Warren Winiarski’s wait is over. The Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars founder has been elected to the 2009 Vintners Hall of Fame, one year after fellow Judgment of Paris ‘winner’ Miljenko ‘Mike’ Grgich was similarly honoured. (The Vintners Hall of Fame, sponsored by the Culinary Institute of America, was established in 2007, based on voting in 2006.)
That Winiarski wasn’t inducted in 2008 is a scalp-scratcher, because his 1973 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon beat Bordeaux in Steven Spurrier’s notorious 1976 taste-off in Paris, and Winiarski’s wines have been benchmarks for elegance and age-worthiness ever since. Grgich made the 1973...
