Old Bridge Cellars

01/09/2025

ICYMI: Please enjoy this Quench episode that aired last night titled “Summer Down Under”. Andrea Robinson, MS chats with our resident Aussie Gavin Speight and Wine Australia's Mark Davidson to discuss these Aussie wines: Brokenwood Hunter Valley ILR Semillon, Leeuwin Estate Art Series Chardonnay, d’Arenberg Dead Arm Shiraz and Chambers Rutherglen Muscat.

ENJOY!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pU8Y55aaIOw

01/08/2025

Listen to Andrea Robinson, MS chat with Gavin Speight about Aussie wines. Tonight at 5:30pm PT! 👏🍷🇦🇺

Feeling thirsty? Or freezing in the winter weather? Quench is back, and I've got you covered! We're traveling to Australia 🦘 tonight, where it's sunny and warm, and the harvest season has begun!

We'll get a look at some of the first grapes to come in, destined for sparkling wine, before we dive into Australia's signature wine styles - bottle-aged Semillon, a globally award-winning Chardonnay with a California (yep!) connection, old vine Shiraz, and a swoon-worthy dessert wine style you can't find anywhere else. It's like a Fig Newton in a glass (but fat-free, haha!).

Wines are listed on my website, if you want to taste along. I'll be pairing aged gouda cheese 🧀 and truffle popcorn 🍿 with my Chardonnay selection and well, everything else (popcorn goes with everything).

Streaming live tonight on YouTube or Facebook starting at 5:30pm PST or 8:30pm EST - links in comments. See you soon!

01/06/2025

Glad the secret is getting out! Thanks to wine educator Jennipher Walters, for suggesting Champagne COLLET as her go-to budget-friendly Champagne. 🙏 🍾 🥂

Champagne is synonymous with ringing in the new year but it ain't cheap. We asked the expert about the best budget-friendly bottles of sparkling wine to uncork at midnight.

12/30/2024

Countdown to New Year’s Eve. Do you have your Champagne? 🥂

12/20/2024

Looking for a great Napa Cab that doesn’t break the bank? 🍷💵

Robert Craig Affinity fits the bill, but don’t take our word for it. This wine is one of “6 bottles with excellent value” included in today’s roundup of wines recommended by Esther Mobley of the San Francisco Chronicle.👏

Robert Craig Winery “Affinity” Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 2021 ($76, 14.8%)
This wine, whose fruit comes from a blend of vineyards, is the most affordable Cabernet from Robert Craig Winery, a venerable estate on Howell Mountain. It’s a gratifying wine, tasting like blackberries and baking spices, with a smooth, lush mouthfeel.

Congratulations to Elton, Jason & the RCW crew for this honor. 👏👏We are proud to represent Robert Craig Wines across the USA.

12/18/2024

James Suckling’s Top 100 Wines of Australia for 2024 highlights the steady evolution of the country’s top offerings, which continue to impress with their elegance, balance and regional character. Like #27, Yeringberg’s red from the Yarra Valley.

The 2022 vintage garnered 97 points from new reviewer Ryan Montgomery. “Deeply brooding and refined aromas of blackcurrants, graphite, bay leaves, licorice and dried herbs. The palate is full-bodied with seamless tannins, giving notes of blackberries, blueberry bush, mocha, violets and cedar. A very polished and pure Bordeaux-inspired blend of cabernet sauvignon, merlot, petit verdot, malbec and cabernet franc. Excellent. Drink or hold. Screw cap.”

(Photo is of a previous vintage, 2017, which received 94 points.) OBC is proud to be the exclusive US importer of Yeringberg. Congratulations to the entire team at Yeringberg for this recognition. 👏

12/16/2024

Another Year End Round Up that we love. 🥰 Of the 15 standout wines that Food & Wine’s Executive Wine Director Ray Isle tried in 2024, Greywacke Wild Sauvignon makes his list:

Of Greywacke 2021 Wild Sauvignon, Ray says: “I wasn’t surprised to find that New Zealander Kevin Judd’s top bottling was my overall fave — he’s a brilliant winemaker and has been at the top of the Sauvignon game for years. As I noted in the column, “greywacke” refers to the type of bedrock in the vineyards that he farms, and “wild” refers to Judd’s use of native (rather than cultivated) yeasts for fermentation. It’s a gorgeous, deeply distinctive white — flinty and smoky, with lots of creamy citrus fruit and a supple, rounded texture. And I’ll repeat: If you think all New Zealand Sauvignons taste the same, this will immediately change your mind.“

Kudos to the entire Greywacke team. 👏🌟

12/13/2024

James Suckling’s Top 100 Wines of Australia for 2024 highlights the steady evolution of the country’s top offerings, which continue to impress with their elegance, balance and regional character. Six of the 100 come from the OBC family, representing the diverse regions of Margaret River, Heathcote, Hunter Valley and Barossa.

#13 Jasper Hill Georgias Paddock Shiraz 2022
#33 Cullen Diana Madeline 2022
#37 Cullen Kevin John Chardonnay 2023
#39 Leeuwin Estate Chardonnay Margaret River Art Series 2021
#45 Brokenwood Graveyard Shiraz 2023
#84 John Duval Annexus Grenache 2023

Congratulations to these wineries for the well-deserved recognition.
https://www.jamessuckling.com/wine-tasting-reports/top-100-wines-of-australia-2024?mc_cid=496e311041&mc_eid=e798c14fc2

12/13/2024

Champagne to Celebrate... 🍾 - https://mailchi.mp/obcwines/champagne

12/12/2024

Do you have a bottle of Maison l'Envoyé Straight Shooter Pinot Noir on hand? Thanks for including it, Ray Isle!

