ABOUT

Cantina Sauvage is about genuine, authentic, unfuctwithwine!

What drives me to do what I do, in the fashion I do it, is a desire to break down boundaries and notions about what wine "should be" and bring a person to an experience that transcends those expectations.

My friend Suli and I, are sharing the space. Suli is creating snacks and weaving masterful plates with a Leventine palate, through his own project, Café Suliman! Suli and I are working side by side dishing up tasty treats and glasses of authentic UNFUCTWITH BADDASSERY!!!! SO STOKED!

The last few years have been a journey! I didn’t start Cantina Sauvage with the thought that i would one day open another wine bar, let alone in the shell of my beloved Bar Ferd’nand. So much has happened in the intervening years since Ferd’nand’s opening, it’s arc of existence: closing, and the conception of Cantina Sauvage. When Ferd was happening, its trajectory toward Natural Wine, was an organic one (no pun intended) . . . I am not a fan of the term “Natural Wine”, if only because it is now so politically charged. I prefer the term, Authentic wine . . . and yes, a wine that truly inspires me, that I feel a connection to, is usually one that is pretty much unfuctwith, naturally made. However, a wine, to me, doesn’t have merit, simply because it is naturally made. There is some truly shitty wines, that are natural… mud puddles are natural too . . . it doesn’t mean I want to drink from them. But, if you’re trying to make wine and not use anything to curb the growth of the many different strains of ambient bacteria, (that shit is hard to do!) My hat is off to you. And really, even if your naturally made wine tastes like ass, that’s okay too. I like ass . . . What really bothers me, is that ”natural wine” has become a political statement to some of us. I don’t know about you, but I get enough politics in almost every other aspect of my life and I don’t need my wine to be politicized.

When I started Cantina Sauvage, in 2018, my hope was to move the wine experience outside the confines of the “Food & Wine” box. I started with tastings in my apartment; in friends yards; and at other commercial spaces, not normally associated with tasting wine. I created space for a direct discourse between the producers and the consumers, in a thoughtful and intimate setting, trying to dissolve the membrane within which, each respective community exists. Since the inception of Cantina Sauvage, my goal has been to evolve the business with intention. as to what the next move should be, and not take on anything that didn’t feel like a natural progression for Cantina.

Cantina Sauvage takes the notion of natural, unfettered, authentic wine making and applies it to the social and artistic aspects of the wine experience. Through tasting events, you’re invited to approach the wine in a more interactive way, through meeting the producer or importer of the wine and learning their point of view…what inspires them to do what they do! The story of the wine and the people who bring the wine to bottle imbues (the wine) with extra-dimensionality. The style of wine I work with doesn't come from tank farms of temperature controlled stainless steel, but from farms and cellars through the guidance of winemakers who are fanatical about what they do. They know the less intervention in the process of growing grapes and bringing it to bottle, the more the wine will reflect what it truly is — a living, evolving entity.