The hottest restaurants in the US, according to the Michelin Guide
Michelin’s star-rating system has become a standard many restaurants measure themselves against. Only a select few establishments have earned and maintained the highest rating.
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Michelin arrived on American shores in 2005, bringing its merry band of inspectors to evaluate restaurants across the land — well, not really across the land. Michelin now rates restaurants in just four U.S. cities: New York, San Francisco, Chicago, and Washington, D.C. (Los Angeles was briefly covered, but dropped in favor of Washington.)
However, despite the company’s limited scope (both in terms of geographic coverage and its disregard of restaurants that aren’t rooted in European or Japanese culinary traditions), the guide still holds significant authority in the food world. Michelin’s star-rating system has become a standard many restaurants measure themselves against. Only a select few establishments have earned and maintained the highest rating of three stars. And just because they’ve reached those heights doesn’t mean they don’t have to maintain them. After all, Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s eponymous restaurant was downgraded from three to two this year.
Now that all the Michelin guides for America have been released, the country now boasts 14 restaurants that the old French tyre company regards as having “exceptional cuisine, worth a special journey”. From Alinea to Saison, here are those 14 restaurants.
## Alinea, Chicago
Ever since Michelin first came to the Windy City for its 2011 edition, chef Grant Achatz’s temple of molecular gastronomy has held three stars. Drawing on flavours from around the world — one course may be a chicken thigh with Mexican spices, while another may be a rare Japanese fish — Alinea’s modernist cuisine is strongly influenced by the time Achatz spent at Ferran Adrià’s El Bulli. The restaurant is a showcase of advanced technique where your food is likely to be dehydrated or subjected to liquid nitrogen; you may even be fed an edible balloon.
## Benu, San Francisco
Among his peers, chef Corey Lee is highly revered. Praised for his technical ability and refinement of dishes, Lee’s Benu earned its third star in the 2015 guide. Lee has merged flavours from Korea, China, and Japan with techniques he honed as the French Laundry’s chef de cuisine for 4 years. The result is a lauded tasting menu that will feature dishes like oyster with pork belly and kimchi, or smoked quail with lilies and fermented pepper.
## Chef’s Table at Brooklyn Fare, New York City
The name is a bit of a misnomer — as chef César Ramirez has moved his fine-dining restaurant from Downtown Brooklyn to Hell’s Kitchen in Manhattan — but the format has endured. Diners sit arrayed around a counter with the chefs in full view, preparing them a multicourse tasting menu of French-Japanese fusion cuisine. When Brooklyn Fare earned its third star, a Michelin inspector told the New York Times, “I don’t believe there is anything quite like it in the world, though you might see the closest parallels in Tokyo or Kyoto. If you took the cuisine out of the setting, it would compare favorably with other three stars.”
## Coi, San Francisco
In 2017, only one restaurant was elevated to three stars in all of America, and that was Coi. Originally opened by chef Daniel Patterson, he stepped down from his seafood-driven, fine-dining restaurant at the end of 2015 and handed the reins to Matthew Kirkley. “Our inspectors have been following chef Kirkley since his days at L20 in Chicago, and we were thrilled to see that he is at the summit of his art,” said Michael Ellis, international director of the Michelin Guide. “We were truly impressed by his artistry and his team’s ability to produce sublime dishes based on local ingredients like abalone, oysters, and seafood.”
## Eleven Madison Park, New York
The dynamic duo of chefs Daniel Humm and Will Guidara bought Eleven Madison Park from hall-of-fame restaurateur Danny Meyer in 2010 and have been remaking this bustling brasserie in their image ever since. Now much more of a serene presence, the restaurant serves a beautifully crafted menu that honors Humm’s quest for elegance and simplicity while remaining rooted in his French training. The restaurant graduated to three stars in 2012, and in 2017, it topped the World’s 50 Best Restaurants list.
## French Laundry, Yountville, California
Around since the early 1900s, the French Laundry was transformed by Thomas Keller into a leader of American fine dining after the chef took it over in 1994. Rooted in his love of French food and technique, the nine-course menu features dishes like cauliflower velouté with toasted marcona almonds, John Dory with creamed black-trumpet mushrooms, squab with sunchokes, and venison with caramelized Brussels sprouts. One of the greatest testaments to the French Laundry’s influence has been the sheer number of alumni who have opened acclaimed restaurants of their own — from Grant Achatz’s Alinea and Corey Lee’s Benu to Rene Redzepi’s Noma and Jordan Kahn’s Vespertine. Like his idol Paul Bocuse, Keller has created a proving ground for exceptional chefs.
