Cameron Hughes isn’t a winery and doesn’t have a tasting room.  Cameron is a real guy in San Francisco who buys premium already made wine, bottles and labels it, and sells it mostly through Costco and Safeway.

Yep, vintners around California have already made the wine but need to pawn off some for a variety of reasons, such as need money now, too much to sell through their distribution system, or it isn’t quite what their niche market wants.

At the 2008 Wine Bloggers Conference in Santa Rosa I was heading to my room in the hotel when two Cameron Hughes staff came toward me carrying bottles of wine.  I told them it was my wife’s birthday and I would love to bring her some wine in our room.  I scored two bottles of Sonoma County Cab.  That was the first I had heard of Cameron Hughes.  We loved the wine!!  Katya was delighted with the gift.

The past couple of years all of our wine, lots of cases, have come from our tasting room adventures.  A few weeks ago I headed to Costco and spent about $300 on various wines in the $8 – $10 range.  I came out with quite a haul and so far we like almost all of it.  Two bottles were Cameron Hughes.

Again, the Cameron Hughes wine, a Napa Merlot (Lot 112), is a favorite and the price is great. You would pay $22 or more in a tasting room.

Buying at Costco lacks the experience of a cozy tasting room and a road trip but hey, this is not to be ignored.  CH wine is a delight and the variety is an adventure.

- jim

I mentioned to the Cameron Hughes guys at the Wine Bloggers Conference that my wife’s birthday was that day (Saturday) and I didn’t have a present.  So they gave me two bottles of their 2006 Cab Sauv.  One from Chalk Hill and the other from a Mt. Veeder vineyard.

This rainy afternoon we are trying them both.  The taste and nose is very different.  We really like both.  We slightly prefer the Chalk Hill.  Just fun to taste the difference between two AVA’s in the same mountains between Russian River and Napa regions.  Both are worth trying and do them together for more fun.  I have no idea what the retail prices are but you can sort that out online.  Costco carries these wines.

Now, what was Katya’s reaction to receiving two free bottles of wine from her husband?  She was excited as always.  They may as well have been diamond rings.  She’s always happy when her hunter-gatherer husband brings home the goodies. 

- jim