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Staff Favorites - Thomas Zacharia
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Reviews
Maison 76 Bouzy Grand Cru Brut Champagne
Review Date: 10-08-2026
This is irresistible champagne. What else do you need to know? Based on the 2018 vintage, entirely barrel fermented. and having spent 8 full years on the lees, it seems impossible that this bottle of bubbly liquid gold is only $54.99. Rich, powerful, and with stellar depth, this bottling is broad shouldered and thrilling from start to finish.
Price:
$54.99
2022 K&L Discovery Series Châteauneuf-du-Pape
Review Date: 10-08-2026
Made by Rudolphe Dupin, the talent behind our best-selling Montfaucon wines, this is a great value from Châteauneuf-du-Pape! Deeply fruited aromatics waft enticingly from the glass and carry straight through to a broad, generous palate full of deep, silky fruits, and touches of wild herbs. Great stuff!
Price:
$29.99
2008 Maxime Toubart "Heritage" Brut Champagne
Review Date: 10-08-2026
There are 3 certainties in life: Death, taxes, and current release 2008 champagne of this quality, at this price point, does not exist. And yet, here one is, staring you in the face, at a price to make you do a spit take! You're wondering, what's the catch? The answer: Nothing! After 16 years on the lees, this wine is just so delicious, full of rich butterscotch and clove notes, beautiful brioche character, and fragrant aromatics. Bravo, Monsieur Westby, on this stellar find!
Price:
$59.99
2024 Domaine Samuel Billaud Chablis 1er Cru "Mont de Milieu"
Review Date: 10-07-2026
I tasted Samuel Billaud's 2024 Mont de Milieu first thing in the morning, basically straight after housing a chorizo breakfast burrito from Los Tacos #1, so you could say my palate was primed for success. So it says something that I continued to make the entire store staff taste it again and again throughout the day, repeatedly commenting on the ever-expanding aromatics and fruit profile which only became more entrancing as the wine opened, all underlined with a broad-tipped marker by Samuel Billaud's signature precision-driven style.
Samuel Billaud made the wines at his family's Billaud-Simon until a falling-out pushed him out in 2009, and for his first vintages he worked from a rented cellar in the next village over with bought grapes. He's since moved into a gravity-fed winery that backs onto his grandparents' old house in the center of Chablis and bought back a slice of the family vines, including fractions of Les Clos and Vaudésir. Jasper Morris puts it plainly: "Every time I taste with Samuel I am astonished by the beauty of his wines."
Mont de Milieu sits on the same bank, the same Kimmeridgian slope and the same south-facing exposure as the grands crus, one hill along from Montée de Tonnerre with a small side valley in between. Basically, you get the ripeness and the weight of the big hill where the grand crus sit, without the same price tag, and this is a stellar example of the giving nature of the site.
Mark my words, in 5 years time Samuel Billaud will be spoken about in the same circles as Raveneau and Dauvissat. Some might say he already is! I would never tell you that this wine is a steal, but for the price you pay, you are getting one hell of a bottle.
2024 Prosper Maufoux Bourgogne Blanc
Review Date: 10-07-2026
I have been repeatedly be wowed by chardonnays across all price points from the beautiful but limited 2024 Burgundy vintage, and Prosper Maufoux's has helped restored my faith that prodigious value does still exist in Burgundy!
Sipping this bottle makes me want to sit at my kitchen island, put on some John Coltrane, and slide into an endless evening of soft French cheeses and pate de Campagne. Or, you know, a bag of white cheddar pop corners. Take your pick. Sourced from choice plots in the Côte Chalonnaise and Mâconnais, the aromatics are fresh and lightly creamy, and the palate has touches of weight alongside lovely apple and pear fruits, and hints of citrus peel. Fruit, light spice, and everything nice. For $25, this wine is simply a delight!
2025 Domaine Francine & Olivier Savary Chablis Vieilles Vignes
Review Date: 10-05-2026
The 2025 Vieilles Vignes Chablis from Savary is sourced from vines 45+ years in age. It's superbly bright and fresh, all lemon zest, white flowers, and wet chalky tension, then it flashes a little weight through the middle, teasing creamy breadth, before immediately snapping back to pure Chablis, with a remarkably lithe, mineral, and linear finish. I'd be delighted to drink this any day of the week!
Price:
$37.99
2023 Domaine Benoît Cantin Irancy "La Grande Côte"
Review Date: 10-05-2026
This is a red wine that transports you to your favorite bistro in Dijon or Paris. One with paper on the tables, wooden chairs, and mirrors on the walls, sipping a glass while awaiting your steak au poivre and a tangle of frites. It's immediately charming and totally irresistible.
If you've ever wondered where Burgundy keeps its secrets, drive fifteen minutes south of Chablis and you'll find Irancy, a south-facing amphitheater of Kimmeridgian limestone with fewer than 200 hectares of vines and fewer than fifty growers, every one of them making red wine on soils the rest of the world associates with oysters and Chablis.