## Grace, Chicago
Coming up through two of Chicago’s most legendary chefs — Charlie Trotter and Grant Achatz — Curtis Duffy opened Grace with no shortage of ambition. “I want to be the best restaurant in America,” he said in the documentary For Grace, which chronicled its opening. Duffy divides his tasting menu into two experiences: flora and fauna. The vegetarian flora offers dishes like sunchoke with burrata and fennel, or carrot with green strawberry and hazelnut. On the meat-eater side, there’s lamb with pineapple and olive or squab with maitake, cranberry, and black mint.
## Le Bernardin, New York City
When not gallivanting around the globe with his buddy Anthony Bourdain, Eric Ripert helms one of the finest seafood restaurants in America. Le Bernardin, an import from Paris, originally opened in 1986 and was a hit immediately upon arriving on our shores. Ripert took over the kitchen in 1994, continuing the approach of exceptional seafood simply prepared. The menu is divided into three preparations: “Almost Raw,” where geoduck sashimi is dressed with ginger ponzu; “Barely Touched,” where yellowfin tuna and langoustines get the lightest sear; and “Lightly Cooked,” where you may find pan-roasted monkfish with squid-ink fideos and a chorizo emulsion.
## Manresa, Los Gatos, California
It’s cliché to say a chef embraces farm-to-table, but David Kinch has been a pioneer in developing vegetable-centric, contemporary California cuisine. Utilising the bounty of Golden State produce, he’s inspired by the region, making dishes like Tidal Pool that mimics the rocky coasts of the Bay Area. It’s a rich broth that poaches a raw slice of foie gras and is accompanied by uni, butter clams, mussels, oyster, pickled kombu, toasted nori, and shitake mushrooms. His influence continues around California, with alums opening their own outstanding restaurants, like James Syhabout of two-Michelin-starred Commis in Oakland, Jeremy Fox of Rustic Canyon in Santa Monica, and Josef Centeno of PYT in Los Angeles.
## Masa, New York City
Offering one of the most expensive tasting menus in America, chef Masa Takayama serves up an omakase sushi experience at his eponymous restaurant in New York’s Time Warner Center on a corner of Central Park. The Japanese-born chef moved to Los Angeles in the late 1970s and eventually opened Ginza Sushi-ko, which helped establish the city’s love for sushi. In 2004, with encouragement from Thomas Keller, he moved to New York to create Masa. Fish from Japan is flown directly to him from Tsujiki Fish Market to ensure the highest-quality product for his customers. In the 2009 guide, Masa became the first Japanese restaurant in America to earn three stars.
## Per Se, New York City
As Thomas Keller prepared to bring his Francophile cooking to New York after his success with the French Laundry in Napa, he was asked how his new restaurant would compare to the one that had established him as an iconic American chef. He’d respond, “It’s not the French Laundry, per se.” The name stuck. Like the French Laundry, Per Se serves a nine-course menu, replete with his take on modern French.
## Quince, San Francisco
Chef Michael Tusk has combined his love of Northern Italian cuisine with his surrounds in Northern California to evolve classics like tortellini into modern American fare. Opened in 2003, Quince earned its third Michelin star in the 2017 guide. As with fellow Bay Area pillars of contemporary California cuisine, Quince is devoted to sourcing the best product. Tusk has created a partnership with Fresh Run Farm — an early adopter of organic farming — to grow heirloom fruits, vegetables, and flowers exclusively for the chef.
## The Restaurant at Meadowood, St. Helena, California
When chef Christopher Kostow led Meadowood to its third Michelin star for the 2011 guide, he became only the second restaurant outside of New York to earn the award. And, at the age of 33, he was the third-youngest chef ever to reach Michelin’s pinnacle. The restaurant, located at the Meadowood Resort in St. Helena, has become a leader in modern American cuisine, driven by the terroir and produce of the Napa Valley.
## Saison, San Francisco
Joshua Skenes grew up in Jacksonville, Florida, and considered heading to art school before deciding to attend the French Culinary Institute instead, working for Jean-Georges Vongerichten while still in school. Skenes originally opened Saison as a pop-up in San Francisco, but its popularity led to a permanent location serving a nightly 18-course menu of modern American cuisine while Phil Collins plays in the background. Skenes cooks with a naturalistic streak, involving himself in how the squabs are raised to feed diners, working with a local fisherman for Bay Area seafood, and cooking directly with fire.
