Where to drink wine in New York City
by Gift Guide's Art World Correspondent
Ivan Gaytan, Gift Guide’s Art World Correspondent, is back with a guide to what art shows are worth seeing in New York right now. I’ve also asked him to write about what wine excites him: where to drink it, where to buy it. Ivan is sort of famous in our friend group for being a man who dines alone at fine restaurants in New York City. He brings a book.
“I ran into Lucy Bull standing in front of a painting of a mountain covered in fog”
In late 1871 Cézanne lived across from Napoleon’s Halle aux Vins where barrels were kept outside stacked next to one another. Inside, the aisles of the market were given according to region so that one could walk down a rue de Jura or a rue de Languedoc or otherwise. He could see it from his window and so painted Paris, quai de Jussieu (la halle aux vins), 1872. John Rewald’s The Paintings of Paul Cézanne lets us know that it is the last in a series of predominantly monochromatic paintings before joining Pissarro in Pontoise, where “there begins a new phase of work.” With that series I would also include Bouteille, verre et citrons, 1867–69, on view an enjoyable Metro-North train ride away at the Yale University Art Gallery, where you will also find La Maison du docteur Gachet à Auvers-sur-Oise, 1872–73, Le Chemin du village, 1872–73, La Partie de pêche, 1873–74, which hung in Monet’s bedroom (he received it as partial payment for one of his own works—art dealing, you understand, was once much more fun), and Paysage avec moulin à eau, c. 1871. The painting that featured a water mill was donated to the museum by the collector Walter Bareiss, whose home in Greenwich, CT had a funky addition to hang works in that has since been removed. That structure, according to a 1958 Talk of the Town, once housed La Route tournante, 1902–06, and Bonnard’s Femme à sa toilette, 1923, among other works. He writes, “weekends I rehang my pictures, switching them around, since I can’t hang everything at the same time… my wife likes to garden, and we grow some outstanding asparagus.”
This was about where I was when Kaitlin asked if I would recommend some wine for Gift Guide, reading about Cézanne’s life around 1870, so it was fitting to learn that Hortense Fiquet’s father had 39 acres of vines left to his care in the Jura. I wondered if it was possible to locate those vines, surely still being tended to, and began by purchasing a bottle from a producer I enjoy (maybe not for everyday drinking, but worth keeping in the fridge for a week to settle) and proceeded to spend hours combing documents online (did you know the BNF’s cabinet des estampes is searchable?). Looking up various producers and their proximity to Saligney, where the Deprez family vines were located, I eventually gave up—I don’t know who to ask. I went to The Met and looked at some of Pissarro’s Pontoise landscapes instead, a substitute for going to New Haven and seeing the works mentioned above. I drive through often enough anyway and typically stop by one of the great bookstores in the tri-state area: Grey Matter. From the Met, after seeing the Caspar David Friedrich show—where I ran into Lucy Bull standing in front of a painting of a mountain covered in fog—I made my way a few blocks south to see what Le Rock had by the glass: this blend, drinkable, but I more appreciated their magnum pour of a wine by Jean-Francois Malsert, delicious: it’s sort-of this. More people should bring magnum bottles to poker games and house parties, regular wine bottles collect quick and fill up the sink that everyone is putting empties into, magnums don’t go as fast and are more fun to pour, it’s theatrical.
Regarding a place like Le Rock, I follow a perverse interpretation of John’s idea here. I’ll go to an oddly branded restaurant or wine bar presuming their list might be good and order the same variation of ingredients and get out for about $100–$125, and so with this in mind I wholeheartedly recommend Jupiter and Le Rock. Everyone knows these places, but both are easy to walk into, for the most part, and their food is good and the lighting is nice and the prices aren’t exactly crazy. They both have bars too so if you’re dining solo there is typically a seat and they both have great service (Le Rock especially, ask me why!). I don’t have a discerning taste in wine, but if you want to impress a friend who does, and if you’re in the same area, go to Aldo Sohm. The room is terrible, poorly decorated, the music is awful, they have those high seats and tables that are often covered by tourists bags and heavy coats and to top it off there is a couch that you kind of sink into, but their wine list is great. It’s a place you might take your grandpa after some occasion in midtown and he’ll be awfully upset about the price of a glass of Pinot Noir. When I went, I greatly enjoyed Dorli Mühr’s incredible 2021 ‘Samt & Seide’ Blaufränkisch, it’s sold out everywhere in the city, but there is this, which I would be happy to try (sources tell me this was once Kaitlin’s favorite wine shop). Aldo Sohm perfectly encapsulates a tendency whose opposite is found in wine bars that lots of people frequent like Frog (terrible), Rhodora (pretty good, you can sit outside and smoke!), Plus de Vin (points for this somm serving me my first Riss wine in 2018), or St. Jardim (very good, if often a bit crowded), the middle ground is probably something like La Compagnie (remaining silent here), all of these places are serviceable and they often have similar wine lists and I would say to skip the food because it’s overpriced, the wine is too, so opt for a bottle if you can.
