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RUTHERFORD, Calif. — Half a century ago, a Croatian immigrant’s Chardonnay stunned the French and put Napa Valley on the map forever. We went inside Grgich Hills Estate to hear how that bottle changed everything.
Half a century ago, a bottle of Chardonnay made by a charming Croatian immigrant shook the wine world to its foundations. This year, as the 50th anniversary of the legendary 1976 Judgment of Paris approaches, that story is being told anew from the sun-drenched vineyards of Grgich Hills Estate in St. Helena, where the legacy is very much alive and still fermenting.
Miljenko “Mike” Grgich arrived in Napa Valley in 1958 with little more than a dream and a university degree in viticulture and oenology. He had grown up in a small, poor village in Croatia, where wine wasn’t a luxury it was simply life. “My father grew up actually stomping grapes and making wine,” recalls his daughter Violet, now President of Grgich Hills Estate, who has been working at the winery since 1977. From those humble beginnings, Mike rose to craft the 1969 Cabernet that put Robert Mondavi on the map, before moving to Chateau Montelena, where he made the Chardonnay that would rewrite history.
The Judgment of Paris was, in Violet’s telling, almost accidental in its ambition. Wine merchant Steven Spurrier and colleague Patricia Gallagher organized a blind tasting to celebrate the American Bicentennial, pitting California wines against the finest French Burgundies and Bordeaux before an all-French panel of professional judges. The odds were deliberately stacked. The result was seismic. “The number one winner overall was the Chardonnay that my father made at Chateau Montelena,” says Violet, “and Stag’s Leap won the red portion, so two Napa Valley wineries.” The reverberations were felt far beyond California. “I think it also encouraged, particularly people on the West Coast, to start enjoying wine a little bit more often, not just as something for special occasions.”
Mike went on to found Grgich Hills Estate in 1977, and the winery has been family-owned ever since. In 2022, it became regenerative organic certified, guided by a philosophy rooted in restraint and respect for the land. Winemaker and VP Ivo Jeramaz, Mike’s nephew, carries that torch today. “We recognize there’s no great wine without great grapes,” he says. “Chemicals are not good for us, for nature, or for the quality of wine.” The approach is almost meditative in its simplicity: let the soil work, step back, and trust nature.
In 2023, Mike Grgich passed away at nearly 101 years old, still selling wine in his final week. He drank it just about every day of his life. “He’s one of the healthiest people we knew, and definitely one of the happiest,” Violet says with a smile. His founding spirit lives on in the estate’s ethos, and perhaps most purely in his own words: “If wine doesn’t bring nothing more, just the smile and the happiness of the people, I think it’s worthwhile to try.”
At Grgich Hills, they’re still trying. And the world is still smiling.
For more information, visit https://grgich.com/
