Last night Graeme Macdonald and his girlfriend Sarah hosted my wife and I at their lovely cottage amidst the ToKalon vineyard. Graeme opened up his 2009 MacDonald Cabernet, and it was just simply amazing, as good as Cabernet gets in my book. Notes of tobacco and anise, with just enough fruit for everyone, seamless on the palate with just amazing structure that Tokalon is famous for. For those of you who do not know Graeme, Doug Wilder did an amazing feature on his project a couple of months back. Graeme’s Great grandparents purchased a slice of Tokalon in 1955, and started selling Chenin Blanc, riesling, and Cabernet to Robert Mondavi while he was still with his family at Charles Krug. The family then split the fruit after the Robert/ Peter split, eventually selling all of the fruit to RMV, which they have continued to this day. Graeme who now farms the vineyard, was trained at UC Davis, and has worked for Opus One, Colgin, and spent many years as Abe Schoener’s assistant at Scholium project. He is also a personal friend.
This is a wine not to be missed, I believe it reaches the heights of what Napa Cabernet could be, from one of the greatest vineyards in California
What’s the price?
Nice write up Tegan (check out my Avatar)!
Some more info here:
Also for those in NYC I am organizing a dinner for Graeme on Monday and a couple of seats have opened up.
Yeah but, what’s the price?
Less than a first growth Bordeaux, that’s for sure. And I don’t think you’ll have to wait until 2030 to drink it. ![[stirthepothal.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/f/f40faec63ca1018898a40805efbf9f0066a3d205.gif "[stirthepothal.gif]"){kind=small}
I can’t wait for the Monday dinner. Sould be interesting.
Tegan, I am happy to hear your thoughts on MacDonald 2009. For those who are asking, I know what the price will be yet since the wine has not been officially released I don’t feel it is my place to disclose it. I can say that anyone who wants any of the 2009 (22 cases) needs to be on the mailing list (early). As Tegan touched on, this is a unique story and the wines are beautiful.
Signed up a while back…hope I make the cut, as I’m all kinds of curious.
Really enjoyed Graeme’s work with Abe, looking forward to this project. When will the wine actually be released? No info on the web site that I can find.
I saw Fall of 2013, in an email I believe.
Website says first release will be Fall 2013.
Since there seems to be some renewed interest in this wine and the NY dinner on Monday, I would like to offer the board complimentary access to the issue of my magazine where I reviewed MacDonald. Select the link and create a free registration. You will receive an email that requests you confirm your information before you can login to view it. http://www.pdwr.co/macdonald. Enjoy a safe holiday!
Thanks. Are you attending the dinner?
Jay,
As much as I would like to be there I am in the middle of moving the house and office from Napa to Sonoma. I look forward to hearing what people think of the wines at the dinner.
Thanks
Jay, Happy to see you liked the wines.