The climate has done Irancy a favor the Côte d'Or might envy: the amphitheater now ripens Pinot comfortably most years, slopes once written off as too cool are being planted, and the village sailed through the 2016 and 2021 frosts that gutted the rest of Burgundy, so the wines have gone from lean and angular to genuinely delicious without losing their chalky northern minerality. The Cantins have been farming here for generations, and Benoît, who bottled his first solo vintage in 1994 with his father Bernard still at his side, works 16 hectares spread across ten of the village's lieux-dits. "La Grande Côte" is sourced from a steep slope that tumbles toward the Yonne River and faces south-southwest so the Pinot soaks up every hour of northern sun, making this cuvée is the fullest and most structured Irancy in Benoit's range.
In 2023, vibrant and pure-fruited aromatics leap out of the glass, immediately calling you for a second sniff. Wild fresh berries and fresh violets on the palate all coil around a chalky, beautifully fresh core.
Who knew Red Burgundy under $30 could be this compelling?
Price:
Hidden
2024 Lucien Lardy Moulin-à-Vent "Les Thorins"
Review Date: 10-02-2026
Before the famous windmill gave Moulin-à-Vent its name in 1936, the wines from this hillside were sold as "Thorins," and the slope was so well regarded that the village of Romanèche added it to its own name. Les Thorins is still the heart of the appellation, a bank of pink granite shot through with manganese where Gamay stops being the easygoing grape of the family and starts behaving like something a bit more serious and contemplative from the Côte d'Or.
Lucien Lardy ferments his Gamay in whole bunches the traditional Beaujolais way, but with one twist: a grid pins the fruit down under the fermenting juice, so the wine keeps all the violets-and-crushed-berry perfume the method is famous for and picks up the color, grip and depth that most carbonic wines never get.
2024 was a patience-testing year in Beaujolais, with a rainy August and a cool September that pushed picking back, and the growers who kept their vineyards clean were rewarded with wines of unusual lift and crunch. Fortunately for us, this is just one of those wines! The 2024 Lardy Moulin-à-Vent leans bright and red-fruited: crushed raspberry and violets abound, with a lick of iron and cracked pepper, and a juicy, palate thrilling finish. Truly a delicious bottling, and a stunning value in Moulin-à-Vent!
Price:
$19.99
2024 Domaine Henri et Gilles Buisson Bourgogne Blanc
Review Date: 09-30-2026
When you taste a great 2024 White Burgundy, nothing else can compare for the rest of the day. The light of the sun doesn't warm the skin as it should, the rain won't seem to end, and all you can think about is going back for another glass of that liquid sunshine. It's a vintage that cannot be ignored, and won't soon be forgotten. The 2024 Bourgogne Blanc from Henri and Gilles Buisson is the perfect daily Burgundy for a weeknight thrill. It's a wine that smells, and tastes, like you might be enjoying a $50 (or these days, let's face it, $80) Puligny Montrachet. Sunny, bright, and offering bushels of fresh peaches and pear fruit, it marries an excellent creamy texture with supreme tension and precision.
The fruit comes primarily from the brother's young vines in Saint Romain, which recently received the award of one Michelin Grape. The Wine Advocate has dubbed the estate "Saint-Romain's contemporary reference point," and vinous piled on the praise noted they they're "really going places." Stellar White Burgundy under $30 isn't easy to find anymore, but when it comes around, all I can say is, buy it! You'll never regret having an extra bottle (or 10) of these lying around ready to drink.
2024 Domaine Henri et Gilles Buisson Saint-Romain "Sous La Velle"
Review Date: 09-23-2026
In a word? Enrapturing!
In a paragraph? Here goes: Why can't I stop smelling this glass? That's the honest first note I wrote on the 2024 Sous la Velle. There's an indescribable character my favorite Chardonnays tend to share. A sort of restless energy, matching tension and freshness stride for stride with weight and texture. This has those characters in spades. Electric aromatics, that gorgeous flinty reduction the best young white Burgundies wear like a glove, and underneath it lime zest, crushed stone, and salty ocean-air.
Discoveries like this are why I adore wine, and why I took this job. Huge fan. I bought it for the store and then I bought it for my house!
2023 Olivier Leflaive Bourgogne Blanc "Les Sétilles"
Review Date: 09-02-2026
A zesty, lemony cream pie of a nose waves an enthusiastic hello, followed by perfectly tart apple and bits of almond butter around the edges. On the palate, this rips with a push pull between freshness and texture that leaves you wanting (re: needing) another glass. Fortunately, you can have one, because this bombshell is only $34.99. A great reminder that great Burgundy doesn’t have to cost great sums of money.
