Adel’s Wine Cellar

This family owed shop is a real gem. The owner is very helpful in finding a wine in your price range that is delicious. He gives good deals on the flowers outside of his shop also!

I was searching for a hard to find wine so I contacted the wine maker who referred me to Adel. I was VERY pleased with the service I received.
1. I called and he answered the phone.
2. Adel knew exactly what wine I was referring to.
3. Had it in stock.
4. Reasonably priced.
5. Took my info. over the phone and shipped it over night. I had 4 bottles delivered to my doorstep the very next day.
What else can I say, but 5 stars!

This shop is definitely underrated.
They have an absolutely fantastic selection of wines and vintages. It’s not all just 2012s and 2013s. They have some of my favorite wines (Ridge, St. Innocent) in many different vintages. Over the past few days, I’ve purchased a 1997, a 1999 and a 2003. There aren’t many places you can go and do that. Sure, each bottle was just under $ 50, but the selection is terrific.

Wonderfully eclectic mix of CA and international wines, many that are hard to get even in the better Bay Area grocery stores. No pretense or snobbery is evident in the proprietor, either, which is great when you’re just looking to be experimental. For those wines that I have bought elsewhere I noticed that the prices are a few bucks higher here, but I will always gladly pay for the experience when it’s a personal, local thing. Going through the partially organized piles of wine took me back to exploring Foyle’s bookshop in London. If you go in with nothing more specific in mind than «wine» then you’ll likely find something fun and you’ll be smiling on the way out. For me, this is the way wine shopping should be. Definitely going back. My biggest complaint? Two entire rows of snacks for sale! Yeah, I know Adel’s running a business, but all I could think was how much better pinot noir looks on a shelf than Snickers bars.

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While waiting for Zazie, we walked up this way to venture out and work up our appetite. We randomly ran in this Adel’s Wine Cellar because of the gorgeous sunflowers that they sell here. Then I walked in the shop with the though this is just any other neighborhood wine shop. Little that I know to my pleasantly surprise, I saw a decent selection of Barbaresco, Alsace, then I was staring at it.
I then complimented the man who ran the shop. He asked if we would like to see more. Hell yeah, I said. He pointed us to the room upstairs. Only if I knew, I was like the kid in a candy shop. I left my lover and started to touching almost every bottle here. The old wold wines selection is freaking AWESOME. It’s my kind of wines.
Oh my lovers, amazing selection of Grand Cru Bordeaux, Burgundy, Michel Chapoutier, he’s the king of Rhone in the last 2 decades — Northern and Southern Rhone, and Sauternes.
— 1995, 1996 M. Chapoutier Chateauneuf-​du-​Pape La Bernardine, Rhone
— 1975 Château Palmer, Margaux, Third Growth. Troisieme Grand Cru Classe in 1855. I got a few of these at home and drank a few at Picasso in Bellagio, exquisite.
— 1981 Château La Mission Haut-​Brion, Pessac-​Leognan, Cru Classe de Graves in 1959 — I can drink this all day, every day!
— 1982 Domaine de Chevalier, Pessac-​Leognan, oh LOVE!
Think of a kid in a candy shop. Well I don’t eat desserts or anything sweet, but I drink fine old word wines. We picked up a few bottles and can’t wait to pop it soon.
For those who complain about the price points, I beg to be differ. If you want something at BevMo, go there. Adel’s Wine Cellar is definitely wine lovers like myself. We know what we want and we get. If you try to compare with Internet price, you got no idea what you will get. There”s no return policy online through brokers. Plus shipping cost, tax, insurance, you end up paying more.
That’s not including the condition of the bottle. Price changes as the bottle shoulder fills, it can change the bottle price from hundreds to thousands of Dollar. So with this old world wines, you need to know what you are getting.
Well, I found my little «candy shop» and I can’t wait to come back to visit all my future lovers. For now, I got to drink those lovers in my cellar that we just got from Adel’s Wine Cellar. I’ll be back… SOON!
P. S. if you are bout to scream at me, I’m not professional, I’m just a level II Somm. That’s all. Thank you!

Nice selection of some hard to find wines.
That being said ridiculously over priced and pricing is clearly based on the mantra «it’s old therefore it must be expensive.» Simply, this is a terrible way to price wine. $ 60 for 2005 Copain Tour Ensemble? Really? $ 28 retail for the most recent vintage, so the previous was probably even cheaper. 7 years in the bottle doesn’t double the price for a wine that probably peaked a couple years ago. Just one example and believe me I could go on, but you get the point.
Probably better to look elsewhere but fun to poke around.

Adel and his brother are always super friendly to me and their recommendations are spot-​on 95% of the time. Sooo. .. not sure where some of the reviews below are coming from. Another complaint seems to be that Adel’s prices higher than online — duh, he has overhead just like every other brick & mortar business. That said, I haven’t seen any egregious markups. Finally, to those who complain about buying a corked bottle — well, that’s just a fact of buying older wines. If you think the wine is spoiled from poor storage, bring it back and talk to Adel about it.
At least everybody can agree that Adel’s offers a unique and impressive selection. I love Adel’s and will keep going back and back.

Everytime I go there, the guy behind the counter is always rude. Why have a business like this when you can’t be nice. I will never go back ever.

Adel’s is a hidden gem for wine enthusiasts and novices alike. Adel is very knowledgable about his wine and good scotch and very friendly to boot. I’ve gone in and bought a $ 400 wine as well as a $ 20 wine and felt like I was getting a deal every single time. Adel has looked after me and my wife for several years and I consider him like a father/​brother figure. His brother Abdul is also very helpful and friendly. In short a very good wine shop run by some great people. Perfect wine shop for Cole Valley.

