Latest news with #NapaValley
Daily Mail
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
All the celebrity rosé wines ranked: From Angelina Jolie to Cameron Diaz and Meghan Markle... one A-lister will be left VERY sour
It seems every celebrity has a side hustle these days, and many of them start in a vineyard. Earlier this month, Meghan Markle finally released her anticipated As Ever rosé priced at a whopping $30 per bottle.
Forbes
2 days ago
- Business
- Forbes
Next Generation Unveils ALH, A Heritage Wine from Paul Hobbs
Daughter and Father, Agustina and Paul Hobbs, Together in the Vineyard to Craft ALH Wine SENA Sebastian One of Agustina Hobbs' earliest memories is walking hand-in-hand with her father, internationally renowned winemaker Paul Hobbs, in a vineyard in Argentina at the age of four. Two years later she was with her father in a wine cellar and accidentally fell into a vat of freshly picked grapes. When her father immediately rushed to pick her up, she looked up at him with a big smile, licking the sweet grape juice from her lips and fingers. Given a childhood where she literally grew up in wine, it was not surprising that Agustina chose to earn a degree in Viticulture and Enology from Cornell University. From there she worked as a harvest intern at wineries in Europe and South America, as well as sales roles in Japan and Hong Kong, before returning to New York, where she spent seven years selling wine for different distribution companies. 'Then my father presented me with the opportunity of a lifetime—to create a father-daughter wine brand sourced from special blocks within our Nathan Coombs Estate in the Coombsville AVA of Napa Valley,' reported Agustina in a recent in-person interview. 'The chance to craft a wine and take it to market was a challenge I was excited to take on.' So, after three years of hard work, including harvesting the grapes in the autumn of 2022, fermenting and aging the wine for 18 months, finalizing the blend, Agustina's new brand is born and ready to be released on August 1, 2025. 'I like to think of it as a new style of Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon – fresh, bright and elegant, yet still ageworthy,' she said. 'We decided to name it 'ALH', which are my initials, as my father encouraged me to make this my own.' Agustina Hobbs As A Child Eating Grapes in the Vineyard ALH One of the reasons that Agustina can create a lighter and fresher style of Napa Valley cabernet is that the Coombsville sub-AVA is one of the coolest appellations in Napa Valley. Located south of the town of Napa, it receives more of the cooling breezes off the San Pablo Bay than other regions in Napa. This results in grapes that usually take longer to ripen, allowing the full development of flavors, while still retaining fresh acidity. 'I like to think of the ALH wine as a new style of Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon – fresh, bright and elegant, but still ageworthy.' Agustina Hobbs, Winemaker Indeed I experienced the cooler temperatures of Coombsville during our interview, because Agustina and Paul invited me to meet them at their vineyard. It was a foggy morning in July with a cool breeze, and even though I wore a light coat, the chill cut through. This morning fog from the Bay is common in southern Napa Valley on summer mornings, but usually burns off by noon. It is part of the reason that the grapes stay so fresh, but still produce intensely complex flavors. 'This is the Nathan Coombs Estate, named after the historical founder of the City of Napa,' announced Paul. 'I purchased it in 2012, and it features rolling terrain with different blocks of varying soils, exposures and slopes.' Two of those blocks are the ones that Paul gave to Agustina so she could produce her first wine, ALH. 'I wanted to create a special selection for Agustina that is her own, so she could be be creative from a viticulture and winemaking perspective,' he said. Given that Paul Hobbs established his first winery on his own, it is understandable that he would want his daughter to succeed on her own. However, Paul doesn't just own one winery; he owns or is involved with six other wineries around the world, including those in Argentina, France, Armenia, Spain, and New York. In addition, he is an international wine consultant, has produced ten 100-point scoring wines, and was named 'The Steve Jobs of Wine' by Forbes in 2013. Given this level of winemaking expertise, it would be challenging for a father not to give his child advice, but Paul says he is trying to take a 'hands-off' approach, and Agustina agrees. 'I go to him if I have questions, but otherwise, he encourages me to make my own decisions,' reported Agustina. She pointed to a map of the vineyard blocks, explaining the special Haire loam, clay and volcanic soil composition with a 20% slope. She described how the grapes are sustainably certified by Napa Green and are handpicked, and transported to Paul Hobbs winery in Sonoma County, where they undergo fermentation using native (natural) yeast. 