2021 Newton "The Puzzle" Spring Mountain Bordeaux Blend
Review Date: 07-10-2026
The 2021 Puzzle is Newton's mountain Cabernet blend at its most generous, dense and dark. It pours rich and dark, chocolate and mocha lifting out of the glass, before turning soft and fabulously friendly on the palate. Chalky dark fruit abounds, with a generous, almost decadent finish. Mostly Cabernet Sauvignon from Newton's high volcanic sites, filled out with the a supporting cast of Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Petit Verdot.
Price:
Hidden
2021 Groth "Oakcross" Oakville Proprietary Red
Review Date: 06-23-2026
Here's a magic trick: pull fruit from your Reserve Cabernet Block, the same block that goes into your $150 Reserve, which is the same wine that earned Robert Parker's first 100-point score for a California Cabernet back in 1985, and fold it into a Proprietary Red instead. Instead of $150, you pay under $60, and presto, you've got this unbeatable deal of a bottle.
What lands in the glass is California in its Sunday best with a Bordeaux accent. The fruit is dense and dark and almost brooding, with an inky core framed by the kind of gravelly, fine-grained structure the Left Bank of Bordeaux built its name on. Power and polish in the same mouthful. At under sixty dollars, calling this a steal undersells this bad boy.
2025 Lagrange, St-Julien
Review Date: 06-01-2026
The 2025 Lagrange has really beautiful and potent aromatics. The palate is juiced up and robust, with light spice character and easy tannins. This is super tasty right out of the gate today, and will be irresistible after some short-term cellaring.
Price:
$49.99
2025 d'Issan, Margaux
Review Date: 06-01-2026
This is a ripe style, but very nicely balanced as well. Very dense, chewy, and focused with dark fruit, cloves, mocha and well integrated tannins. Intense yet elegant with a core of real power.
2025 Haut-Bailly, Pessac-Léognan
Review Date: 06-01-2026
Haut Bailly's 2025 is composed of 55% Cabernet, 36% Merlot, and remainders of Cabernet Franc and petit Verdot. Yields were quite low, clocking in at 26.6 hectoliters per hectare, compared to an average of around 35-40 in most years. Fortunately, the wine is as lovely as it is scares. Soaring, luscious aromatics with an undertone of warm spice. The palate is richly fruited with great density and breadth, and soft, integrated tannins. In my notes, I dubbed the 2025, "boldly elegant," and looking back, I can't help but concur!
2025 Mouton Rothschild "Aile d'Argent" Bordeaux Blanc
Review Date: 06-01-2026
This has super ripe and generous aromatics, with boat-loads of exotic citrus fruits. The palate is full of has passionfruit curd, with a rich creaminess that rides fresh waves of acidity impressively. Yum!
2025 Le Petit Mouton Rothschild, Pauillac
Review Date: 06-01-2026
Always a vineyard selection, the 2025 Petit Mouton has a higher percentage of Merlot than in previous years. The supple Merlot-focused core is sweet-fruited fresh, and very silky. There’s ripeness and power aplenty, and the wine finishes with a refreshing note of acidity.
Price:
$179.99
2025 Réserve de la Comtesse de Lalande, Pauillac
Review Date: 06-01-2026
The 2025 Reserve de la Comtesse flatters with silky dark fruit, a plush mid palate, and impressive structure. The core is inky dark, full of black licorice, mocha, and ripe blackberries, with an impressively persistent finish. Well done!
2025 Pichon-Lalande, Pauillac
Review Date: 06-01-2026
The 2025 Pichon Lalande is full of entrancing juxtaposition. Ripe, but classic, structured, but expansive. The aromatics are deep and dark, with a palate to match. A perfectly ripe, satiny dark fruit core, wrapped in supreme structure. This is already quite exuberant and expressive!
Price:
$149.99
2025 La Mission Haut-Brion, Pessac-Léognan
Review Date: 06-01-2026
The aromatics on the 2025 La Mission demand your attention. They're so beautiful and pure, full of dark berries and spice tones. The palate is supple and creamy, with a showering of red and dark fruits, superbly integrated tannins, and a long, persistent finish. This is elegance incarnate in a bottle. I loved it!
Price:
$224.99
2025 Angélus, St-Emilion
Review Date: 05-21-2026
Angelus recently put their finishing touches on their gorgeous new cellar, which utilizes conical fermenters for gentler extractions. The 2025 has joyful, bright and effusive aromatic. The palate is expansive and precise, with an undertone of spice. It’s sappy and startlingly pretty, with well integrated tannins The 50% Franc shines beautifully in this vintage, adding intrigue and depth to alongside the lushness of the merlot which rounds out the other half of the blend.
2025 Cheval Blanc, St-Emilion
Review Date: 05-08-2026
If you're a fan of Cheval Blanc's glorious Franc dominated expression, buy now or forever hold your peace - yields were down 50% in 2025 and all of their wine is being released during En Primeur. The good news? The wine delivers with elegant and lifted aromatics, a juicy and vibrant palate complex fruits, all carried along by excellent mineral freshness. Even at this young stage the wine is super promising with great persistence and focus.