Virtual Wine Tasting Featuring Alex Gambals New Santa Rita Hills Wines with Special Guest Alex Gambal

"Away with you, water, destruction of wine!"

Catullus | (84 BC – ca. 54 BC) Latin Poet

We are hosting virtual tastings every Wednesday on Zoom and Instagram live which will be posted to Instagram TV.  The virtual tasting packs are up on our web page under the gift box selections, and you can purchase them before the event and taste along with us or purchase them any time after the event until the wines are no longer available and taste the wines and watch the producer interview at your leisure.

Today, we have our good friend Alex Gambal and his new partner Peter Work will be with us live on a zoom call Wednesday, July 21st at 6pm EST.  We will be showing three wines from Gambal and Work and three wines from Alex’s last vintage in Burgundy for a total of six wines.  We have a package of these six wines listed on this e-mail and in the Wine Watch gift Box section at www.winewatch.com.   If you want to follow along you can purchase all six wines in one pack or any of the wines individually on our web page just type in Gambal and you will find the selections we are showcasing for the event along with all the wines available from both Gambal and Work and Alex Gambal’s Burgundy label. 

For those that would like to attend in person and be part of the studio audience on the day of the event the price is $55 + tax and there are only 10 seats available to our studio audience the day of the tasting.  There will be a few small bites served but this is not a dinner.  For reservations to be part of the studio audience please call 954-523-9463 or e-mail andy@winewatch.com.

Virutal Wine Tasting with Alex Gambal and Peter Work from Gambal Work Santa Rita Hills
Wednesday July 21st 2021
6:00pm

Virtual Tasting 6 pack for Alex Gambal and Peter Work Wines - Wine Watch
Price: $422.00

2017 Gambal Work Chardonnay Santa Rita Hills  30907
Price: $49.50   Your Price: $43.56      Quantity in Stock: 120

(93 points) A big, creamy white, offering a luscious mix of dried apricot, apple tart and glazed pear flavors that feature a backbone of glistening acidity. Oily richness shows on the broad finish. Drink now through 2024. ~K.M.  Wine Spectator - 150 cases made

2018 Gambal Work Pinot Noir Francesca Santa Rita Hills  30906
Price: $64.50   Your Price: $56.76      Quantity in Stock: 120

2018 Francesca’s nose is clean as fresh ripe raspberries jump from the glass. It is of medium weight in the mouth and reminds Alex of a 1er Cru from Beaune, such as a Clos des Mouches or a Vignes Franches. Its distinct mineral mouth feel, not heavy nor light, has the texture one finds in wines grown in the limestone of Burgundy. It will be at its best in 2-4 years.

2018 Gambal Work Pinot Noir Bentrock Vineyard Santa Rita Hills  30905
Price: $64.50   Your Price: $56.76      Quantity in Stock: 119

2018 Bentrock has the rich nose of the Cote de Nuits with the black briary fruit one finds in the wines of Morey-St. Denis and the 1er Crus on the north side of Gevrey-Chambertin such as Combe au Moine and Les Cazetiers. Its mouth feel, really the texture of the wine, is complex and sophisticated giving the wine a long finish. It will be at its best in 4-6 years.

2018 Alex Gambal Saint Aubin 1er Cru Les Murgers des Dents de Chen  24527
Price: $56.00   Your Price: $49.28

This 1er Cru “Les Murgers des Dents de Chien” is located just above the Grand Cru Chevalier Montrachet, at the edge of Puligny-Montrachet.  We have harvested all the grapes from this plot since 1999.

2018 Alex Gambal Chambolle Musigny  10485
Price: $95.00   Your Price: $83.60

Between Morey-Saint-Denis to the North and Vougeot to the South, the winegrowing area of Chambolle-Musigny stands at the end of an anticlinal valley, which has scattered its scree and colluvium for the delight of Pinot Noir. This grape variety is known here for producing the most “feminine” red wines of the Côte-de-Nuits.

This small winegrowing area counts 2 Grands Crus and 24 Premiers Crus.

This Chambolle-Musigny wine is made with grapes organically grown in a plot located in the climat named “Les Cras”.

2018 Alex Gambal Chambolle Musigny 1er Cru Aux Echanges  13721
Price: $150.00 Your Price: $132.00

Aux Echanges is one of the lower vineyards in the band of Premier Cru climats that runs north to south across the Chambolle-Musigny appellation, following the lower section of the Côte d'Or escarpment and, here in Chambolle, across the ancient alluvial fan created by the wash that ran through the Combe Ambin valley and out into the Saône valley.

For those that would like to attend in person and be part of the studio audience on the day of the event the price is $55 + tax and there are only 10 seats available to our studio audience the day of the tasting.  There will be a few small bites served but this is not a dinner.  For reservations to be part of the studio audience please call 954-523-9463 or e-mail andy@winewatch.com.

