Grapes: Carignan, Valdiguie Region: Mendocino County, CA Farming:Organic LIOCO was conceived in the summer of 2005 in the alley behind Spago Beverly Hills. Wine director Kevin O’Connor and wine salesman Matt Licklider, critical of the heavy-handed wines of the day, wondered if it was possible to make more nuanced wines from California soils. In the early aughts, this was still relatively unknown. By contrast, vineyards in France and Italy were long ago mapped according to qua

Grape: Grignolino Region: Piedmont, Italy Farming: Organic Nestled within the original castle of Castagnole Monferrato, La Miraja was constructed as an armory in the 11th century, only to be retrofitted as a cellar in the 1400s. In this armory-turned- cellar, Eugenio Gatti, a seventh-generation viticulturist, turns out Barbera, Grignolino, Freisa, and his fabled Ruché. La Miraja (pronounced “me-rye-uh”) is tiny by any measure, comprising less than 4 hectares under vine. It is

Grapes: Zametna Crnina, Blaufrankisch, Pinot Noir Region: Ptuj, Slovenia Farming: Organic Gönc winery is a family tradition going back to 1936, when Peter Gönc’s great grandfather built their first wine cellar and planted the vineyard around it in the small town of Dobrovnik in Slovenia. After World War II, his grandfather moved to the city Ptuj where he started working in the Ptujska Klet, or Ptuj wine cellar, as a cellar cleaner and worked his way up to head winemaker and C

Grape: Vermentino  Region: Tuscany, Italy  Farming: Organic The addition of the contemporary Casanova Estate to the La Spinetta family came about as the result of a challenge between Giorgio Rivetti and a Tuscan colleague. Giorgio, convinced of the indisputable value of indigenous grape varieties, often found himself criticizing his Tuscan winemaking counterparts, not being able to comprehend why producers were replacing beautiful, historic Sangiovese vineyards with young int