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Elevage Selections We love natural wine! We treat wine like any other agricultural product that comes from the earth. Its important to us that wines have something to say! Enjoy!
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We hold it to the same high standards that we hold our food - like organic farming and minimal preservatives. To us grape growing should be good for our health and be environmentally sustainable. It’s important to us that winegrowers are conscious of these ideals when farming their grapes and making their wines. Basically, we like wines made with the least possible use of chemicals, additives and

technological intervention. There are over 200 different synthetic chemical additives permitted in winemaking today that won’t show up on a wine label. These additives along with many modern winemaking techniques can change the way wine tastes. We think manipulation in the winery can erase individuality and Terroir. Industrialized wine making processes can yield wines that taste exactly the same regardless of the grape variety or region they come from. Some of these wines can taste the same every vintage with no mention that perhaps one year’s weather was different from the last. We believe that wine should taste different every year and that it should reflect the vineyard from which the grapes were picked. We always ask ourselves what the wine has to say about the place its from, the grapes its made up of and the people who created it. We like to work with small wineries that are run by the people that work there, not a board of directors. We like to get to know the people that work there and understand why they make the wines they do. We like wines that are farmed organically (with or without certification), have low sulphites and are fermented with indigenous yeast (aka natural or wild yeast). Grapes should be handpicked and usually the wines we work with are completely unfined and unfiltered, have seen no new oak and have had no colour, sugar, acid or tannin adjustments or additives of any kind. We love drinking wine and we are romantic about the world of wine but we are not dogmatic or rule bound. We like to work with winemakers who share the spirit of these ideas, who care about the earth and have a desire to make the best wine they can in the most natural way possible.

A photo of the *now sold out* Cuvée Moïse from Arnaud Lambert in Saumur. A sweet, botrytis affected Chenin Blanc harvest...
03/06/2024

A photo of the *now sold out* Cuvée Moïse from Arnaud Lambert in Saumur. A sweet, botrytis affected Chenin Blanc harvested in 2001 but not released until 2021. Hard to put into words wines this deep and complex. This is a thoughtful wine that also wants to be drunk, and with food too. We paired this wine with .billyboi dessert for the collaboration dessert .wpg this weekend. It was awesome!!! As with the other wines from Arnaud and his family, only available in winnipeg

Storm watch with this absolute stunner - blend of white and red grapes from the 0/0 genius that is Diego Losada  . Godel...
16/08/2022

Storm watch with this absolute stunner - blend of white and red grapes from the 0/0 genius that is Diego Losada . Godello, Palomino, Mencia - all the good stuff you want from Bierzo (Spain). This is really good. Drink it while there is still some in stock

We have a number of new arrivals from Andreas Tscheppe. Only  There is so much to say about these wines, and there are s...
06/04/2022

We have a number of new arrivals from Andreas Tscheppe. Only

There is so much to say about these wines, and there are some nice details on our website, but know this: these are some of the finest, most mineral, chiselled and energetic white wines we know of. Full stop.

Drink them now or drink them in a decade. They are precious, but also highly drinkable and digestible. These are wines for every moment of every day and we love them.

We wait all year for these and don’t get much of them, so if you would like some now is the time.

It’s no surprise that Matt Sherlock of  and  is smiling in this photo. He knows how good the wines are that are going in...
14/03/2022

It’s no surprise that Matt Sherlock of and is smiling in this photo. He knows how good the wines are that are going into bottle this week. Expect new wines from both wineries soon.

The last photo is of Nichol’s Ownrooted (!!) Old Vine Syrah vineyard. The oldest Syrah vines in the country planted on granite. Always a fantastic wine, and this year especially so.

As they do every year Jay and Wendy from  are making delicious bubbles from vineyards farmed with great respect and atte...
12/03/2022

As they do every year Jay and Wendy from are making delicious bubbles from vineyards farmed with great respect and attention to detail. Here is Jay walking us through one of his gamay vineyards where he is now training the vines higher so that the chickens who roam it don’t eat all their grapes.

