{"title":"Terroir Club 2025","description":"","products":[{"product_id":"e7","title":"Bodegas Roda Sela","description":"","brand":"Select Sellars","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46521944572137,"sku":"401402","price":39.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0579\/2805\/7022\/products\/image_65afbab3-c539-44fa-bf8a-d38159d4b33b.png?v=1631717875"},{"product_id":"laherte-freres-extra-brut-ultradition","title":"Laherte Freres Brut Ultradition","description":"\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eIn the Côteaux Sud d’Épernay, the Laherte family farms just over ten hectares of scattered parcels—limestone, clay, sand, and that flickering chalk seam that makes Champagne Champagne. Most growers spend their careers trying to translate a single site; the LaHertes have spent seven generations weaving a patchwork. Their work is brisk, biodynamic, and human-scaled. Horses still appear in certain parcels; biodiversity isn’t brochure language but daily practice. And the wines show it—vibrant, tensile, a little wild around the edges in the best possible way.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eBrut Ultradition\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003e is their entry point, though “entry” feels misleading; it’s more like the handshake that tells you everything you need to know about a person. Built from roughly half Pinot Meunier, with Pinot Noir and Chardonnay completing the trio, the wine carries the clarity and precision of Meunier grown on cooler south-facing slopes. It opens with orchard perfume—pear skin, white cherry, quince—and a chalk dust whisper reminiscent of flint. On the palate, the wine moves with that signature Laherte directness: firm acidity, tense mineral lines, a gentle brush of spice, and a finishing note of something herbal and green—like bruised lemon leaves.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eThe base wines see fermentation in a mix of vessels—classic Champagne foudres, older barrels, stainless steel—and a patient élevage before bottling. The dosage sits low, allowing the wine’s natural sweetness of fruit to stay buoyant without tipping into plushness. Every decision nudges the wine toward transparency: Champagne not as luxury object but as pure agricultural delight.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eHow to drink it:\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003eThis is the bottle you open at the beginning of an evening when you want the conversation to bloom. It’s stunning with raw things—oysters lifted by mignonette, scallops shaved into cold ribbons, a simple plate of radishes with salted butter. But it also adores texture: gougères, fried smelts, tempura vegetables, Comté or young Alpine cheeses whose nuttiness plays in counterpoint to the wine’s taut minerality.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eUltimately, Brut Ultradition is Champagne that tastes like a place where someone is tending vines with care—where the work is quiet, thoughtful, and across generations. It invites you in, not to impress you, but to simply explore its crystalline depths.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Select Sellars","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47081554739433,"sku":"531907NV","price":64.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0579\/2805\/7022\/files\/IMG-8704.png?v=1713466381"},{"product_id":"loren-crossing-napa-valley-cabernet","title":"Loren Crossing Napa Valley Cabernet","description":"\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eEvery so often, a new winery comes along that feels less like an arrival and more like a continuation — another pair of hands stepping into the long American tradition of coaxing meaning from land. Loren Crossing is one of those places. Their 2023 Cabernet doesn’t trumpet novelty; it reads more like the first careful wheel of a cheesemaker discovering the rhythm of a new dairy — patient, attentive, willing to let the raw material speak before shaping it into form.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e2023 was a generous year in Napa, long and even, the kind of season that allows growers to make decisions with the same deliberateness as an affineur turning wheels in a quiet cellar. The wine reflects that steadiness. It opens with the clean, dark edges of blackcurrant and graphite — the raw ingredients — then folds into notes of blackberry skin, roasted plum, and a cedar tone that feels hand-planed rather than lacquered. There’s a youthful firmness to the tannins, not unlike the springy resistance of a cheese still early in its aging life: not yet softened, but already hinting at the depth time will reveal.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eWhat’s most striking is the sense of place emerging through restraint. Loren Crossing resists the modern impulse to inflate; instead, they build flavor the way great cheesemakers build complexity — through balance, precision, and trust in the inherent character of the region. You taste Napa not as spectacle but as structure: warm days, cool nights, volcanic soils under tension with riverbed gravel. The wine carries that history the way a bandaged cheddar carries the imprint of its cloth.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eDrink it now for its clarity and youthful edge, or let it rest five to eight years, allowing those tannins to loosen and the fruit to settle into a darker, more resonant register. Pair it with foods that echo its grounded confidence: dry-aged ribeye, braised lamb shank, or, fittingly, a piece of well-aged Alpine-style cheese — something with caramelized onion warmth and enough backbone to stand beside a Cabernet that’s finding its voice with admirable honesty.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Select Sellars","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48304713138409,"sku":"125501","price":26.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0579\/2805\/7022\/files\/IMG-1413.png?v=1744997630"}],"url":"https:\/\/waterfordwine.com\/collections\/terroir-club-2025.oembed","provider":"Waterford Wine and Spirits","version":"1.0","type":"link"}