Saturday, October 25, 7:00 pm
Members $125, guests $150

Since this dinner is being held at the end of October, we imagine that Elias Fernandez, Shafer Vineyard’s celebrated winemaker, will be busy in the cellars brewing up another vintage of wines that Robert Parker has called “consistently brilliant” in the Wine Advocate. That’s why you’ll just have to settle for Shafer’s former head grape crusher—founder, chairman, and all-around “good guy” (per Parker) John Shafer, whose plush, opulent California wines will be matched with Roberto Donna’s lusty Italian food.

The story of John Shafer’s winery’s rise to vinous venerability starts in 1972, when he uprooted his family from suburban Illinois to settle on a rocky little spread just off Napa’s Silverado Trail. He and his 17-year-old son, Doug, now the winery’s president, cleared land for new vineyards, replanted the few existing plots, and, in 1978, crushed their first grapes. The next 20 years are easily summed up as a meteoric rise to the top of the California wine world. Shafer’s Hillside Select Cabernet Sauvignon, made with grapes from those first few acres, is one of the New World’s most acclaimed wines; it can be hard to get your hands on, even at $150 or more for a bottle. Though he’s best known for his wines, John Shafer is also a driving force behind the creation of the official Stags’ Leap American Viticultural Area (AVA), an advocate for sustainable agriculture, and for his charitable work on behalf of Napa Valley’s low-income residents.

By that count, Shafer is well matched with chef Donna, who also prides himself on his nonprofit work with groups like the D.C. Central Kitchen and Share Our Strength. He says he likes to give back to his community for the success it has given him at Galileo, which Washingtonian magazine called “one of the country’s best Italian restaurants.” And they’re not the only ones ladling on the accolades: we gave him an American Express Best Chef: Mid-Atlantic award in 1996; Wine Spectator routinely gives the restaurant its top award, Nation’s Restaurant News has inducted Roberto into their Fine Dining Hall of Fame; and in 1996 the president of Italy called Galileo one of the 20 best Italian restaurants in the world. An advocate of Piemontese cuisine, which he grew up on, Donna oversees some 11 D.C.-area Italian restaurants (by last count). Lately, the chef has been making waves with his new “laboratorio”—a small, private kitchen and dining room in Galileo where he cooks for 20 to 30 guests, improvising multicourse meals, and, according to Marian Burros in The New York Times, entertaining the likes of Ferran Adrià, Mario Batali, and other culinary luminaries.