Treasure Island, San Francisco
For Europeans who are not familiar with Brumaire, this is certainly THE wine-tasting event on the West Coast for anyone with a soft spot for natural wines. The event is quickly fully booked as wine lovers reserve their tickets in advance for this single-day tasting and celebrating in San Francisco (more later about it, you can guess I attended). But the evening before, there's a more intimate event set somewhere on Treasure Island; like Brumaire it's organized by Bradford Taylor of Ordinaire, Josh Eubank of Percy Selections, Quinn Kimsey-White of Psychic Wines and Matt Coelho of Woods Beer Co. Here is a visual oversight of this party, akin to some side parties held
along wine fairs in Angers, Montpellier or elsewhere, but with something different of course,
we're in San Francisco, with all the cool vibes of the background. For the information, Treasure Island is an artificial island that was used for the military, and a brief look at a satellite image shows it's still a quirky place, not fit for mainstream tourism, with its warehouses and empty lots. The word was that it all began at 7 pm, and I reached the island with a commuter bus from near Embarcadero, this was fully dark already, wasn't sure to find the address, happilly a lady on the bus told me where to get out. Even using Google Maps it wasn't easy (I disable the location function on my phone), I had to walk around poorly-lit warehouses before I ended up finding the party.
I had arrived the previous day, landing at SFO, and as soon as I emerged from the BART on 19th street in Oakland I stopped at Punchdown, the first wine bar centered on natural wines to have opened in the Bay Area. i went there unannounced, this was the early afternoon and Jackie (pic on left) who spent time in France with vignerons recently explained me about the two nice wines I had. My second stop was Ordinaire (I was to sleep 15 minutes from there by walk), the co-organizer of Brumaire. Still quiet on an early afternoon, I enjoyed a glass of La Lunotte poured by Diego (pictured here with Mikayla, an old friend from his East Coast days with whom he just reconnected (she happens to live close from here now). The young mother had walked in with her baby girl (there was another young family with baby at a table), i love this casual side in here...
The event was supposed like last year to be held wholly outside but the weather these
days were colder than usual in San Francisco, it rained occasionally during the evening, the wind was erratic and being inside this warehouse was more comfortable. This place happens to be a winery, it's where Woods Beer Co. makes their wines, making it even more exciting for a party gathering wine lovers. For those who got the invitation for this party, the motto was , just bring a bottle there'll be food, and man, there was a lot of wine in there indeed, Bradford and Josh must have brought a few cases as well, bottles of nothing-added wine were turning around, you didn't even had time to have a look at the funky labels.
Winemakers attending Brumaire were there too, some had come from far away like Christophe Foucher of La Lunotte, it was funny to see him again here in San Francisco and Oakland, the last time I had stumbled upon him was on the market place in Saint-Aignan the previous saturday as he was shopping on the farmer's market... If I remember he has arrived this very day, didn't seemed too much tired by the jetlag though.
This was a great experience for me to be part of this crowd of fun-loving, wine-loving people, there was good music (with a DJ), good food, lots of wine, and on top of that many of these folks I had never met before came to me to congratulate me for this blog, very rewarding indeed... The success of natural wine is expanding in California and on the West Coast, and this is also encouraging winemakers in the area to follow suit.
Here is Caleb Leisure is making wine in the same facility than Nic Coturri in California, with the same philosophy, his first vintage was 2016, making 500 cases in 2017 and 2018 and planning to make more hopefully next year. Caleb works in part with the grapes of Old World Winery, its owner Derek Trowbridge being a terrific farmer known throught the region. He gets other fruit from Mendocino and also the Sierra Foothills. Caleb also helps Nic in the shared facility. More on Caleb later.
There were indeed a good number of cult winemakers from France, after Christophe, here is Julie Balagny from Beaujolais, she's been coming here for a few times now. She poses here alongside Bradford Taylor, from the Ordinaire wine bar in Oakland (he's the one who invited me here in the first place); Bradford now lives most of the year in Chicago with his wife and family, but he still owns Ordinaire anf flies here now and then.
Aaron (of Not Drinking Poison) was there too, spending something like a week or more in the area, visiting precisely several of these winemakers working naturally and from dry-farmed vineyards.
Brent Mayeaux pictured also in the group with Aaron spent time in France working there with vintners (including some in Auvergne) and he's starting something here in California, his winery name being Stagiaire, which means trainee in French, I guess as a reference to his time as a trainee in the different wineries he went through. More on his wines later, they're not yet on the market bu i've tasted them at Brumaire.
Man, I couldn't believe my eyes, Philippe Jambon the cult winemaker from Beaujolais was there too, and it takes this San Francisco trip to wonder why I haven't been visiting him again lately, must correct this (my linked story is quite old now)...
