The Wine Messenger
Cristina Mariani-May is family proprietor and co-CEO of Banfi Vintners, America’s leading wine importer, and the award winning Castello Banfi Vineyard Estate in Montalcino, Tuscany.

The Wine Messenger
The NYC Insiders Guide
for women who aren't kids
Recommendations for Celebrating Mom and Mother Earth

Natura Sauvignon Blanc (100% Organically Grown Grapes) - Made from 100% organically grown Sauvignon Blanc grapes, nurtured in the cool climate of Northern Chile’s famed Casablanca Valley.  Organically grown grapes bring forth mineral notes and hints of peach and lime.  Full and round with flavors of apple, pear and herbs, the wine finishes with crisp acidity and good balance.  Average US retail around $12.

Novas Cabernet-Merlot (100% Organically Grown Grapes) - Made from 100% organically grown Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot grapes, from Chile’s Central Valley, this deep ruby red wine features aromas of ripe dark fruit mixed with a hint of mocha.  The palate is smooth with flavors of black cherry and strawberry folded with a bit of cream, round tannins and a balanced body.  Average US retail around $15.

Coyam  Red Chilean Cuvee (Certified Biodynamic Wine) The word Coyam, meaning oak, was used by the Mapuches, the original inhabitants of Chile. Ancient oaks surround the Emiliana vineyards where these biodynamic grapes are grown in harmony with the natural rhythms and forces, seen and unseen.  This blend of six biodynamic varieties (Syrah, Merlot, Carmenere, Cabernet Sauvignon, Malbec and Mourvedre) is intensely violet in color, with elegant expressions of ripe blackberries and cassis, delicately balanced by notes of oak, mineral, toffee and chocolate.  Average US retail around $35.



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Of a Mom and Mother Earth
Cristina Mariani-May
co-CEO Banfi Vintners


In this season of Mother’s Day and Earth Day, it seems very appropriate for me to salute one of the great women of wine and the wines she inspired.

Doña Emiliana Subercaseaux is often affiliated with the men in her life – her father, Don Ramón Subercaseaux, and her husband, Don Melchor Concha y Toro.  Her marriage brought these two Chilean families, both wealthy from silver mining, together, the epicenter of their world being Don Ramón’s farmland in the Pirque region just outside of Santiago.  He planted grapevines there in 1860 along the bank of the Maipo river, and after his death Don Melchor and Dona Emiliana hired a French enologist to plant vintes yielding the noble varietals of the Bordeaux region.  Passionate for nature, she also landscaped the gardens around their home as a breathtaking park.

Emiliana and Melchor purchased another estate a few years later and planted a second vineyard as their wine business became a burgeoning empire.  Upon Don Melchor’s death in 1892, his widow and their son Juan Enrique ran the firm.  But as proof of who really held the power, when Concha y Toro was incorporated in 1923, 75% of the shares were issued to Doña Emiliana.  In 1929, she gave most of those shares to her five daughters; though Concha y Toro began to be traded on Santiago’s stock exchange in 1933, Doña Emiliana’s daughters still owned nearly one-third of the stock as late as 1947. 

Concha y Toro became and remains Chile’s leading wine producer and is critically acclaimed for making some of the country’s – and world’s – best wines. Its most prestigious cuvee was named for Don Melchor himself, but an even more appropriate honor was bestowed upon Emiliana.  In the late 1990s Concha y Toro pioneered sustainable, organic and biodynamic viticulture on a collection of prime vineyard estates and named the affiliate after the nature-loving, strong willed tomato who inspired them – Emiliana. 

So here are three great wines to enjoy this Mother’s Day, raising a toast to all of us mothers, all of our own mothers, to Doña Emiliana, and to Mother Earth!