Wine Watch invites you to participate live on ZOOM at 6pm EST on the 21st of July, simply click the link below at 6pm and you will be admitted to the party.

Andrew Lampasone is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: Virtual Wine Tasting with Alex Gambal
Time: Jul 21, 2021 06:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

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Gambal and Work

GAMBAL-WORK is the creation of four men who believe that great wine is made by following a seamless line from the vineyard to the bottle. This is easy in theory but requires discipline and vigor to see and hear a myriad of small details throughout the entire process.  It is a journey that begins with the soil and vines, consummating nearly two years later with bottling.

Alex Gambal and Peter Work arrived at this, their second professions, via circuitous routes. Alex, an American, discovered Burgundy in 1993 and since has developed an estate of thirty acres from Chassagne-Montrachet to Gevrey-Chambertin. Peter, a Dane, found Santa Barbara in 2001 and since has carefully cultivated an estate of nineteen acres in the Sta. Rita Hills.

Both Alex and Peter are passionate about Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, the two historic varieties of Burgundy and the Santa Rita Hills. They also share a dedication to bio-dynamical cultivation.

A bit about Alex Gambal

Burgundy today is a paradox, one of the planets greatest terroirs for growing pinot noir and chardonnay and yet so many of the wines from this region remain average, overpriced examples of these two varietals.  I visited this region in March of 2008 for the Grand Jours de Bourgogne, a tasting that encompasses the entire region of Burgundy, with each village hosting a tasting highlighting their appellations wines with almost all of the major properties showing their wines.  The Corton tasting included a whopping 150 wines with equally as many vintners.  This tasting is one event that sums up the opening statement of this offering.  This is by far the largest grand cru in Burgundy and of the 150 different wines that have Grand Cru status only about 1/3 of the wines were grand- leaving the latter 2/3 of the wines shown at this event just grandly overpriced. 

Much of the dilemma that plagues Burgundy and causes the mass amount of mediocrity is that many of the new generation of producers are not enthusiastic about making wine.  They also have come to the realization they can sell everything they produce without working very hard.  This is not to say that there is a lack of passionate producers that worked hard to be the best regardless of profit, but that for the quality of the vineyards here there seems to be an alarming amount of average wines.  One of the things that add to the confusion here is that there are more small subdivided vineyard plots here probably than anywhere else in France or the world for that matter.  If you look at the most famous wine region of France and compare Burgundy to it you will find a few interesting facts.  Each time Burgundy produces one bottle of red wine, Bordeaux produces nine. For white wines, the ratio is one for two. Furthermore, Grand Crus in Burgundy only represent 3% of the total production!  In a year, the prestigious Château d'Yquem may produce around 8.000 cases whereas the Marquis de Laguiche (the largest owner of the prized Le Montrachet vineyard) will only produce 700 cases of Le Montrachet. 

Alex Gambal, one of the newcomers to this area has made one of the biggest impacts on the quality and the marketability of this region.  Alex has brought the American work ethic and his enthusiastic approach to marketing his wines and during the Grand Jours de Bourgogne he did what very few vintners do for the influx of Burgundy fans, he opened up his cuverie to his patrons so they could taste his newest releases in a relaxed and comfortable environment.  Most other producers only show their wines at the big tastings hosted by each appellation.

Born in Washington D.C., Alex Gambal discovered Burgundy in 1993, along with a passion for its wine.  He had caught the wine bug so bad that he decided to move the entire family to Burgundy to work with one of the leading U.S. importers of Burgundy Becky Wasserman.  It was not long before he was enrolled in the famous wine school in Beaune studying about winemaking and viticulture.  Only a few short years later he left Wasserman and created a négociant-éleveur business in 1997.

During the first year, Alex began by purchasing 1996 vintage finished wines and by 1998 had already established relationships with local growers.  Alex began to vinify the wine, beginning with grapes and must. In 2005, Maison Alex Gambal vinified 95% of the wines that will be bottled and they now own vineyards in the Bourgogne appellation that account for about 50% of the production of their two entry level wines; the Bourgogne Rouge and the Bourgogne Blanc.  In 2011 Alex make international wine news as he became the first American ever to buy Grand Cru vineyards as he managed to buy a small parcel of Batard Montrachet along with a few parcels located in Puligny and Chassagne Montrachet.  He is constantly enlarging his holdings to make as many domaine wines as possible.

The philosophy of Alex Gambal is a respect for the character of each appellation and vintage.  In addition, he believes that good winemaking, although imperative, should be secondary to the quality of the grapes which result from relationships and a sharing of ideas with the growers.  Achieving this goal requires constant attention to the individual vineyards including pruning techniques, green harvesting, vine maturity, etc. (certain vineyard sites are even picked by his own small team of vendangeurs).