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Watch of the Week: TAG Heuer Formula 1 | Kith
The legendary sports watch returns, but with an unexpected twist.
Over the last few years, watch pundits have predicted the return of the eccentric TAG Heuer Formula 1, in some shape or form. It was all but confirmed when TAG Heuer’s heritage director, Nicholas Biebuyck, teased a slew of vintage models on his Instagram account in the aftermath of last year’s Watches & Wonders 2023 in Geneva. And when speaking with Frédéric Arnault at last year’s trade fair, the former CEO asked me directly if the brand were to relaunch its legacy Formula 1 collection, loved by collectors globally, how should they go about it?
My answer to the baited entreaty definitely didn’t mention a collaboration with Ronnie Fieg of Kith, one of the world’s biggest streetwear fashion labels. Still, here we are: the TAG Heuer Formula 1 is officially back and as colourful as ever.
As the watch industry enters its hype era—in recent years, we’ve seen MoonSwatches, Scuba Fifty Fathoms, and John Mayer G-Shocks—the new Formula 1 x Kith collaboration might be the coolest yet.
Here’s the lowdown: overnight, TAG Heuer, together with Kith, took to socials to unveil a special, limited-edition collection of Formula 1 timepieces, inspired by the original collection from the 1980s. There are 10 new watches, all limited, with some designed on a stainless steel bracelet and some on an upgraded rubber strap; both options nod to the originals.
Seven are exclusive to Kith and its global stores (New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Hawaii, Tokyo, Toronto, and Paris, to be specific), and are made in an abundance of colours. Two are exclusive to TAG Heuer; and one is “shared” between TAG Heuer and Kith—this is a highlight of the collection, in our opinion. A faithful play on the original composite quartz watch from 1986, this model, limited to just 1,350 pieces globally, features the classic black bezel with red accents, a stainless steel bracelet, and that creamy eggshell dial, in all of its vintage-inspired glory. There’s no doubt that this particular model will present as pure nostalgia for those old enough to remember when the original TAG Heuer Formula 1 made its debut.
Of course, throughout the collection, Fieg’s design cues are punctuated: the “TAG” is replaced with “Kith,” forming a contentious new brand name for this specific release, as well as Kith’s slogan, “Just Us.”
Collectors and purists alike will appreciate the dedication to the original Formula 1 collection: features like the 35mm Arnite cases—sourced from the original 80s-era supplier—the form hour hand, a triangle with a dot inside at 12 o’clock, indices that alternate every quarter between shields and dots, and a contrasting minuterie, are all welcomed design specs that make this collaboration so great.
Every TAG Heuer Formula 1 | Kith timepiece will be presented in an eye-catching box that complements the fun and colour theme of Formula 1 but drives home the premium status of this collaboration. On that note, at $2,200 a piece, this isn’t exactly an approachable quartz watch but reflects the exclusive nature of Fieg’s Kith brand and the pieces he designs (largely limited-edition).
So, what do we think? It’s important not to understate the significance of the arrival of the TAG Heuer Formula 1 in 1986, in what would prove integral in setting up the brand for success throughout the 90’s—it was the very first watch collection to have “TAG Heuer” branding, after all—but also in helping to establish a new generation of watch consumer. Like Fieg, many millennial enthusiasts will recall their sentimental ties with the Formula 1, often their first timepiece in their horological journey.
This is as faithful of a reissue as we’ll get from TAG Heuer right now, and budding watch fans should be pleased with the result. To TAG Heuer’s credit, a great deal of research has gone into perfecting and replicating this iconic collection’s proportions, materials, and aesthetic for the modern-day consumer. Sure, it would have been nice to see a full lume dial, a distinguishing feature on some of the original pieces—why this wasn’t done is lost on me—and perhaps a more approachable price point, but there’s no doubt these will become an instant hit in the days to come.
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The TAG Heuer Formula 1 | Kith collection will be available on Friday, May 3rd, exclusively in-store at select TAG Heuer and Kith locations in Miami, and available starting Monday, May 6th, at select TAG Heuer boutiques, all Kith shops, and online at Kith.com. To see the full collection, visit tagheuer.com
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8 Fascinating Facts You Didn’t Know About Aston Martin
The British sports car company is most famous as the vehicle of choice for James Bond, but Aston Martin has an interesting history beyond 007.
