Wine

Kevin Rathbun’s diminutive wine bar opened in 2005 and remains one of the city’s few casual post-work stopovers—a place to catch up with friends, predinner, over a glass of simple wine (from a list dominated by Spanish, French, and Italian varietals) while noshing on simple meats and cheeses.

"Big, round, chalky stone muscles.” “Invigorated Clementine candy smells.” “Am I allowed to call this a ‘cascade of flowers’? Am I?” Steven Grubbs is the Beat poet of our wine scene.

Former Falcons offensive lineman Chris Hinton owns the most comprehensive wine emporium in the northern suburbs, offering $10 Hess Select Chardonnay and $1,200 Château Latour alike.

Fans of Australian Shiraz2, South African Pinotage, or Argentinian Malbec will note their absence on Miller Union’s beverage roster: Co-owner Neal McCarthy, who compiles the restaurant’s list, avoids the Southern Hemisphere.

This storefront, recently under new ownership, fine-tuned its inventory to support smaller artisan winemakers like the Scholium Project’s Abe Schoener, a Greek philosophy professor turned eccentric vintner.

Dashing wine director Andreas Loaiza compiles the most egalitarian selection in town: His 250-bottle list roughly balances Old World and New World, familiar and esoteric, and prices at all tiers to please every possible taste.

Anne Quatrano and Clifford Harrison’s farm-to-table pioneer might not seem an obvious place to discover inexpensive vino: Its bottle selection over the years, while often affordable, has vacillated between intriguingly obscure and boringly accessible.

Italian-only wine lists are on the rise throughout the city (the affordable options at Buckhead’s just-opened STG Trattoria stand out), but none yet compete with the 200-bottle compendium at Riccardo Ullio’s fourteen-year-old jewel.

Buckhead’s thirty-three-year-old steakhouse has, no contest, the most thrilling restaurant cellar in town. It’s not just the rotating 1,350-bottle selection, or the iPads on which you can peruse the ratings of the fruit-bomb Cabs you’re considering.

Executive chef Kevin Gillespie draws the crowds, but Woodfire’s ace service staff works tirelessly to ensure that the Woodfire experience surpasses expectations.