel "Cuvee Millésime" Brut Champagne which is a new disgorgement. This current batch has four more years on the lees than the first bottles that we sold, and the dosage has been dropped to 5.6 grams per liter. This wine is so creamy and perfect texturally that it is easy to get carried away with. The honeyed pastry nose has a little hint of vanilla from the barrel vinification, but the chalky drive balances it perfectly. The pineapple like, subtle fruit of this great Champagne remind me so much of Meursault but the mineral finish could only be Champagne. Don’t miss this one.
Drink from 2013 to 2032
Price: $59.99 Add To Cart

Louis Roederer "Brut Premier" Champagne
Review Date: 4-18-2013
This is great Champagne. Louis Roederer has been pushing quality like few others in the region over the last decade, and no wine shows the heights that they have reached as well as the Brut Premier. With massive investment in organic viticulture, including a massive purchase of 1er vineyards from Leclerc-Briant, a return to plowing in the vineyard instead of chemical treatment and obsession with every detail in the winery they have created something here that has no rival among the big names, especially at this price. The 1/3 of the fruit that they buy comes from growers like Benoit Marguet- so you know they are getting top stuff. While most of my time is spent advocating for single origin Champagnes, this bottle is a great argument for blending and the balance that cellar master Jean-Baptiste Lecaillon created here is second to none. This wine has a great brioche nose and plenty of vivacious sparkle. It is a perfect aperitif!

2012 Ricardo Santos "Finca de Roberto Azaredo" Semillon Mendoza
Review Date: 3-27-2013
Semillon from Mendoza? The Ricardo Santos Finca De Roberto Azaredo was a surprise in many ways. Like the rest of the Bordeaux varieties Semillon is a happy traveler, and these 60 year old vines deliver the goods in the most unlikely place. If found the wine to have a gorgeous honeyed character on the nose and a rich, oily lanolin flavor on the palate. The back end of the wine is completely dry and quite long given the price. This is a must for anyone who loves white Bordeaux, and I think it should age very nicely.
Top Value! Drink from 2013 to 2022
Price: $14.99 Add To Cart

2010 Zolo "Reserve" Cabernet Sauvignon Mendoza
Review Date: 3-27-2013
What an impressive bottle of wine! If this Cabernet Sauvignon were from Napa instead of Mendoza it would be a good deal at $50. Luckily for us, it is from Argentina and a steal at $17.99. The Zolo Reserve is cool and curranty on the nose and rich and complete on the palate. The finish is polished and long giving the impression of something far more costly. This is the perfect thing for steaks on the grill!
Top Value!
Price: $17.99 Add To Cart RP 93

2008 Mas Codina Vinya Ferrer Cabernet Sauvignon Penedes
Review Date: 3-26-2013
Fans of Torres Cabs take note- this is a serious little bottle of Cabernet! The Mas Codina Vinya Ferrer has plenty of tasty, curranty fruit and solid, medium bodied texture. I felt like I got much more than $15 worth on the finish... This wine has got minerality and length that I associate with much more expensive bottles!
Price: $14.99 Add To Cart

2008 Mas Codina Cava Brut Reserva Penedès
Review Date: 3-26-2013
This is my top recommendation for sparkling wine under $15 store-wide. This bottle of bubbles is so clean and refreshing that it is sometimes a little too easy to drink. The bead and texture are what set it apart from most of the other inexpensive sparklers that are available; this wine has very compact streamers that I associate with more expensive wines. Try it out!
Price: $12.99 Add To Cart

2007 Can Mayol Loxarel Gran Reserva Familiar Brut Nature Penedes
Review Date: 3-26-2013
The Gran Reserva Familiar from Can Mayol Loxarel offers up a lot more than just simple refreshment, and I was very impressed by it in today’s staff tasting. The bright nose offers up some nougat and shows the patience that this high quality house has for ageing their Cava. On the palate it is light and easy going, but the very dry finish offers up some real minerality. Well done!
Price: $21.99 Add To Cart

2005 Pierre Moncuit-Delos Blanc de Blancs Brut Champagne
Review Date: 3-20-2013
This Champagne has an immensely creamy nose with hints of brioche and ripe pear. On the palate it shows the best of the 2005 harvest in Champagne with plenty of exotic, candied fruit and fancy pastry dough. This is rich and full bodied blanc de blancs and has a very good finish, which is focused but not austere in any way. I can’t wait to try this with some scallops!
Drink from 2013 to 2018
Price: $54.99 Add To Cart RP 89

Pierre Moncuit "Cuvée Pierre Moncuit-Delos Grand Cru" Brut Blanc de Blancs Champagne
Review Date: 3-20-2013
This wine has a big nose that is Meursault like in its scale but without the oak. I found it full of ripe fruit and fragrant wild flowers. On the palate it is dry and cutting on the back end but full and ripe up front. This all Mesnil, all estate Champagne really shows its class on the finish, which is very, very long for its low price. So good!