Sometimes you don’t have to drink French wine to drink the best wine
19/11/2021

Sometimes you don’t have to drink French wine to drink the best wine

Lets talk about  "Les Rois du Pét-Nat" - the Kings of Pet-Nat,  Pascal Potaire and Moses Gadouche of Les Capriades.Their...
29/10/2021

Lets talk about "Les Rois du Pét-Nat" - the Kings of Pet-Nat, Pascal Potaire and Moses Gadouche of Les Capriades.

Their goal is to bring the elegance of great Champagne to wines that are fermented naturally, without the addition of lab yeast and other chemicals (and at better prices). They do it. They have been doing it for years. These are some of the most impressive naturally sparkling wines you can find anywhere …. And you can find them in Winnipeg.

Pascal and Moses work out of a small winery within the Touraine Appellation of the Loire Valley just outside the city of Tours. Almost their entire production is dedicated to Pet Nat wines, which in this case means that these sparkling wines are produced using only one natural fermentation. The wines are bottled mid ferment to produce natural bubbles in the bottle, then disgorged after some time (up to 36 months for some of their wines). They refer to this technique as “Methode Ancestrale” but we also called it Pet Nat, short for Petillant Natural, meaning naturally sparkling.

With only 3 hectares of their own vines, they also buy organic fruit from likeminded growers nearby. Some of the vines that they work are almost 90 years old. All of the fruit for their wines is farmed organically and they farm their own vineyards under biodynamic principles.

These are delicious wines, characterised by racy acidity reminiscent of Champagne and explosive aromatics. They come in varying degrees of dryness although most of the wines have a pleasant touch of natural residual sugar. Alcohols are low, typically around 10-11% and wines are dominated by bright, fresh floral and fruit aromas. The wines come with a strong mineral backbone and lovely freshness. There are no additives. No sugar, yeast, sulfites or otherwise and yet these are very stable sparkling wines, keeping their bubbles for days after being opened.

We love these wines and drink them all the time, you should too.

Find them

The incredible wines of Arnaud Lambert are here and already disappearing quickly! Arnaud’s driving ambition is to truly ...
29/09/2021

The incredible wines of Arnaud Lambert are here and already disappearing quickly!

Arnaud’s driving ambition is to truly understand and reveal the distinctions within his extraordinary corner of the Loire Valley. He farms only 2 grapes: Chenin Blanc and Cabernet Franc. Organic since 2009, Biodynamic since 2018, Arnaud is making some of the most detailed and complex versions of these grapes that we have encountered.

Though the hills Arnaud farms are slowly becoming well known today, Brézé and Saint-Cyr have been famous for their wines for over 500 years. In the past the wines of Brézé were regularly exchanged, barrel for barrel, with Chateau d’Yquem. Though each unique, the hills share some important properties; high elevation with a diverse geological profile and a significant presence of tuffeau, (the Loire’s famous chalky limestone used in the construction of Renaissance architecture). Clay and sand are also found, giving body to the reds and richness to the whites. The wines are finely mineral and detailed with bright acidity and structure which gives them years of life ahead of them.

Arnaud harvests by hand, his pressing and extractions are very gentle and wines spend their whole lives on their fine lees. Fermentations are with natural yeast. During the aging process many different vessels are used and Arnaud approaches Chenin Blanc and Cabernet Franc how a Burgundian winemaker would. His Burgundian inspiration is clear in the style of the wines too, which tend towards delicate fruit, elegance and acidity rather than richness and power, though the whites have this too. There are no sulphites used during vinification, only a small dose at bottling. There are a number of wines available, only

2019 Saumur Blanc Saint-Cyr en Bourg
2019 Saumur Blanc Les Perrières
2019 Saumur Blanc Clos de Midi
2019 Saumur Champigny Rouge Yves Lambert
2018 Saumur Rouge Clos Tue-Loup

Domaine Dandelion IS HERE. Only  in tiny quantities. Dandelion is a small Burgundian Domaine in the upper reaches of the...
21/09/2021

Domaine Dandelion IS HERE. Only in tiny quantities.