I enjoy drinking wine but it is a slow process for me. For instance, I began to drink wines from the Alsace because I am interested in the region (regarding Lenz, you can read both the Richard Sieburth and Michael Hamburger translations in one afternoon, and end here). This led me to the wines of Catherine Riss, whose 'T'as Pas du Schiste?' you can still find on some lists in NYC; Jean-François Ginglinger, whose wines, at least in my experience, have been a bit more difficult to come by (I first had a bottle of his Sylvaner in Paris in 2019—oh God!); and Pierre Frick, whose wines are currently available at Chambers Street and Wine Therapy (terrible name, start with the crémant!). Chambers Street is my local wine shop, and it’s worth going out of your way to visit if you’ve never been. I cannot underestimate the value of getting to know your local shop and finding one that is good. Sure, look, if you’re just picking up a bottle of any white from the shop fridge that is nearest to your train then admittedly this is not advice for you, but if you care, you will take time to find the shop where the staff members have tried a few things on the shelves and can speak to you in a way that is neither patronizing or overbearing. At Chambers Street they’re all very knowledgeable and have particular regions of expertise, so you’ll strike up a kinship with one of them if you are exploring. You’ll learn words like allocation, its importance to a wine shop’s business, and how they ingratiate themselves to their loyal customers through such terms, and you will discover that people routinely buying whole cases from a shop is a very good sign—buy wine from stores where this is happening.
Across from Chambers Street there is perhaps one of the most impressive and unpretentious wine lists in the city at Chambers. I imagine it’s a great place to go on a date. I go and sit at the bar and eat the chicken. The food is excellent, unlike most wine bars, because this is a restaurant. Their sommelier, Pascaline Lepeltier, is one of the most recognized and awarded in the business and she has just written a very well regarded text on the subject: One Thousand Vines. She went to school for philosophy. I’m guessing she did not study the Frankfurt School but maybe something like phenomenology. I’m guessing that phenomenology is popular with people who do their sommelier certifications, but that is likely a rude connection for me to try and draw. Do the Gift Guide readers know of a sommelier who has read the unabridged Julie, or the New Héloise or something like the Aesthetic Theory? (I’ll add that they should be over the age of forty?) I’ll drink wine that this person can recommend. My point is that this is how you should make your decisions. A lot of people simply choose a bottle of wine because they had it on their birthday, this is another strategy and at base this impetus is not incorrect. The most common thing you can do is to follow on social media some sommeliers and drink what they’re drinking—it is what they are paid to do! Look at the labels and recognize some of the producers they frequently enjoy. If you’re buying a bottle at a good restaurant you’re allowed to ask one or two questions. Get to know the importers and drink from their portfolio, see what they’re about. Drink whatever Wink Lorch is drinking. I buy what I enjoy and I buy the same thing over and over again. I’m sure there are trends but I really do not know them, so granted you’re taking advice from this sort of person. This isn’t because I am a contrarian, I just can’t really be bothered to follow wine in this manner. I think most people are this way but many end up drinking bad or mediocre wine. As to be expected, there’s a backlash against ‘natural wine’ in the industry because everyone started to drink too much of it that was poorly produced—whoever’s fault this is (I would say: wine bars indiscriminately charging over $20 a glass), I’ve missed it. This has also led to some good wine bars starting to move away from natural-specific lists and cheekily winking at you when they mention that a producer on their list is not biodynamic. Who cares! I like the notoriously bad wine list at The Odeon, it is suitable. Same at Cafe Luxembourg, I’ve had that Alsatian pinot like fifteen times. My only real advice would be that next time you want to buy something with a little colorful label because you’re going to a birthday or picnic, buy this instead: it’s excellent and inexpensive and everyone will be impressed by how good it is.