'Once fermentation is complete, we age the wine in 29% new French oak barrels for 18 months. The final blend is 90% cabernet sauvignon, 7% merlot and 3% cabernet franc wine, and we bottle it unfined,' she stated. Agustina Hobbs in Nathan Coombs Vineyard in Napa Valley to Produce New ALH Wine ALH Tasting ALH Cabernet Sauvignon and Discussing Food Pairings After seeing the vineyard and learning how the ALH wine was crafted, I was curious to taste it, and the results were very pleasing. The wine color is a dark shimmering ruby with a nose of fresh plums, cassis, violets and a hint of complex herbs. On the palate, the wine is velvety and streamlined with notes of black cherry, dusty chocolate mocha and graphite, with a long elegant finish. In addition to tasting delicious on its own, it is a wine that will pair well with food, given its fresh style with lively acidity. We discussed food pairing suggestions, and Agustina had some clever ideas. 'Younger people are are exploring more foods from around the world, and I think this wine pairs very well with a variety of cuisines. Recently, my friends and I tried it with grilled eggplant, baba ganoush and beans. It was an excellent pairing because the food brought out the bright blue and black fruit notes in the wine, and the acidity refreshed the palate between bites,' she reported. Agustina also mentioned that the wine paired well with Korean and Japanese food because the umami flavors in the food brought out the fruit and herb notes in the wine. 'But growing up in Argentina, I can't forget to mention how well cabernet sauvignon goes with a big grilled steak, roasted veggies, and Provoleta (Argentina's famous melted cheese),' she said with a grin. New ALH 2022 Cabernet Sauvignon from Coombsville AVA in Napa Valley Wildly Simple Productions LLC National Tour to Launch the New ALH Wine Brand The new ALH wine will be launched in six key markets across the U.S. starting in August 2025. Agustina will go on tour to share her story about the debut of her new wine. The 2022 ALH Cabernet Sauvignon will release at $75 per bottle and be available in restaurants and select wine shops, as well as online at The wine is sustainably packaged in a lightweight bottle and features a label with an orange-red design on a rectangular cream-colored label. If you look closely, the label includes the embossed title: 'ALH – Coombsville Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley.' 'We worked with graphic designer, Michael McDermott, to create the label. I wanted a modern, minimalistic design to communicate the fact that the wine is a contemporary style that pushes boundaries. The blind-embossed typography on the label subtly reveals itself with the light so that people would be curious and take a closer look,' explained Agustina. Agustina Hobbs, Winemaker for New ALH Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa Valley SENA Sebastian
Telegraph
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
We asked a wine expert to try Meghan's rosé. This was her verdict
To much fanfare, Meghan Markle last month released her very own Californian wine, a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Mourvèdre, Grenache, and Syrah. The launch of the Napa Valley rosé follows the release of the Duchess's line of fruit 'spreads' (that's jam, to you and I), 'edible' petals (not quite potpourri), herbal tea, crepe and shortbread mix, plus orange blossom honey under her As Ever moniker. The Provençal-style rosé is touted on the bottle as: 'Effortlessly elegant - crafted for slow afternoons and golden-hour gatherings... the essence of sun-drenched outdoor moments.' The rather boozy offering, at 14.5 per cent ABV, retails at £22 ($30) per bottle and is sold in cases of three (plus an extra $20 for shipping). After managing to bag an order of the sold-out wine, The Telegraph enlisted Diane Gross, a wine expert and the owner of Cork, a wine bar in Washington, DC, to give her verdict. Gross knows a thing or two about rosé. Her wine bar, which she opened nearly 18-years-ago, offers 350 varieties of wine ranging from $10 to $400 a bottle. The bar also has a rosé menu served exclusively on their patio. To truly put the wine to the test, Gross conducted her tasting blind. As Ever was concealed in brown paper along with two other bottles, one from California and another Provençal rosé, to avoid bias. Once the glasses were poured, giving her first impression on what turned out to be the Duchess's glass, Gross said the millennial pink wine is 'the colour of rosé everybody likes.' 'I'm getting a little more on the nose here,' she said, adding it had notes of cooked fruit, red fruits, cherries, spice, and candy. Gross continued: 'The wine isn't sweet at all, it's just sort of that top note of tutti frutti, like, it's a little bit like your chewing gum. But it's not a bad thing at all, it happens a lot in rosé.' She also described the wine as a little 'hot', meaning that the taste of alcohol is a little overwhelming. In the blind test, Meghan's wine was her least favourite compared to the other two pale rosés, a French blend with notes of lime and strawberry, and a citrussy Californian offering. However, she insisted she enjoyed it: 'I like it, it just tastes like it has darker fruit notes. It has that sweet-salty finish that you sometimes get with rosé. 'It has a little bit of a blend, the fruit, and the minerality comes through.' But asked if she'd take it to a dinner party the answer was a resounding no. 'When I go to somebody's house, I only take wine that I love. Whether it's going to a party, and I'm bringing a $12 bottle, or I'm going to a nice dinner and I'm bringing a $50 bottle, I only take things that I absolutely love,' she said. 'Probably I wouldn't take it for that reason, okay, but that's [just] me. 