Dandelion is a small Burgundian Domaine in the upper reaches of the Hautes Côtes de Beaune. Though just a stone's throw from famous villages like Pommard and Meursault, the village Dandelion calls home, Mavilly-Mandelot, is practically unkown.

Morgane Seuillot (from Burgundy) and her partner Christian Knott (from Australia) farm 6 different parcels over 4 hectares near their cellar and home. Each vineyard is small and farmed uniquely to the others - though they are all organic with some Biodynamic principles employed and a heavily reliance on compost. There are no tractors in the vines - everything is horse plowed. Morgane does almost all the work herself, by hand or with her father and their 2 horses Safran and Reine. Though Christian, who's day job as head winemaker at Chandon de Brialles (biodynamic) is heavily involved as well. The Dandelion vines are old and low yielding and require delicate care and attention. The farming is beyond just organic though. Copper and sulfur treatments are virtually abandoned, with milk from an organic dairy farm sprayed instead of sulfur. Indeed, spend time with Christian and Morgane you will learn more about true organic agriculture than anywhere else….

They primarily farm Pinot Noir, but they have some Gamay and Aligote in miniscule quantities as well.

In the cellar nothing is added (no sulfites), ferments are with native yeast in concrete. The reds are in whole bunches. Wines are aged in old, neutral Burgundy barrels and are racked once before bottling, not with a pump, but by hand.

Even the labels for the bottles are made by hand from an old-fashioned paper mill in the Auvergne, applied of course, by hand.

The wines are beautiful. Dark and rich, reminiscent of wines from much more famous and expensive vineyards in Burgundy, but there is a brightness and lightness to them as well. They are complex, long, ethereal and utterly drinkable. With many Burgundy wines becoming more and more commercial, overpriced and lifeless each year, Domaine Dandelion stands out as not just one of the best Domaines in Burgundy, but in all of France.

Great things happening here! SOCC is a great Organization, doing important work in their volunteer run community orchard...
30/08/2021

Great things happening here! SOCC is a great Organization, doing important work in their volunteer run community orchard. We got the wine alongside our friends but there other great businesses sponsoring this as well. The food is going to be great!

Drank some very special wines last night. These 2 bottles were so good, so expressive and so deep that they reminded us ...
18/08/2021

Drank some very special wines last night. These 2 bottles were so good, so expressive and so deep that they reminded us why wine can be such an incredible thing.

These wines are special not because of their naturalness or So2 content (there’s none), or because of their rarity or price or their off the beaten track regions they are from. They are so because of the people behind them, because of the distinct combination of the winemakers hand and the land they farm.

Ewald and Jean Yves both have a very distinctive touch in the cellar, and both produce singular wines, with a rare energy. They both also produce wines from insane Terroir… their wines can be weightless, yet concentrated and structured, long and complex. Both of these bottles had VA, on that limit of what is comfortable, but the line they walk is so fine that the wines are just bursting from the glass.

Experiences like this are not so common - so if you find these wines, it might be a good idea to pop the corks 😀

SEEING FRIENDS IN REAL LIFE NOT ON ZOOM 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
14/06/2021

SEEING FRIENDS IN REAL LIFE NOT ON ZOOM 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

Hot out? Need your thirst quenched? Love white wine? Great, same.We have worked with Filippi for some time now, first vi...
04/06/2021

Hot out? Need your thirst quenched? Love white wine? Great, same.

We have worked with Filippi for some time now, first visiting Soave, Italy in 2018. Soave is not a region we associate with interesting, quality wines, rather commercial styles meant for the masses, but Filippi is different. The family has been farming the region since the 1300s, with wine a major focus for over 100 years. The rolling hills their vineyards lie on reach up to 400 meters above sea level, where some of the oldest vines of Garganega and Trebbiano di Soave can be found. These are wines of incredible concentration and depth, dripping with Terroir.

Certified organic, with biodynamic practices used since 2007, their land is subdivided into three different Soave crus:  Castelcerino, Monteseroni and Vigne della Brà. Each single vineyard is characterized by very different soils which results in different mineral expressions in the finished wines. Castelcerino has terrain of volcanic origin and is rich in basaltic rocks, Monteseroni has limestone soils, and Vigne della Brà has a mix of basaltic rocks and limestone. Each individual cru is surrounded by dense woodland, which includes the oak and chestnut trees the vineyard posts are made of.

