I want everybody who enjoys Deerfield wine to be able to have it on their table anywhere in the world and the internet helps people to do that. That being said I encourage people to buy Deerfield wine online and it's a convenient way to be able to experience it if Sonoma Valley is a plane ticket away. I do have some advice though to help make drinking a bottle of Sangiovese in Germany as similar as possible to drinking it straight out of the barrel in the Cave.

Keep in mind that wine is alive. It's ever changing and like the rest of us can get stressed. Robert often remarks that wine is unique because it is not a solution - it is a suspension. In a solution, solids are dissolved in a liquid such as salt dissolved in water. In a suspension, like wine, microscopic solids actually hang in formation within the liquid. So jostling the wine around can shake up these very fragile bonds that when connected create the depth and complexity found in all Deerfield wines. You may have heard the term "bottle shock". After a wine goes through the traumatizing experience of the bottling line it can lose its cool. Maybe it doesn't like the loud noises - I'm not too sure... But what often follows is a period where the wine tastes one-dimensional: The flavor is there but the body isn't. The good news is that after a month or two the wine pulls its act together. If you can restrain yourself and wait a few months to open a bottle you will be rewarded.

A similar thing happens when a wine is shipped. Its journey impacts it. Travel tends to fray our ends a little bit and wine is no different. So if you order a bottle: Thank you, now do yourself a favor and stick in the cellar for at least a few weeks, then bring it to your friend's house and enjoy it with company for the full experience.

Wine is also very sensitive to temperature. Our cave is ideal because it stays a constant 60º. For that reason we do not ship to Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Pennsylvania, Utah by Ground when the weather is too hot. For all other states we can deliver by way of refrigerated truck. In our experience, sending it by 3 Day Air gets the wine to you safely if you live in one of the aforementioned states. Make sure that you will be home to sign for the package as an adult signature is required. State laws have made shipping wine to certain states challenging however, we can accommodate shipping to most states so give us a call or order online!



Wine has been around for a long time. There is evidence of winemaking dating back 6500 years ago, so it’s not exactly a new facet of civilization. Yet the role that wine plays in our modern culture is definitely enjoying a rapid expansion. That’s what the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art is taking a look at in its new installation “How Wine Became Modern: Design and Wine, 1976 to Now”. It opened this weekend so I cruised down to the City to check it out,

The Exhibits:

If you’re not familiar with the historic “Judgement of Paris”, in which two California wines trumped the first growth French counterparts in a blind tasting on their home turf, you can watch the film Bottleshock to get up to speed (plus Bill Pullman hasn’t been this good since Independence Day). If you do remember that day that reshaped the notion that quality wine is exclusively synonymous with Bordeaux, than you may enjoy the large mural depicting the judges in a style reminiscent of The Last Supper. The actual bottle of 1973 Chateau Montelena and 1973 Stag’s Leap, with the issue of Time chronicling the event might impress you even more.

Pantone 221 – Cabernet. A wall chronicling every wine-related paint color reveals how your local paint shop probably has a better wine selection than your local supermarket.

One of my personal favorites was a series of bottles of Chardonnay in which the artist added oak chips to each bottle according to the Fibonacci sequence, in which each number is the sum of the two preceding numbers, producing a perfect gradient of color.

Wine was even dripping from the ceiling into a case of eclectic stemware. Some of the pieces emphasized function while others emphasized…erm…well…the stem. Still I enjoyed the novelty and the decanters definitely belonged in a museum (although they were also available in the gift store).

The most educational exhibit was definitely the look at the concept of terroir. Their approach was to take soil samples from all over the world and display them along with live weather reports, a quote from the grower about their view on terroir, and the raw statistics of the vineyard such as annual rainfall and average root depth. I noticed that most of the Old World growers espoused the exemplary qualities of their vineyard’s location while growers from New World countries highlighted the impact of the human element on terroir.

An entire wall was dedicated to label art, with overlapping categories separating themes like “Good Vs. Evil” and “Femme”. We see the label art whenever we go shopping but seeing it broken down like this really makes you think twice about the label and the message it tries to convey.

There was a display studying wine’s impact on literature. There’s a Japanese manga apparently that is all about wine and, in fact, it actually impacts Eastern Asian buying patterns. Who knew?!

Usually smell isn’t on display at MOMA but it was in “How Wine Became Modern”. A wall highlighting the more unusual smells wine critics identify such as Cat’s Pee and Hamster Cage were present for all to sniff.

On the way out was a screen rapidly flashing videos related to the consumption of wine taken from television and film over the decades. For me, this piece best illustrated how wine has stained the fabric of our lives.