We had a great chef for this party, no less than Kosuke, a Japan-born cook who worked years in Paris and followed his wife in California. In Paris he worked at 6 Paul Bert in the 11th arrondissement. He is now the chef at Ordinaire (terrific food, I ate there the previous evening) but he plans to go back work in France this summer with a partnership in a top table in Metz in north-eastern France (he's waiting for his visa but it's almost sure he'll move there this summer). His wife worked at Le Verre Volé in Paris with Quentin who is the manager at Ordinaire in Oakland, the 2nd in charge after Bradford, small world indeed...
Was happy also to meet there a new importer of these wines : Tess Bryant set up her company Tess Bryant Selections a few months ago (septembre 2018) with the aim to bring uncorrected wines on the West Coast and beyond. Tess imports natural wines here but primarily from Australia which is having these days a strong and healthy scene in this regard. Australian natural wines are not well known here in California and she's working to correct this and bring these wines to all the states (already 6 now, and counting), not only California or the West Coast, even if for now she sells mostly in California and New York. She sells now the wines of 10 producers from Australia, two from France (Lisanne van Son from Touraine and Sylvain Martinez from Anjou) and one from California. Expect more to join her portfolio. Incidently, Lisanne also makes wine in Australia and her Aussie wine should of course be imported here as well. Tess speaks good French, I was impressed. While we were chatting someone came to pour us a Gamay d'Auvergne, I love this job...
Very happy also to see Avi Deixler was there too (here standing with Julie Balagny), and see him again since my visit in his dairy-farm facility last summer; Avi is the rebel winemaker behind Absentee Winery; thanks to his obstinacy, the North Marin Wine District kind of emerged on the map and the wines really shine. Avi was pouring a few of his magnums at the party.
Here is another wine importer who speaks good French (he learnt French to speak with the vignerons), Keven Clancy manages Farm Wine Imports , a company which was created 10 years ago with the help of Joe Dressner with the aim of making Louis-Dressner Selections wines distributed in California. After 10 years the local market had changed a lot and expanded as natural wines became very popular on the West Coast. Keven says that now the difficult thing is to make a distinction between fashion and serious commitment : the thing is, there isn't enough of these wines for every one, so they have to make the distinction between loyal, long-term buyers (oe aspiring to be) and the ones who follow the trend of the day, reasy to by now but not reliable as long-term buyers and followers.
At one point there was a special ovation directed at Josh Eubank for his birthday. Josh (pictured here with wife Lara) founded the California-based import & distribution company Percy Selections and he is the co-organizer of this event and Brumaire. Josh and his family live mostly in Paris actually. You can find Percy Selections wines at Ordinaire among other places.
Here is Diego, the man mho makes things go smoothly at Ordinaire wine bar when Bradford and Quentin are not there. Not a California native, Diego Perez adapted quickly after moving from Rhode Island, he does a great job with the rest of the staff, Quentin, Alex, Daniel and Cormac (Kara who is still a friend on the place doesn't work here anymore) . Speaking of Diego, the new thing is, he's beginning to make wine himself with this young woman at his side on the picture, Georgia, they buy the grapes in the region and thus he'll be able to keep working at Ordinaire (hasn't to keep a vineyard). More on their wines later here.
Of course that was easier for me to spot the French winemakers in this crowd, here Philippe Jambon with Julien Altaber who is now the man at the wheel not only at Sextant but also at Dominique Derain.
I had also the chance to speak with D.C. and Lisa. D.C. Looney and his wife Lisa Costa are the founders of The Punchdown in Oakland, the oldest established wine bar in the Bay Area. Back in 2010 natural wines were not that obvious in California esprcially compared to the vibrant markets of New York and Montreal. I was supposed to pay a visit when I stayed on this side of the bay in 2013 (we were staying at the Anthony Chabot campground on the hill above Oakland), but couldn't find a parking spot and gave up at the last minute. Read Noah Sanders' recent profile of Punchdown and how D.C. and Lisa do their job. D.C. and Lisa also love outdoor and camping, every weekend they leave for somewhere along the Sonoma coast or in the Sierra, both love Nature and I tell them how much I also love camping in these US Forest Service campgrounds, it's a sad thing we don't have the equivalent in France. They say they forage for mushrooms on season and of course bring natural wine at the picnic tables near the barbecue grills (we'd bring craft beer for our part).
Sorry for tyhe quality of this picture, i wanted to shoot without flash but the light was really dim i this corner of the room - Here is Cub Dimling who has opened very recently in Chicago the Red & White wine bar with co-owner Nathan Adams [the linked story may not be accessible in Europe because of another of these heavy-handed EU Internet regulations, use this proxy as an alternative]. I understand she came with Bradford and this is yet another vibrant wine bar on the Chicago scene, they have a 200-bottle wine list and growing. The other woman on the picture, Ann-Marie Meiers, also comes from Chicago, she works at Brardford Taylor's wine shop there, Diversey Wine, a place of course with a similar philosophy and centered on nothing-added wines.
Here are a few other attendees, beginning with Nic Coturri (left) of the Sonoma Mountain Winery, then Julien Guillot of Domaine des Vignes du Mayne, a man I don't get the name of sorry, and Quentin, who left Le Verre Volé years ago to work at Ordinaire in Oakland.
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