Grapes are hand harvested, fermented with indigenous yeasts and aged for varying amounts of time, sometimes many years, on the lees before bottling. The winery works by gravity flow and the wines are made with a gentle touch and very low sulphites.

Castelcerino $28
100% Garganega planted on Basaltic soil. 6 months on lees. Hand harvested, fermented naturally in stainless steel. Fresh, salty and thirst quenching.
 
Vigna Della bra $37
100% Garganega planted on Basaltic, Volcanic soils and limestone. Richer than Castelcerino, with a long life of aging ahead of it.
  
Susinaro MAGNUM $63
100% Chardonnay planted on Basaltic soil. Hand harvested, fermented naturally in stainless steel. Is this the best value magnum out there? Maybe.
  
2012 Castelcerino 56 Mesi Sui Lieviti "Foglio 1" $50
100% Garganega planted on Basaltic soil. 56 months on lees brings richness, complexity and depth. An incredible wine.

Available at the shops tagged. Enjoy!

Our final introduction to natural Chile is here: Rogue Wines. Rogue is a collaboration between Leo Erazo (of A Los Vinet...
27/05/2021

Our final introduction to natural Chile is here: Rogue Wines. Rogue is a collaboration between Leo Erazo (of A Los Vineteros Bravos, see that post too!) and Justin Decker. In 2014 their friendship transformed into a winery, making their first few wines in a garage.

Rogue doesn’t own vineyards, but relies on 3 different growers, all of whom they have very close relationships with. 100% organic, the fruit come from the same plots every year. These vineyards are worked entirely by hand or by horse – no tractors to compact the soil. The bush vines vines are planted on hillsides, always dry-farmed and are a minimum of 60 years old, some up to 170. The soils are mostly granite, clay and quartz.

All of the fruit is handpicked. Wines are naturally fermented and aged in cement or in oak, often using concrete globes for improved fermentation kinetics. The reds are rich and dense, with lithe fruit and elegant floral notes but they are also fresh, with great backbone and texture, perfect for whatever you want to throw on the BBQ.

Unique for Chile, Rogue also makes Malbec, and an incredible one at that. Details below. Today there are 2 red wines, but a white and orange are on the way too!

Grand Itata Tinto $24.50
95% Cinsault, 5% Pais from a single vineyard. Destemmed, fermented on skins for 2 weeks in cement then aged for 1 year. Medium weight with that perfect combination of fruit and savoury notes. Fresh but firm.

Macho Anciano Malbec $42
Made only in the best vintages, this Malbec comes from a single vineyard of 80+ year old vines on exposed granite bedrock. 90 % destemmed. Fermented in Cement, 2 weeks on skins, aged in very old used oak barrels. 2 years of aging. This is a serious, age worthy Malbec to be enjoyed at the table. Complex, deep and long with heady aromatics and elegant fruit.

The wines are available now, only

More good news from Chile! Leo Erazo’s A Los Viñeteros Bravos wines are here! 15 years of studying and working in soil s...
20/05/2021

More good news from Chile! Leo Erazo’s A Los Viñeteros Bravos wines are here! 15 years of studying and working in soil science, and numerous vintages all over the world brought Leo back to Itata, a region in southern Chile with a winemaking history dating to the 1500s. With its granite soils, bush vines, and small vineyards, Itata is a place lost in the beautiful past with very few large scale wineries.

The Bravos winery is totally off grid, gravity fed and as of this week 100% solar powered. They use only rainwater in the cellar. For Leo, making wine from organic fruit is not enough (They have always been organic), the project has to have 0 inputs of CO2 into the atmosphere as well. All of the vineyard work is done by hand or horse, there are no tractors to compact the soil. And the wines? 100% delicious. Light, juicy reds and mineral, textured whites often with weeks of skin contact. Leo is a strong voice for Pais, an indigenous Chilean red grape variety also called Mission. Pais isn’t known as a serious terroir expresser, but in the hands Leo, it is.

