A perfect Saturday afternoon with nothing to do. Wife out with the girls for a luncheon. Son playing tennis with, em, a cute girl (cool). No work to do, and workout done. A perfect day to do some wine shopping.
The problem is, this town bites. Now I know Orlando is not some cosmopolitan metropolis, but you would think with over 2,000,000 people, with a solid professional demographic, that more than the normal Cabernet/Chardonnay market would be represented.
We have some bigger retailers like ABC and Total Wine, with boring offerings, and a handful of boutique stores, with more boring, almost repetitive offerings. Caymus. Silver Oak. Jordan. BV. Mondavi. Mainstream Bordeaux. Mainstream Champagne. Tons of Australians. Some big Spanish bombs. A few Souther Rhones.
I had jingle in my pocket to spend and nothing to spend it on. Nothing interesting. Nothing that caught my eye. Almost no Northern Rhones. No Chinons. No top-tier Beaujolais. No real interesting Bordeaux offerings, like a Cantemerle, Sociando Mallet or Talbot. Even the interesting stuff like Leoville Poyferre and Barton, were off-years.
Reminded me why 95% of my wine purchases are through the internet. I’d probably be a drunk if Chambers or Crush opened up a joint in Orlando.
Yes. We’ve got one great retailer with a lot of geek wines and enthusiasm/knowledge, but he’s small, also a wine bar and closed on Sundays and I think Mondays. Also a far drive from my apartment, but that’s my own issue.
We’ve got one place that has a lot of good stuff, but the staff is utterly moronic and it seems like their buyer, the only guy who knows anything about what they’re selling (including how to find the price on an unmarked bottle), never seems to be there. Then we’ve got a place that has a terrible selection but an enthusiastic, geeky staff (who must hate what they sell).
The Rosenthal and Louis/Dressner portfolios have just come to Missouri though so things are thawing a bit here. There’s one overpriced boutique shop in my neighborhood that is slowly getting these wines. It’s a ten minute walk from my apartment, which is what Chambers Street used to be when I was living in NYC. Bit of a downgrade.
I ripped on Orlando while there and complained about wine shops and a Cellar Tracker member was not pleased. If they don’t even have Columbia Crest Grand Estates at the six places I went that is bad. I wasn’t looking to buy anything high end and had to just end up with beer.
Minneapolis is ok but almost all the high end wines I buy are from elsewhere. Winestreets when they have a sale (not frequent as they use to) it is the best place by far. Henn Lake is fine along with Surdyk’s but not much else out there. Our local paper promotes all the over priced shops that do offer service but I don’t need they help and refuse to spend $5 per bottle for a $15 bottle of wine.
I’m going to disagree with my across the river Twin Citian. MSP has better than okay wine stores with knowledgeable staff. But there is no one single wine store to get all one’s shopping done. So I do a little here, a little there.
John is right, however, with his point about high end wines. They can probably be sourced for the customer who really wants something, but they are not a regular part of inventory.
And the Champagne selection is rough. I brought a case of good and interesting bubbly back from Binny’s when I was last in Chicago.
I feel your pain. When I visit my dad for our annual Holiday Time in Deltona, just north of Orlando, I usually end up at ABC because it’s easy to find. But the selections are always 2nd & 3rd tier burgs ie: Champy ect. and it just never seems to satisfy as there are no interesting bottles from N. Rhone (or S. Rhone for that matter), Chinon, or other areas I’d be interested in exploring. And this past winter I ended up with recent vintage premoxed whites.
But try finding interesting wines on Oahu. A challenge. And when you do find them they are priced outrageously. Thank goodness for the internet!
Nope. Within ten minutes of my house are Grapes and Zachys. Crush is a quarter mile from my office. Chambers takes 20 minutes on the subway, which makes it much too far away. Astor is closer than Chambers. I once bought a 1922 Madeira at Beekman, which is four blocks from my office. Sherry Lehman is over a mile away from my office, so it might as well be in Wyoming.
At least 85% of the wines I buy are ordered (via the internet) from the USA. In Manila, although there is a handful of decent shops, their prices are pretty ridiculous compared to those in the US - with Bdx at least twice to thrice US prices, and you can just forget about buying old vintages. The only shop that has a regular stock of old vintages of Bdx & Burgundy isn’t selective when it comes to provenance, so that’s out. The closest to good, non-internet wine shopping I have is HK.
Like I said, I’d be a drunk. Such incredible shops. I forgot about Sherry Lehman, another store I visit when I’m in NYC. May be there close of month for a Christie’s auction.
Sorry - right after I posted it, I went back and looked at the Wikipedia article again, and realized that they were using some idiotic nonstandard approach to standard deviations - so I yanked it real quickly.
Chicago is an interesting wine-buying market. A couple of the bigger players in town (HDH, Flickinger, TCWC) are not bricks and mortar. While they all have fantastic selections and great customer service, something is definitely lost by them not having more of a physical presence in town.
I’ve loved Wine Discount Center for their ecclectic mix of wines, but they don’t go very deep in any one region. Perman’s is another great option for some esoteric wines, but I can buy the same wines for cheaper (including shipping) from Chambers/Crush/Weygandt/Taureau. And then there’s Binny’s. Great beer outfit, and I’ve been really happy to live just two blocks from their massive Lincoln Park shop. Saw my first bottle of Jura wine there a couple weeks ago.
Like Jay I live in Westchester, and can conveniently stop by Grapes and Zachys. I’m regularly in city, and so easy to drop by Chambers. Those are my big 3, but I can stop by Astor, PJs, Crush, Wine Cellarage, etc as needed.
But my big question is whether Jay’s office in an alternate dimension, as I can’t picture any place on earth that could be a quarter mile from Crush (E 57th bet 3rd and Lex) and more than a mile From Sherry-L (E. 58th or 59th at Park)!
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