Surprise Time?
A blind taste test of big dollar wines: Prominent Houstonian opens up hisunderground cellar
Photo by Shelby Hodge
Photo by Shelby Hodge
Photo by Shelby Hodge
Photo by Shelby Hodge
When wine collector and businessman Frank Hevrdejs purchased bottles of Chateau Mouton Rothschild in 1982 for $32, he had no idea that today the wine would retail at $3,000 a bottle. So when he and wife Michelle hosted a group of Houstonians at their Pebble Beach vacation home, they decided that a blind wine tasting, including the Mouton Rothschild, would make for an interesting entertainment.
In preparation for the pre-dinner tasting in the Hevrdejs' underground wine cellar, Frank spent hours researching the best of the best from his extensive collection. He made a selection of five French and California wines, all rated between 95 and 100 points. He compared his purchase price with current day cost and prepared an information sheet that would be revealed to guests after they had made their choices.
The goal was to determine the highest-rated wine and the most expensive wine, which might or might not be one and the same.
With crystal decanters and wine glasses in place and the sterling silver spit bowl for the traditional "swirl, sniff, slurp and spit" technique at the ready, Kim and Dan Tutcher, Jana and Scotty Arnoldy, John Poindexter, Shafik Rifaat and this writer readied the taste buds for a wine-driven joy ride.
The goal was to determine the highest-rated wine and the most expensive wine, which might or might not be one and the same.
Some among the gathering of sophisticated palates guessed that the tops was #3 (2005 Harlan Estate, today valued at $900). Others saluted #5 (2005 Palmer, currently retailing for $1,00). And still other guests rated #4 (Ghost Horse Vineyards, $500) as tops. Only one guest, Rifaat, nailed it, selecting #2 (the Mouton Rothschild) as the premiere wine. With its 100 rating and current price tag of $3,000, it was indeed the winner.
It was interesting to note, as Poindexter observed, how the Mouton Rothschild and #1 (1982 Haut Brion, purchased for $35 a bottle and now priced at $1,800) became more popular once the pedigrees were revealed. At this point, there was no more spitting for these wines were just too good not to savor all the way down.
That great year for wine proved a propitious year in more ways than wine. In 1982, Frank and the late Gordon Cain founded The Sterling Group, a Houston-based private equity firm. Retired as Sterling Group chairman, Frank today is chairman of First Sterling Ventures, also a private equity firm.
