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Robert Mondavi Private Selection

Robert Mondavi Private Selection

John: I do about six of these a year, and this is a wine tip.

Adam: Oh, good. We love a John C. Dvorak wine.

John: It’s a cheap wine that I have every so often. And every time I have it, I say, why don’t I plug this wine? It’s interesting because I’ll give you a little backstory about some of these cheap California wines that are done by Gallo. They bring out this fabulous wine — the Turning Leaf was a good example. If you can remember back that far, it came out as a Cabernet. It was like 10 bucks, 9bucks. Tasted like a $50 wine. And then the next year tasted kind of like a $20 wine. And then the next year tasted like a $5 wine. And then they fold it, but they made lots of money.

Adam: I bet they did.

John: So this is different. These guys have yet to have dropped the quality of this product. This is a screwball wine that I think came out of a bunch of purchases. I actually have a bottle here that Robert Mondavi did before he died.

This is a Robert Mondavi wine. And he bought a bunch of California wineries all over the place to use as estate taxes — so he could just dump the wineries and the kids would still have the main winery. But it turned out that the president changed, whatever happened, he ended up owning these places and they changed the names of them. I don’t remember which one this was specifically, but it’s one of the Valley wines from San Joaquin Valley, I think. But it’s sold as Robert Mondavi. And I’ll tell you what it says on the label. It’s like 9 bucks, maybe up to 12 some places.

Adam: Can I get it at Costco?

John: Costco will have it, but all kinds of places have it. They make a ton of it. And it’s a black label wine called Robert Mondavi Private Selection. Which is always a giveaway for what, 9 nine bucks, 10 bucks?

Adam: And it’s a black label?

John: It’s a black label wine.

Adam: Isn’t it always black?

John: No, Robert Mondavi has a tan label. Well, this always has a black label because it’s not really Robert Mondavi. It’s not made there either. It just says Robert Mondavi Private Selection — Bourbon Barrel Aged Cabernet Sauvignon.

Adam: Ooh, that’s very popular.

John: And this wine — I’ve been drinking this on and off for about five years as kind of just a quick wine. If you want to have a dinner, a hamburger wine.

Adam: After breakfast.

John: After breakfast, hamburger wine is good for eggs. It’s a total hamburger wine. And for a California wine, it’s dark, it’s got some Cabernet character, it’s got a lot of oak — and it’s a bourbon-style oak. If you don’t like oak, don’t get this wine. But if you like oaky wines, this is a very well-made wine.

Adam: I’m going to see if H-E-B has it. I’ll talk to Matt at H-E-B. And I’ll tell him to push it. I’ll say, I’ll tell him to put like one of those—

John: A sticker.

Adam: Put a sticker on it. “John C. Dvorak Tip of the Day Wine”. I’m telling you, we should have those.

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