Aston Martin will forever be associated with James Bond, ever since everyone’s favourite spy took delivery of his signature silver DB5 in the 1964 film Goldfinger. But there’s a lot more to the history of this famed British sports car brand beyond its association with the fictional British Secret Service agent.
Let’s dive into the long and colourful history of Aston Martin.
The origin of the Aston Martin name
The company that would become Aston Martin started out as a car dealership. In 1912, Englishmen Robert Bamford and Lionel Martin partnered to sell cars, but soon after they decided to build their own models. Their first prototype debuted in 1915, named in honour of Martin, a racing driver, and his favourite racing venue, Aston Hills. Thus, the name Aston Martin was born.
A speed-demon co-founder banned from driving
Aston Martin co-founder Lionel Martin wasn’t just a keen racing driver—he was an all-out speed demon. As a student, Martin won numerous gruelling bicycle racing records, including riding nearly the full width of England in one 22-hour stretch. He competed in motorcycle and sidecar races and automotive hillclimb competitions. It seems he also brought that need for speed to the public roadways: In 1909, having neglected to pay a previous speeding fine, Martin was caught driving 41.5 km/ph in London and was banned from driving for two years—during which he set yet another cross-country bicycle record.
A tractor company takes over
The years after World War I were tumultuous for Aston Martin, with financial difficulties and numerous takeovers. In 1947, Aston Martin went up for sale and was purchased by David Brown Limited, a company that specialised in farm tractors and industrial gears. Sir David Brown, grandson of the company’s founder, was a lifelong car enthusiast and racer, having built his own competition cars while working as an engineer at the family company. The first car built by Aston Martin after this takeover was called the DB1, named after the tractor company (and the man) that had saved the carmaker.
An indirect connection to Bentley
Around the same time that Sir David Brown took over Aston Martin, he purchased another struggling British carmaker, Lagonda. The company was developing a revolutionary twin-cam six-cylinder engine called the LB6, and Sir David wanted the engine for his new line of Aston Martin sports cars. The Lagonda engine had been designed by none other than W.O. Bentley—the man who co-founded Bentley Motors, who had long since been pushed out of the company bearing his name.
The history of the DB Series
Aston Martin built seven vehicles named in honour of owner Sir David Brown: The DB1, DB2, DB3, DB4, DB5, DB6, and the combo-breaker DBS all bore Sir David’s initials. In 1972, Sir David sold the car company, and the new owners ended the DB series of vehicles, but the name was revived in 1993 with the DB7 in honour of Sir David—who himself was given an honorary position at the company that same year.
Bond, James Bond
Of course, the most famous Aston Martin of them all is the DB5. Just over 1,000 examples were built between 1963 and 1965, but millions worldwide know this as the James Bond car. In the books, author Ian Fleming had specified an earlier Aston Martin DB Mark III as Bond’s car. Still, the DB5 was introduced in the 1964 Bond film Goldfinger, equipped with gadgets including machine guns, smoke screens, oil slicks, an ejector seat, and rotating license plates. Bond has driven several Aston Martin models over the years, including a V8 Vantage, a V12 Vanquish, and two DBS models, but the original DB5 will always be considered the quintessential Bond car.
The angular years
Today, the Aston Martin badge is most closely associated with swooping, evocatively curvy car designs, but in the 1970s the company was obsessed with angular, wedge-shaped designs. The trend began in 1976 with the Aston Martin Lagonda, a shockingly unconventional four-door luxury sedan with “folded-paper” body styling and the world’s first all-digital instrument panel. The Lagonda’s styling was further evolved in 1979 with the Bulldog, a radical concept car with gullwing doors and a sharply pointed nose. The Bulldog was meant to become the fastest road car on earth, but the project was abandoned before production could begin.
For Bond’s eyes only
While most of James Bond’s Aston Martins have been commercially available to anyone who could afford one, the DB10 seen in the 2015 film Spectre was exclusive to 007. As Aston Martin executive Marek Reichman explained to Variety, director Sam Mendes, producer Barbara Broccoli, and Bond star Daniel Craig were touring Aston Martin’s design studios when they saw a concept sketch on the wall. The Bond team insisted that this should be 007’s next car, and Aston Martin spent the next six months furiously working to turn the drawing into a real-world car. The DB10 was unveiled during the launch of the film Spectre, and eight of the 10 examples built were featured in the movie, with the remaining two used for promotional appearances.
