Blogs
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James Laube's Wine Flights
Catching up with Tom Hinde, Yao's winemaker, after tasting the premiere 2009 vintage
Posted: April 16, 2012 By James Laube
Yao Ming, the world's tallest vintner, has put a towering price on his premiere wine. Yao's 2009 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon Family Reserve, priced at $625 a bottle. All 300 cases have already sold out in China, the only market the where the reserve was offered. A second Napa Valley Cabernet, also from 2009, was released at $175; 5,000 cases were made.
The quality of the reserve is impressive. Here are my notes.
Blogs
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James Laube's Wine Flights
Napa's Copia Center is long shuttered, but the statue of André Tchelistcheff that stood at its door may soon find a new home
Posted: April 11, 2012 By James Laube
A life-size statue of André Tchelistcheff may be on the market. If I had a $1 million, I'd bid on it. Seriously.
It could be auctioned as part of the liquidation of the bankrupt Copia, which begins with sales at the American Center for Wine, Food and the Arts' gift shop this weekend and culminates in two days of auctions April 20 and 21. It will be an estate sale of unparalleled scope and value, at least here in Napa.
I consider Mr. T perhaps the most influential man in Napa Valley history, right up there alongside Robert Mondavi. Though André the Great has been dead for two decades, winemakers still speak of him in reverential terms. One could write a book about his contributions to wine. But today I'll just mention a few of the ways Tchelistcheff stood out.
Blogs
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James Laube's Wine Flights
California Chardonnay detractors were legion in recent years, but the versatile grape is still king of the hill
Posted: April 5, 2012 By James Laube
Think what you may and drink what you like, but California Chardonnay is alive and well. At the top end of quality, the wine is not only surviving, but thriving.
March 31, 2012 Issue
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Columns
Posted: March 31, 2012 By James Laube
March 31, 2012 Issue
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Tasting Reports
California’s Rhône Rangers embrace the beauty of the blend
Posted: March 31, 2012 By James Laube
Blogs
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James Laube's Wine Flights
Sandhi, the renowned sommelier's new Sta. Rita Hills Pinot and Chardonnay project, is off to a bright start
Posted: March 30, 2012 By James Laube
Sommelier-turned-winemaker Rajat Parr has found a home. He's settled in Santa Barbara's Sta. Rita Hills for the next chapter in his young winemaking career.
Teaming up with financier Charles Banks, a one-time partner at Screaming Eagle, and Sashi Moorman, a veteran winemaker who makes Evening Land's wines, Parr is the front man and mind behind their new label, Sandhi ("alliance" in Sanskrit), founded in 2009. From 2004 to 2008 Parr made wines with other winemakers under the Parr Selection label. The Sandhi wines show considerable progress in style, density and substance.
Blogs
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James Laube's Wine Flights
No single vintage did more to change the world of wine than 1982
Posted: March 26, 2012 By James Laube
Most of us can point to an instant that changed our wine lives. For some, it's a single bottle that captures the moment (1968 Heitz Martha's Vineyard for me), when a wine transforms into something extraordinary.
There are great moments, and then there are great eras, and the benchmark vintages that define them. For me, the vintage that changed everything was 1982.
News & Features
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News
Lawyer and wine columnist was an influential voice for the nascent California wine industry
Posted: March 21, 2012 By James Laube
Blogs
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James Laube's Wine Flights
The state dinner wine lists should be a matter of good taste and national pride
Posted: March 20, 2012 By James Laube
>p>I like knowing that wines are served at White House dinners to the president and his guests. I'm curious and I consider it a matter of national pride.
Therefore, I found it both odd and out of character for the White House to recently announce that it would no longer disclose which wines were being poured for dignitaries. It's a terrible idea, and what's to stop dinner guests from reporting the selections afterward, as one recently did after attending the state dinner held for British Prime Minister David Cameron?
Blogs
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James Laube's Wine Flights
Kathryn "Walt" Hall and others are adding to the explosion of single-vineyard California Pinot Noirs
Posted: March 16, 2012 By James Laube
Wine labels may fade, but they rarely disappear. Most find new owners or reinvent themselves, to wit: Sonoma's Roessler is gone; enter Walt. Walt is Kathryn Hall's new lineup of Pinot Noirs and Chardonnays. It's a reincarnation of sorts of the former Roessler operation. She and her husband, Craig, bought Roessler in 2010. Walt is Hall's maiden name, as well as a childhood nickname.
Walt is the Halls' ambitious entry into the Pinot Noir and Chardonnay sweepstakes. Under the winemaking direction of Steve Leveque, who also makes the Kathryn Hall Napa Valley wines, Walt has 10 new wines, all from 2010. Most of them are Pinots made in the 200- to 300-case range, and all but one are from California.
The Halls' new endeavor is just one of several fresh rebranding efforts emphasizing single-vineyard wines in California.