'I don't think it would be embarrassing to turn up with it. I think people would think it was super cool, and it tastes good.' And the price point? 'I don't think anybody would be disappointed buying it at $30. It's a tasty wine that folks will enjoy and not feel they have spent too much,' she said. When it comes to the celebrity wine genre, Gross is sceptical but not totally dismissive. She said: 'I would always want to look more, how involved is [the celebrity] really? Are they just putting their name on it? Are they involved in the growing, tasting, the blending?' She conceded that the Duchess had given it a good go. Beyond having a 'nice bottle' and a 'pretty logo', Gross said. 'It seems like some thought went into this, and that there is the style that she's trying to get to. 'For me, that means it was intentional and she was thinking about it, as she is tasting and figuring out what she wanted to do. 'She could have put her name on anything,' she said, adding: 'This was an intentional project, where she really thought about what the wine represented, and what she wanted to represent, which was California.' Gross, who is also from California, says that genuinely comes through. 'You have these beautiful winds, you're on the water,' she adds, somewhat wistfully. A punter's verdict 'I liked Meghan's wine the best' I genuinely liked Meghan's wine the best out of all we had tasted. To me, the notes of Cabernet Sauvignon - one of my favourite grapes - were strong and bolshy, adding an element of peppery spice. To drink, it felt almost velvety and was buttery on the palate. Its bright profile made me think of gold, although perhaps more of the kind you get with costume jewellery, that turns brassy over time. The smell was my least favourite thing about it, reminiscent of the vaguely artificial tang when someone near you opens a bag of Skittles, or something a little soapy. Overall, I enjoyed it but I would probably be equally as happy with a chilled glass of your local supermarket's finest £10 pinot blush. The best things I sampled in Cork was the chips — recently crowned the best in the city, according to Washington City Paper. Perfectly fluffy morsels in golden, frangible, oil-kissed jackets, smothered with herbs and garlic and served with a brothy homemade ketchup that was more akin to a luxurious tomato bisque than a squeeze of Heinz. If Meghan had a product of that calibre, she'd have a returning customer in me. 'It burned the back of my throat' Like our expert, Meghan's rosé was my least favourite of the three we sampled. Let me preface my review with the disclaimer that while I am one of life's great wine lovers, I am far from a connoisseur. My tastes are narrow and specific; Sauvignon Blanc, namely from Marlborough, New Zealand; Vinho Verde, Provençal rosé, Lambrusco, the occasional Crémant and champagne when the occasion calls for it (and sometimes when it doesn't.) As Ever did not have the refreshing qualities I look for in a rosé. It burned in the back of my throat, and I found the taste aggressive. For that reason, Meghan's latest labour of love will not earn a place in my restrictive wine rotation.
Daily Mail
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
'Nail in the coffin' for Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's $100m Netflix deal was poor sales of her As Ever wine
Another 'nail in the coffin' for Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's $100million Netflix deal was that her Napa Valley wine 'isn't selling', an insider at the streaming giant has claimed. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have also fallen out of favour with A-listers, especially the former Suits star, MailOnline's source has said. 'No one in Hollywood rates them anymore or wants to be around them, especially her', the insider said, adding: 'People are bored with them'. Netflix, who have been her As Ever brand's business partner, is believed to have declined to renew the couple's $100million five-year deal in September after their two most recent shows flopped. The Duchess of Sussex has 'had everything going for her ' but the viewing figures for With Love, Meghan have still been 'dismal' and there will be no more shows made, one insider has said. Meghan's lifestyle show failed to break into Netflix 's top 300 programmes for the first half of 2025 and was even thrashed by multiple seasons of Suits. While Harry's passion project documentary Polo ranked at a disastrous 3,436 out of 7,000 shows and was only watched by 500,000 people. Netflix has been working with Meghan to launch and promote her products, some of which have been made by their preferred suppliers, including her jam. MailOnline's insider at the streaming giant has said that Meghan's rosé, which promises to 'capture the essence of sun-drenched outdoor moments', has not been a huge success and this was another 'nail in the coffin' for the $100million broadcast deal. 'The wine isn't selling', they said. Meghan has most recently launched a range of wines but a Netflix insider has claimed the sales have been poor Commenting on As Ever's claims the wine sold out in an hour, the source added: 'It's small batch' - meaning it was only ever produced in a small quantity. Netflix believes the launch has shown that 'there isn't a demand for her wine from a mass market point of view' and this means a bigger and more lucrative supermarket or department store deal is 'unlikely', the source claimed. Customers had to purchase a minimum of three bottles for $90 or six bottles for $159, and 12 bottles for $300. This mean there was a minimum spend of $119, as buyers were also charged $20 for shipping, plus taxes. 