In 1979, Mondavi joined with Baron Phillippe de Rothschild to create the Opus One Winery and it was the Opus One wine that showcased the initial Napa Valley Wine Auction, which Mondavi also founded. “He put the Fumé Blanc in clear bottles when the original frosted bottles weren’t available, and soon everyone was copying the idea of white wine in clear bottles,” Arnold said. “But his greatest skill was marketing.”Īmong Mondavi’s notable decisions was renaming sauvignon blanc “Fumé Blanc,” reportedly because he felt “sauvignon” was too hard for Americans to pronounce and so they wouldn’t order the wine. “When I got there, the winery was in transition, with Michael doing the winemaking but Robert was involved with all the blending decisions,” said Arnold, who started with the Mondavi family in 1974.

But Mondavi’s real strength was in his marketing skills, said Mondavi winemaker Rich Arnold, with whom I spoke in Aspen. Robert Mondavi introduced many of what now are standard winemaking practices, including stainless steel tanks, cold fermentation and using French oak barrels to age wine. These competing visions eventually led to a family break-up and soon after Robert Mondavi founded the winery bearing his name.Ĭuriously, his two sons, Michael and Tim, eventually would split up for reasons similar to those dividing Robert and his brother Peter. The two brothers disagreed – Peter opting for value-priced wines and Robert for wines as good as Europe’s best. In 1943 the family, at Robert’s urging, purchased the Charles Krug Winery where Robert and his brother Peter both worked after graduating college (Robert from Sanford, Peter from Univ. He was born in Virginia, Minn., to first-generation Italian immigrants Rosa and Cesare Mondavi, who in 1921 moved to Lodi, Cal., to raise their family. You can read elsewhere the lengthy bios about Robert Mondavi but here’s a quick review. June 18 was the 100 th anniversary of Bob Mondavi’s birthday (that’s how he introduced himself in his outgoing, direct manner that reportedly was the bane of PR people) and it’s only proper to acknowledge his role in the American wine scene. It’s been a couple of days since the wrap-up of the 2013 Food & Wine Classic in Aspen and there still is so much to write about, but today it’s all about Robert Mondavi. Like the rest of the Mondavi Private Selection wines (there are 11 in all) the 2011 Meritage and the 2012 Chardonnay are solid, well-made, affordable ($11 SRP) wines from selected vineyards in California’s Central Coast, and they all display the bright fruit, insightful construction and immediate accessibility Mondavi wanted in his line of everyday wines. Chardonnay is also very successfully cultivated, and about 30% of the AVA’s acreage is planted to white grapes, with the majority of those grapes being Chardonnay, Read more.As I write this, standing on the desk near the computer are two bottles of Robert Mondavi Private Selection wines. Many grapes grow well in Napa’s Mediterranean climate, but the region is best known for Cabernet Sauvignon.

Napa Valley’s AVA was established in 1983, and today there are 16 sub-appellations within the Napa Valley AVA. But by the late 1950s and early 1960s Robert Mondavi and other visionaries were producing quality wines easily distinguishable from the mass-produced jug wines made in California’s Central Valley. An infestation of phylloxera, an insect that attacks vine roots, and the onset of Prohibition nearly wiped out the nascent Napa wine industry in the early 20th century. Other winemaking pioneers followed in the late 19th century, including the founders of Charles Krug, Schramsberg, Inglenook and Beaulieu Vineyards. Yount planted grapes and began producing wine commercially. Winemaking started in Napa in 1838 when George C. With nearly 43,000 acres of vineyards and more than 300 wineries, it is the heart of fine wine production in the United States. Napa Valley AVA is the most famous winemaking region in the United States and one of the most prestigious in the world.

Opus one 2011 auction