The sparkling wine we're offering today is mouthwateringly fresh with joyful, springing-from-the-glass dark fruit and just a touch of minerality as it finishes clean, crisp, and with satisfying length. It's a pure summer delight. What if we told you it's also made from Concord and Catawba?

For those of us who have been drinking and enjoying hybrid, native, and otherwise "spicy" grapes for 15 years or more, it's been truly satisfying to watch wine lovers finally embrace these often-underrated members of the grape pantheon. After all, if we had all stopped exploring wine once we got to Chardonnay and Cab, what a wonderful world of discovery we'd be missing!

Of New York State's non-vinifera grapes, perhaps the most notoriously "foxy" (that unmistakable aroma of "wild grapey-ness") of them all are Concord and Catawba. But we've found that when these grapes are handled with expertise and their wines are made in authoritative styles, that foxy thing gets chiseled into an appealing brambly quality evocative of a countryside farmer's market, and they can be some of the very best expressions of American wine diversity.

Enter Nathan Kendall, one of New York's most skillful winemakers. You may know him from his Nathan K wines, a favorite on our shelves. But his Chëpìka project — a partnership with his friend Pascaline Lepeltier, a decorated sommelier and NYC hometown hero — features traditional Finger Lakes grapes, native yeasts and ancestral winemaking methods in an homage to the thriving Pre-Prohibition winegrowing industry of 19th-century Central New York. (The name, coming from the Lenape language, means “root.”)

With this entirely dry, traditional method Concord/Catawba sparkler, Nathan has coaxed out an instant summer classic that every member of our buying team found resoundingly, ridiculously tasty. But don't take our word for it! Get yourself some charcuterie, pop a bottle, and find out for yourself.

chëpika, Concord Catawba Sparkling, 2023 $28.99