Choosing a bottle of wine to bring as a host gift is always a daunting task. These 15 bottles range from affordable to super spendy and are sure impress even the snobbiest of wine snob hosts.

12/04/2024

Happy ! Penley’s Francis Cabernet Franc is floral, fragrant, crunchy, and bright. Powdery fine-grained tannins and a core of squishy red fruits and spice.

From the 2022 vintage, artist Beci Orpin has reinterpreted the previous illustrations (Francis has always portrayed a woman and birds) to be screen printed on light-weight bottles.

11/27/2024

Climb the unique stairs of The d'Arenberg Cube and experience the art of wine from a whole new perspective.

11/27/2024

Which wines will you be enjoying tomorrow? 🦃🍷Here’s one suggestion: Wine Spectator shares 10 Terrific Global Wines for Thanksgiving at 90+ points this week. Among them: 2022 Maison l’Envoyé Fleurie Gamay Noir. As the only French wine included in this list, it certainly represents France and Cru Beaujolais well.

MAISON L’ENVOYÉ Fleurie Château Vivier 2022, 90 points
“A sappy well of blackberry coulis and red plum flavors offer a lot of juicy pleasure in this ripe yet balanced version. Shows smoked apple wood notes and a meaty, sanguine edge, with wild herbs and red licorice on the medium-weight, very balanced finish. Shows a lot of appeal. Drink now through 2029.”

Happy thanksgiving! 🍁🦃🍽️

11/27/2024

Why wait? Black Friday is here!🍷 - https://mailchi.mp/obcwines/blackfriday-16531323

11/25/2024

Thank you to for including 2022 Maison l’Envoyé Straight Shooter Pinot Noir among these suggestions for 8 Great host-gift wines.
As Ray rightly points out: “It’s inevitable during the holiday season – you get invited to a party and you need to bring wine. But which one?”

“This modestly priced Oregon Pinot doesn’t rely on any tricks for its silky, red cherries-and-spice appeal – just impressive Willamette Valley fruit, fermented and aged in older barrels to let is pure Pinot character shine.

👏🍷

11/22/2024

The wet weather in Northern California ⛈️ makes this cozy fireside scene very alluring. 🍷🏡 Chateau Séraphine is made to offer great complexity, depth and long aging potential that also shows ‘a sense of place,’ and that place is Pomerol. 🇫🇷

Made by Charlotte Krajewski, it is 100% Merlot from the small 5-acre estate. Dark red, almost black in color showing great elegance and finesse with aromas of fresh blackberries overlaid with subtle notes of wild strawberries, cherries and cassis with just a touch of white pepper spice. The velvety soft palate displays rich and silky tannins that are well supported by a further impressive register of red and black fruits running through the core while delicate hints of chocolate and mocha notes intermingle well to present a long, pleasant and persistent finish.

11/19/2024

Yeringberg, located in Victoria’s cool-climate Yarra Valley, has been home to the de Pury family since 1863. Baron Frederic-Guillaume de Pury migrated from Switzerland in 1850 and purchased 1100 acres of prime Yarra Valley land.

The original gravity-fed wooden winery and underground cellars are still intact and are classified by the National Trust of Australia. The decline of the world market for Australian table wines after World War One led to the demise of the Yarra Valley wine industry and in 1921 Yeringberg was the last established Yarra Valley vineyard to pull out their vines. The vines were replaced with cattle, the property remained intact, and Yeringberg continues to graze sheep and cattle to this day.

The Baron’s grandson, Guill de Pury, resurrected the family’s estate vineyard in 1969 - right at the very beginning of the Yarra Valley renaissance - on the very same slopes chosen by his grandfather more than a century earlier. The de Pury family tradition of excellence in winemaking continues today guided by fourth-generation winemaker Sandra de Pury who makes elegant single vineyard wines from their nine-acre estate vineyard.

OBC is proud to be the exclusive US importer of Yeringberg wines.

11/16/2024

And the hits keep coming! 👏👏
26 on Vinous Top 100 Wines of 2024 list: 🌟Greywacke 2021 Greywacke Wild Sauvignon🌟

“I would be remiss not to include the 2021 Wild Sauvignon in my list of wines of the year. While the 2022 has since been released, you can still get your hands on the 2021 – and you should. It’s the best yet from Kevin Judd’s Greywacke. This is not a fruit party in your glass but a textured, firm and complex white. It’s a wine that has all the right bits in all the right places then follows it up with length and persistence.”

The 2021 Wild Sauvignon screams class. It was a small vintage; poor flowering lead to small crops, and a subsequent dry summer guaranteed intense concentration. It is firm and intense, almost punching you between the eyes with its drive created through a combination of acid and phenolics, which provide structure and ensure this is one that will age gracefully. Aromatically, however, it’s restrained and layered, offering everything from blackcurrant and nectarine to fennel. In summary, it’s a wine that has all the right bits in all the right places and follows it up with length and persistence.
97 points – Rebecca Gibb MW, Vinous, April 2024

Congratulations to the entire Greywacke team on this accolade. Old Bridge Cellars is proud to be the exclusive US importer of Greywacke wines. 👏👏