Friday, April 19, 6:30 P.M.*
Members $65, guests $75

*Please note special time. All tastings begin promptly at 6:30 P.M.; there is no reception.

You can't find a wine lover around New York, or the United States for that matter, who hasn't heard of Morrell & Company. Founded almost 55 years ago, the family-owned, Manhattan-based wine shop has grown into one of the premier wine purveyors in the world, with an inventory of more than 2,700 labels. That's a lot of wine. And with a relocation to Rockefeller Center in 1999, the Morrell family devised a splendid way to move even more of it than they do at their extremely successful and elegant shop. The Morrell Wine Bar & Café opened in November of that same year, with 1,500 wines on the list to choose from and a deliciously complementary menu prepared by chef de cuisine Michael Haimowitz. At this Beard House tasting, you'll have a chance to sample both.

Haimowitz is a CIA grad who grew up in New Jersey. For his externship from school, he traveled to California, to Bradley Ogden's kitchens at The Lark Creek Inn in Larkspur, to be more exact. After school it was back to California and a stint as chef tournant in Wolfgang Puck's Granita in Malibu. Positions in the brigades at Trio in Chicago and Harry's at Hanover Square and The Globe in New York readied him for his solo debut behind the stove in the elegant Morrell Wine Bar. "Michael Haimowitz," said The New York Times, "somehow manages to send out satisfying, well-conceived dishes from his closet-size kitchen." If you are a regular reader of the Times reviews, you'll know that isn't faint praise.

The bar's extensive wine list is overseen by Morrell Group chairman and wine adviser Peter Morrell and managing director Nikos Antonakeas. Back in 1970, it was Morrell who paid the highest price ever at auction for a bottle of wine, $528 for an 1865 Château Lafite-Rothschild, a bottle that later sold for $28,000. His wine- and business-trend-spotting abilities didn't stop there. In 1994 he staged the first New York State auction of privately held wines, and since then Morrell & Company has brought the gavel down on more than $8 million worth of wine auction sales. He's received commendations from the French and Italian governments for his knowledge and promotion of their countries' wines. Supporting Morrell and his company's auction endeavors is Nikos Antonakeas, a renowned wine expert in his own right.

New York magazine said the Morrell Wine Bar & Cafe "has taken connoisseurship to the next level." According to J. Walman, that level is "A+." Internet restaurant critic Steven "The Fat Guy" Shaw concurred in a recent review. "As for the charms of this unheralded restaurant," he wrote, "it goes without saying that the wine list…is incomparable…But the real surprise here is how delicious the food is." No surprise to us.