Chez Panisse's wines - a list that matches a legacy(2)
Even in the 1970s, the restaurant was a haven for winemakers like Phelps and Joseph Swan, who would dine with local wine collectors and routinely dig into their cellars of French wine to uncork in addition to their own bottles.
"They were all hanging out together, and they were hanging out at Chez Panisse on a pretty regular basis," recalls Michael Sullivan, owner of Beaune Imports and president of the restaurant's the board of directors. Among them was Sullivan's own father, wine historian Charles Sullivan.
The wine list has struggled with California's bulkier wine style, but now that a subtler side is flourishing again, Jonathan Waters has returned to local partisanship. Just two years ago he suggested that the "richer density" of California wines made for a hard match with the food (see sfg.ly/oUcOza). Now he's bullish on labels like Wind Gap and Berkeley's own Broc Cellars.
"I love the idea of local wine. I love the idea of connection here," he says. "It's just been harder to find with what's been made in the past two decades."