The wines are organized as they do in Burgundy. The 1 Litre Pipeños, are for everyday drinking ($26), the soil series are organized by soils type and more serious ($26) and La Resistencia ($41) is a complex and vibrant single vineyard Pais from 170 year old vines.

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Those on our mailing list just received more information in their inboxes. Want to learn more? Sign up on our website. Wines can be purchased at the shops tagged above. Enjoy!

We are thrilled to present the No Es Pituko wines from Echeverria in Chile. Chilean natural wines are few and far betwee...
13/05/2021

We are thrilled to present the No Es Pituko wines from Echeverria in Chile. Chilean natural wines are few and far between, but there is a rich culture of sustainable agriculture and environmentalism amongst Chile’s smaller growers.

Originally from Basque Spain, the Echeverria family has been farming in Chile’s Central Valley since 1750. In the mid 2000s the family became interested in natural wines, which they saw as a natural evolution of their sustainability philosophy. It was a barrel tasting which inspired them to produce their own natural wines though. While tasting the raw, unfiltered wines from barrel, one of their customers asked them to bottle the wines as they were – with nothing added and no filtration. This is how the No Es Pituko wines were born. Translating to “It aint fancy”. These are lively, bright and utterly drinkable wines for every day drinking.

There are 4 wines, all of which benefit from being chilled:

🟡 Chardonnay
🟡 Viognier
🔴 Cab Franc
🔴 Cab Sauv

Find them for $21

The wines are certified vegan.

Those on our mailing list just received more information in their inboxes. Want to learn more? Sign up on our website. Wines can be purchased at the shops tagged above. Enjoy!

Fabrizio Vella!These Sicilian beauties are sure to help welcome the sunshine back. Fabrizio Vella Biano: 100% Catarratto...
09/04/2021

Fabrizio Vella!

These Sicilian beauties are sure to help welcome the sunshine back.

Fabrizio Vella Biano: 100% Catarratto. Dry, fresh, salty and vibrant with delicate orchard fruit and bursting aromatics. Fruit is hand harvested then gently pressed into stainless steel for natural fermentation. Bottled unfined and unfiltered.

Fabrizio Vella Rosso: 100% Nero d’Avola. Dry, medium weight with lovely bright fruit aromas. Smooth and soft with a bit of spice and great freshness. Great for the table or the park, delicious with a light chill! Grapes are harvested by hand, then crushed into stainless steel for natural fermentation on skins for 8-10 days. The wine is then pressed off into giant, old wooded casks and stainless steel tanks. Bottled unfined and unfiltered.

Sourced from vineyards throughout Marsala and the small island of Patelleria, the vines have been cultivated organically, with biodiversity in mind for many years. Vines are planted alongside olives, almonds, wheat fields and berries, resting on sandy soils and rolling hills. These are some of the best value natural wines anywhere, both under $18! - available at all the shops tagged.

Here are some lovely wines for you on this dreary dayTragolago Blanco: This orange wine is explosively aromatic and frui...
30/03/2021

Here are some lovely wines for you on this dreary day

Tragolago Blanco: This orange wine is explosively aromatic and fruity. Made from Moscatel and Malvasia grapes from very sandy, saline soils. Grapes are naturally fermented on their skins for 30 days and aged in amphora.

Tragolago Tinto: This is a rich, full bodied red with great freshness. Made from Monastrell (AKA Mourvedre) that gets a short cold soak. Next, half is left whole cluster for carbonic maceration and the rest is destemmed and traditionally macerated before aging. Total skin contact for 10 days.

Marta and Andres at Vinessens are making some of central Spain’s most impressive orange and red wines, without any additives like sulphites and without filtration. They farm their high altitude vineyards organically and work only with local grapes from their area of Alicante. Often they ferment in tinajas (amphoras) made from Spanish clay. Tragolargo means “Long Gulp” – the idea is wine that’s easy drinking and enjoyable, to be consumed in great quantities!

Pick some up at the shops tagged here. Enjoy!

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