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What Venice’s New Tourist Tax Means for Your Next Trip
The Italian city will now charge visitors an entry fee during peak season.
Visiting the Floating City just got a bit more expensive.
Venice is officially the first metropolis in the world to start implementing a day-trip fee in an effort to help the Italian hot spot combat overtourism during peak season, The Associated Press reported. The new program, which went into effect, requires travellers to cough up roughly €5 (about $AUD8.50) per person before they can explore the city’s canals and historic sites. Back in January, Venice also announced that starting in June, it would cap the size of tourist groups to 25 people and prohibit loudspeakers in the city centre and the islands of Murano, Burano, and Torcello.
“We need to find a new balance between the tourists and residents,’ Simone Venturini, the city’s top tourism official, told AP News. “We need to safeguard the spaces of the residents, of course, and we need to discourage the arrival of day-trippers on some particular days.”
During this trial phase, the fee only applies to the 29 days deemed the busiest—between April 25 and July 14—and tickets will remain valid from 8:30 am to 4 pm. Visitors under 14 years of age will be allowed in free of charge in addition to guests with hotel reservations. However, the latter must apply online beforehand to request an exemption. Day-trippers can also pre-pay for tickets online via the city’s official tourism site or snap them up in person at the Santa Lucia train station.
“With courage and great humility, we are introducing this system because we want to give a future to Venice and leave this heritage of humanity to future generations,” Venice Mayor Luigi Brugnaro said in a statement on X (formerly known as Twitter) regarding the city’s much-talked-about entry fee.
Despite the mayor’s backing, it’s apparent that residents weren’t totally pleased with the program. The regulation led to protests and riots outside of the train station, The Independent reported. “We are against this measure because it will do nothing to stop overtourism,” resident Cristina Romieri told the outlet. “Moreover, it is such a complex regulation with so many exceptions that it will also be difficult to enforce it.”
While Venice is the first city to carry out the new day-tripper fee, several other European locales have introduced or raised tourist taxes to fend off large crowds and boost the local economy. Most recently, Barcelona increased its city-wide tourist tax. Similarly, you’ll have to pay an extra “climate crisis resilience” tax if you plan on visiting Greece that will fund the country’s disaster recovery projects.
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Omega Reveals a New Speedmaster Ahead of the Paris 2024 Olympics
Your first look at the new Speedmaster Chronoscope, designed in the colour theme of the Paris Olympics.
The starters are on the blocks, and with less than 100 days to go until the Paris 2024 Olympics, luxury Swiss watchmaker Omega was bound to release something spectacular to mark its bragging rights as the official timekeeper for the Summer Games. Enter the new 43mm Speedmaster Chronoscope, available in new colourways—gold, black, and white—in line with the colour theme of the Olympic Games in Paris this July.
So, what do we get in this nicely-wrapped, Olympics-inspired package? Technically, there are four new podium-worthy iterations of the iconic Speedmaster.
The new versions present handsomely in stainless steel or 18K Moonshine Gold—the brand’s proprietary yellow gold known for its enduring shine. The steel version has an anodised aluminium bezel and a stainless steel bracelet or vintage-inspired perforated leather strap. The Moonshine Gold iteration boasts a ceramic bezel; it will most likely appease Speedy collectors, particularly those with an affinity for Omega’s long-standing role as stewards of the Olympic Games.
Notably, each watch bears an attractive white opaline dial; the background to three dark grey timing scales in a 1940s “snail” design. Of course, this Speedmaster Chronoscope is special in its own right. For the most part, the overall look of the Speedmaster has remained true to its 1957 origins. This Speedmaster, however, adopts Omega’s Chronoscope design from 2021, including the storied tachymeter scale, along with a telemeter, and pulsometer scale—essentially, three different measurements on the wrist.
While the technical nature of this timepiece won’t interest some, others will revel in its theatrics. Turn over each timepiece, and instead of a transparent crystal caseback, there is a stamped medallion featuring a mirror-polished Paris 2024 logo, along with “Paris 2024” and the Olympic Rings—a subtle nod to this year’s games.
Powering this Olympiad offering—and ensuring the greatest level of accuracy—is the Co-Axial Master Chronometer Calibre 9908 and 9909, certified by METAS.