Moët & Chandon "Imperial" Brut Champagne
Review Date: 3-20-2013
This wine replaced the white star in the US market in the fall of 2009 as Champagne lovers here asked for a drier style. Starting in the summer of 2012 all the Imperial is labeled Brut and the dosage is the same worldwide- 9 grams per liter. They blend four batches of the imperial a year, keeping the winemaking team and bottling lines busy. When I drank this with Moet winemaker Elise Losfelt, she explained that the first blend in January following the harvest uses the most reserve wines- around 30%, while the last blend of the year will use around 20% because of the better maturity of the base vintage. Since they want a fresh style of wine at Moet, they only use one to two year old reserve wines. They age all of the Imperial for 30 months on the lees before release. This was certainly the best Imperial I have drunk, with a discreet nose of bread dough and apple-like Meunier fruit. It was easy to drink, dry and clean and a nice way to start an evening.
Price: $37.99 Add To Cart WS 92 ST 89

2004 Moet & Chandon "Grand Vintage" Brut Champagne
Review Date: 3-16-2013
Cinnamon and I enjoyed this for the aperitif with some black and white truffle popcorn on Monday night this week. I love starting off the week with Champagne, and this 2004 surprised me by being my favorite current release of Moet Chandon Grand Vintage Brut that I have ever tasted. It had everything that makes 2004 such a great year in Champagne- clean, linear fruit, excellent focused acidity and a super long finish!
Drink from 2013 to 2024

2005 Elisabeth Goutorbe Brut Champagne
Review Date: 3-16-2013
This is a fantastic wine, and is the best example of the village of Ay that we carry here at K&L. This south facing, very steep cru in the center of Marne valley is perfect for ripening Pinot Noir to full power, but also has the most pure chalk of any place in Champagne where this grape is grown. This tension between ripe Pinot Noir flavor and incisive chalkiness is the signature of Ay, and defines the 2005 Elisabeth Goutorbe Brut. Last night, Cinnamon cooked a Japanese feast of salmon, scallops, white rice and broccoli rabe tempura. I can't think of any wine on the planet that would have gone better with this meal. With plenty of sinewy black cherry Pinot fruit for the salmon and cutting Ay chalk for the rich scallop, I was in wine and food heaven. If you love Champagne, don't miss this wine!
Drink from 2013 to 2025
Price: $39.99 Add To Cart

2002 Moet & Chandon "Dom Pérignon" Brut Champagne 1.5L
Review Date: 3-15-2013
Yesterday I attended a Dom Perignon seminar and welcomed at the Rosewood resort in Menlo Park with a glass of the 2002 Dom Perignon Blanc. It has settled down a lot in the year since I last tasted it. I thought it was great that they showed the wine in large bowled glasses which really brough out the best in the wine. It glittered with a green tinged white gold color in the Sand Hill sun on the veranda and had a nose of pastry dough and clean cane sugar. On the palate it was rich, full bodied and had plenty of white fruit up front. The dosage had integrated very nicely, and it showed quite a bit drier than I remembered it. This is a great Champagne to serve, or keep in magnum.

1996 Moët & Chandon "Dom Pérignon Oenothéque" Brut Champagne
Review Date: 3-15-2013
This Dom isfrom one of the greatest vintages of the 20th century. This famed harvest is known as the 10/10 in the region, for combining very high ripeness (10% potential alcohol) with very high acidity (10 grams per liter of acidity). Region wide stats like this are very rare, since usually acidity drops as ripeness increases. This is the same wine as the 1996 Dom Perignon blanc, but with more time on the lees- effectivly an "RD" release. I tasted it yesterday at a Dom Perignon seminar and the boquet was extremely fresh, with lots of white-fleshed fruit touched by a bit of spicy bread character. On the palate the wine had a strong Pinot character with some meaty flavor, but the finish was an all Chardonnay affair, with length and minerality that go forever. The dosage is adjusted down on these more recently disgorged bottles, and that combined with the extra time on the lees make them very worth seeking out- especially in a vintage as great as 1996!

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