2020 en primeur How US tastings went digital
One sunny morning in June 2020, Philippe de Rothschild and Château Mouton Rothschild’s then managing director Philippe Dhalluin smiled from my computer screen, thanks to Microsoft Teams video conferencing, which I’d just figured out how to use. The duo, at Mouton, plunged into the back story of the excellent 2019 vintage in Bordeaux, while I sipped, and discreetly spat out, barrel samples they’d shipped over to me in rural Connecticut, some 5,700km away.
At my desk, I balanced bottles, glasses, spit bucket, pen and notebook, and scribbled notes.
For US merchants and wine writers, dozens of