2025 has been billed as the year the Sussexes would relaunch. As well as Meghan's new TV show and lifestyle business, the couple have been out and about at concerts including multiple Beyonce shows. There was also a flurry of activity on Meghan's Instagram account, including a number of personal family video such as twerking when about to give birth. 'Meghan hasn't posted on her own socials for nearly a month', MailOnline Netflix insider said. 'The issue is that there's no consistency and people are bored with them. Many stars go silent and in the background are building their brand and equity but it feels like Harry and Meghan are losing their way even more. 'The Netflix deal not being renewed will have a big impact on them as they are running out of options of who will work with them and reap in the future. 'As Ever has a good fan base and a strong database of subscribers to its newsletter but consistency is key and it's not delivering on this so people will quickly be bored and the novelty is wearing off now for most'. MailOnline has asked Netflix and the Duke and Duchess of Sussex to comment. 'There's no animosity from either side', one source told The Sun. 'Things have just run their course. 'Netflix execs are well aware Meghan's priority now is her own brand, and they won't play second fiddle to that'. She also posted a video of her and Prince Harry dancing in a hospital room ahead of Lilibet's birth as part of a flurry of Instagram activity Meghan Markle and Prince Harry's hopes of a new Netflix deal are 'dead', a source was quoted as saying earlier this week. The Duchess of Sussex has 'had everything going for her ' but the viewing figures for With Love, Meghan have still been 'dismal', an insider at the streamer reportedly said. A second season of With Love, Meghan, was announced by the Duchess herself as the first season came out in March this year as part of the couple's $100million deal with the streaming giant, which expires this year. But a Netflix source has claimed: 'This deal is dead. 'She had everything going for her—name, platform, press—and the numbers were dismal. 'They're just waiting for the credits to roll. They're letting it expire without drama. There's no appetite for anything new.' Former executive editor of the American edition of Ok! magazine, Rob Shuter, has claimed that the streaming giant will not offer them a new contract once it concludes. 'The interest just isn't there anymore. They went from buzzy to background noise', a Netflix source told Mr Shuter. Some experts have even claimed that Netflix will want 'to keep a vague hand in' with them in case Meghan and Harry ever split up, so they can get in first with a docu-series on a divorce. There are rumours that they could leave the door open for one-off projects with the Sussexes, although apart from their fly-on-the-wall documentary, Harry & Meghan, most of their shows have been considered flops. MailOnline has asked Netflix to comment. As Ever, which showed Meghan cooking, gardening and hosting friends, was outperformed by hundreds of shows in the first six months of this year. Millions more people watched repeats of Suits, which made Meghan Markle a star before she met Prince Harry. Its 5.3million viewers put it roughly on a par with the second series of BBC hit Peaky Blinders, a 2007 series of Gossip Girl, kids show Grizzly and the Lemmings and a true crime show called Worst Ex Ever. Yesterday MailOnline revealed how two of North America's leading brand experts have claimed Meghan Markle is a 'fraud' and As Ever is all about 'milking' her fame from marrying Prince Harry to 'sucker people into buying her stuff'. Canadian lawyer Phillip Millar and California marketing executive Camille Moore, stars of popular The Art of the Brand podcast, believe the launch and concept of her lifestyle business has been one of the worst they have ever seen. 'I love sh***ing on people who suck. Meghan Markle sucks as far as I'm concerned', Mr Millar has said. 'It [As Ever] is run by a confederacy of dunces working on this platform that is just maximising the value from her fame that came from Suits and being a part of the Royal Family and they're just milking that for everything they can'. Millar and Moore, who have advised big businesses including Mercedes-Benz, L'Oreal, Olaplex, Dior, Van Cleef and Air Canada, say Meghan's business has been a 'royal disaster'. Mr Millar believes that As Ever lacks authenticity because he claims that Meghan is 'pretending' to be a domestic goddess and most people don't believe it. But he added that the people who have rushed to buy her wine, jam, crepe mix and tea shows 'how gullible a lot of consumers are'. Canadian lawyer Phillip Millar and California marketing executive Camille Moore, stars of popular The Art of the Brand podcast, believe the launch and concept of her lifestyle business has been one of the worst they have ever seen He said: 'She's not substantial. I'm agitated by her so much because it is a deliberate misrepresentation of what she is because she thinks she can pretend to be that while actually being this and sucker people into buying her stuff and every step of the way she's failing because it's not legitimate. It's not intelligent. It's not well executed. 