A Speedmaster to commemorate the Olympic Games was as sure a bet as Mondo Deplantis winning gold in the men’s pole vault—especially after Omega revealed its Olympic-edition Seamaster Diver 300m “Paris 2024” last year—but they delivered a great addition to the legacy collection, without gimmickry.
However, the all-gold Speedmaster is 85K at the top end of the scale, which is a lot of money for a watch of this stature. By comparison, the immaculate Speedmaster Moonshine gold with a sun-brushed green PVD “step” dial is 15K cheaper, albeit without the Chronoscope complications.
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The Omega Speedmaster Chronoscope in stainless steel with a leather strap is priced at $15,725; stainless steel with steel bracelet at $16,275; 18k Moonshine Gold on leather strap $54,325; and 18k Moonshine Gold with matching gold bracelet $85,350, available at Omega boutiques now.
Discover the collection here
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Here’s What Goes Into Making Jay-Z’s $1,800 Champagne
We put Armand de Brignac Blanc de Noirs Assemblage No. 4 under the microsope.
In our quest to locate the most exclusive and exciting wines for our readers, we usually ask the question, “How many bottles of this were made?” Often, we get a general response based on an annual average, although many Champagne houses simply respond, “We do not wish to communicate our quantities.” As far as we’re concerned, that’s pretty much like pleading the Fifth on the witness stand; yes, you’re not incriminating yourself, but anyone paying attention knows you’re probably guilty of something. In the case of some Champagne houses, that something is making a whole lot of bottles—millions of them—while creating an illusion of rarity.
We received the exact opposite reply regarding Armand de Brignac Blanc de Noirs Assemblage No. 4. Yasmin Allen, the company’s president and CEO, told us only 7,328 bottles would be released of this Pinot Noir offering. It’s good to know that with a sticker price of around $1,800, it’s highly limited, but it still makes one wonder what’s so exceptional about it.
Known by its nickname, Ace of Spades, for its distinctive and decorative metallic packaging, Armand de Brignac is owned by Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy and Jay-Z and is produced by Champagne Cattier. Each bottle of Assemblage No. 4 is numbered; a small plate on the back reads “Assemblage Four, [X,XXX]/7,328, Disgorged: 20 April, 2023.” Prior to disgorgement, it spent seven years in the bottle on lees after primary fermentation mostly in stainless steel with a small amount in concrete. That’s the longest of the house’s Champagnes spent on the lees, but Allen says the winemaking team tasted along the way and would have disgorged earlier than planned if they’d felt the time was right.
Chef de cave, Alexandre Cattier, says the wine is sourced from some of the best Premier and Grand Cru Pinot Noir–producing villages in the Champagne region, including Chigny-les-Roses, Verzenay, Rilly-la-Montagne, Verzy, Ludes, Mailly-Champagne, and Ville-sur-Arce in the Aube département. This is considered a multi-vintage expression, using wine from a consecutive trio of vintages—2013, 2014, and 2015—to create an “intense and rich” blend. Seventy percent of the offering is from 2015 (hailed as one of the finest vintages in recent memory), with 15 percent each from the other two years.
This precisely crafted Champagne uses only the tête de cuvée juice, a highly selective extraction process. As Allen points out, “the winemakers solely take the first and freshest portion of the gentle cuvée grape press,” which assures that the finished wine will be the highest quality. Armand de Brignac used grapes from various sites and three different vintages so the final product would reflect the house signature style. This is the fourth release in a series that began with Assemblage No. 1. “Testing different levels of intensity of aromas with the balance of red and dark fruits has been a guiding principle between the Blanc de Noirs that followed,” Allen explains.
The CEO recommends allowing the Assemblage No. 4 to linger in your glass for a while, telling us, “Your palette will go on a journey, evolving from one incredible aroma to the next as the wine warms in your glass where it will open up to an extraordinary length.” We found it to have a gorgeous bouquet of raspberry and Mission fig with hints of river rock; as it opened, notes of toasted almond and just-baked brioche became noticeable. With striking acidity and a vein of minerality, it has luscious nectarine, passion fruit, candied orange peel, and red plum flavors with touches of beeswax and a whiff of baking spices on the enduring finish. We enjoyed our bottle with a roast chicken rubbed with butter and herbes de Provence and savored the final, extremely rare sip with a bit of Stilton. Unfortunately, the pairing possibilities are not infinite with this release; there are only 7,327 more ways to enjoy yours.