'There was nothing about her brand that was good from the start to a distinguishing eye. She was a fraud what I can see from the beginning who was just using opportunities to advance herself. Her brand wasn't one built on substance. It was based on using people. 'They're not executing anything well on any show on anything. But it shows how gullible a lot of consumers are'. Mr Millar said that investors including Netflix appear to have failed to ask serious questions of Meghan before the launch. 'People who consider themselves smart because nobody ever questions them are running this business and telling her to use a playbook that works for products where scarcity matters. Confectionery scarcity doesn't matter. He added: 'There's an egocentric approach to it that if you achieve some level of celebrity, you think you can build a brand, but that's the start of your brand. You can make short-term money from it, but it's not a long-term strategy'. Phillip believes Meghan has failed to see what she really is - a 'disruptor' rather than a homemaker. He said: 'Her brand should be I'm a disruptor. I go into TV. I make noise. I go into the Royal Family. I make noise. She should brand herself as a rebel, but she's not consistent with what she is. 'She should be a disruptor and sell products that are not that expensive and that represent disruption, but that audience is not spending a lot of money'. Ms Moore said Meghan is responsible 'for really probably having the worst brand execution to date', adding: 'She's had zero ownership in this business. It's effectively like she's just like labeling her brand'. She added: 'I feel like she's doing such a brutal or good job, depending on how you're looking at it, of getting this like free PR and then absolutely s***ing the bed'.
Bangkok Post
23-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Bangkok Post
Versailles orchestra plays New York in 'Affair of the Poisons'
NEW YORK — Acrobatics, fortune tellers, opulent gowns and palace intrigue: the New York debut of the Versailles Royal Opera Orchestra was a performance befitting the era it recalls. Monday's immersive show " Versailles in Printemps: The Affair of the Poisons" centred on France's 17th-century period of excess and seediness that its creator, Andrew Ousley, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) has parallels to the present day. At the evening staged in Manhattan's new Printemps luxury emporium, guests and performers alike donned velvet waistcoats, silky corsets, feathered headdresses and powdered makeup. Core to the performance's tale was the discovery of arsenic, Ousley said -- the first "untraceable, untasteable poison." "Everybody was just poisoning everybody." And at the web's center? A midwife and fortune teller named La Voisin, he said, a "shadowy-like person who basically would peddle poison, peddle solutions, peddle snake oil." "She was the nexus," Ousley continued, in a scheme that "extended up to Louis XIV, his favorite mistresses" -- inner circles rife with backstabbing and murder plots. The poisoning scandal resulted in a tribunal that resulted in dozens of death sentences -- until the king called it off when it "got a little too close to home," Ousley said with a smile. "To me, it speaks to the present moment -- that this rot can fester underneath luxury and wealth when it's divorced from empathy, from humanity." Along with a program of classical music, the performance included elaborately costumed dancers, including one who tip-toed atop a line of wine bottles in sparkling platform heels. The drag opera artist Creatine Price was the celebrant of the evening's so-called " Black Mass," and told Agence France-Presse (AFP) that the night was "a beautiful way to sort of incorporate the ridiculousness, the campness, the farce of Versailles with a modern edge." Drag is "resistance," she said, adding that her act is "the essence of speaking truth to power, because it really flies in the face of everything in the opera that is standard, whether it's about gender or voice type." Period instruments The Versailles Royal Opera Orchestra formed in 2019, and its first stateside tour is underway: the series of shows kicked off at Festival Napa Valley in California before heading to New York. On Wednesday it will play another, more traditional show at L'Alliance New York, a French cultural center in Manhattan. The orchestra aims to champion repertoire primarily from the 17th and 18th centuries, and plays on period instruments. "Playing a historical instrument really gives me a feeling of being in contact with the era in which the music was composed," said Alexandre Fauroux, who plays the natural horn, a predecessor to the French horn distinguished by its lack of valves. Ousley runs the organisation Death of Classical, an arts non-profit that puts on classical shows in unexpected places, including the catacombs of Brooklyn's Green-Wood Cemetery and crypts in Manhattan. Monday's spectacle included over-the-top performance, but Ousley emphasised that the evening was ultimately a celebration of classical artists. "These are players who play with such energy, to me it's more like a rock band than an orchestra," he said. "When you can sit and feel, with a group of strangers, something that you know you feel together -- that's why I work, because of that shared connection, experience and transcendence."