Great selection of wine, ranging from vintage to «everyday». Really nice guy and very helpful.

Came in to Adel’s today for the first time, looking for a nice bottle of champagne for New Year’s Eve. They seemed very helpful, showing me a number of options. I ended up dropping a substantial amount of money on a bottle that was «very rare» and good. Got home, looked it up online, and found that I was overcharged by about 50%. Dozens of places carried the same vintage and none were anywhere near the price I was charged.
If you know your wines, and have a good idea of what they should cost, this might be a good place to shop. But if you’re just some schmuck coming in off the street, be aware that you might get fleeced.

If you are a San Franciscan wine lover of older vintages you should be happy that Adel’s exists.
I don’t know of anywhere else that has so much older burgundy and rhone, and there is a good selection of mosel, port and californian wine.
Its inevitable when selling older bottles that some will not be in good condition (hence some disappointed reviews), but I’ve not had a problem yet and see no evidence that this problem is particularly bad at Adels.
I’d love to know if he accepts returns for out-​of-​condition or corked wine. Has anyone tried.

When you need that special bottle and no one else has it the come here they have an amazing collection.

Let’s do a «good and bad» (which is going to sound weird if you see the 5 star rating but you’ll understand).
Good:
— arguably the best collection of rare vintage wines in the city,
— once you get to know Adel, he’ll steer you to the right wines for your taste,
— a ton of unique wines.
Bad:
— if you don’t know Adel and/​or he doesn’t serve you himself then you might find nothing of interest or get bad results,
— if Adel doesn’t like you you’re doomed,
— if you just want to buy the most recent darling of Wine Spec you won’t find it.
I’ve been buying wine here for more than 15 years. I’m a semi serious collector. I’ve bought wine from pretty much every other source in the Bay Area (and LA and NYC). I’ve bought one corked wine from Adel in that time (and he replaced it).
But I pretty much give Adel the parameters («I want to spend X, I want to get Y bottles of wine, so many for drinking in the short term and so many for laying down and you know what I like»). He selects the wine and I can veto if I want.
A couple things to know that might help people out.
1 — the wine on «display» represents a small percentage of total wine available.
2 — he doesn’t carry any wine from South Africa (due to an unfortunate soccer incident).
3 — the best deals are on the older vintage wines (mostly look for stuff that is more than 10 years old).
4 — check your wine geek ego at the door.

Come here for two reasons, the depth of the wine selections and Adel himself.
First the wine. The selection is outstanding. Some regions are a bit underrepresented (there are better options for Bordeaux and Piedmont) but the vintage depth is tremendous. I’d be a bit concerned about the storage, but I’ve yet to encounter any issues, even with wines that are over 20 years old. I won’t discount others experiences, but I haven’t had any problems.
Next Adel. He’s almost the wine nazi. He’s passionate, opinionated, and well connected and is more than happy to share his unique view on the wine industry and wines themselves. Get him rolling on the changes in prices on wine and you will be grateful. The trick is to engage him as much as possible, not shrink from him.
The bad: Organization that reminds me of junior high students bedroom. Mild effort to organize by region, no effort by vintage or winery, and many bins have to be dug through. Plus, like someone else said, the food is nothing more than your liquor store convenience, not anything you’d actually serve with a good wine.
Ultimately, five stars for an impressive vertical depth and a truly unique wine purveyor.

Came in here trying to buy some port to get drunk on. Seeing the large selection I hoped for some banyuls shit up in here… bought instead I left with port.
Need wine? This place is fine.

Adel’s Wine Cellar does have an impressive collection of hard to find wines in his «secret» room. Screaming Eagle, Harlan, even some DRC. However I would not trust the purchase of such expensive wines in a place that stores wine with a single window type AC as a cooling unit (check out the 2^nd floor).
Prices are always a bit on the high-​end, just look it up in
or
and you will see that Adel’s prices are usually 10−30% above the average. Do yourself a favor and shop elsewhere. What others have said about wines being vinegar is not a joke, just go there and see for yourself.

I can’t say that I know enough about wine to pass judgment on Adel’s, nor have I been there enough to really render a fair verdict. Here’s what I do know:
The wine collection is certainly expansive and expensive relative to other wine shops. I found wine from nearly every region and varietal I’d ever heard of (and plenty that I hadn’t). You’ll have a hard time finding wine that’s priced under $ 10 a bottle, but you’ll be in luck if you’re looking for some good $ 20+ bottles.
The food+drink inventory is quite below par. If you’re looking for a snack here, you’re out of luck. What’s there has a significant premium, even for a Cole Valley convenience story you’ll be paying more.
The flower selection outside always looks fresh, but I’m not a man that’s savvy on the price of lilies, so I don’t know how much you’ll have to pony up.
Help was great, Adel gave me a nice walk through of some of the choices I was considering. A friend told me that Adel occasionally opens a bottle and sips it through the afternoon. If you’re lucky enough to catch him in this state, a free tasting awaits you. Could be a Cole Valley legend. Who knows.
I’m going back here again when I need to buy a nice bottle of wine. And you should too, dammit.

Great selection, liked a lot the small cellar for the top shelf bottles, not that many wines from Piemonte but a wide selection from Tuscany. Also check their website before going, it will save you time. Adel admitted that some bottles may be in the store… but he doesn’t know where. He can be a little be mean and this is perfectly reflected in the store style. Corner-​store attitude applied to vintages selection, pure buying pleasure, challenge him. I didn’t drink my bottles yet so far then, 3 stars. I’ll post an update soon for the quality of those bottles.
UPDATE: maaaan. 3 out of 3: vinegar. Two Cotes du Rhone Saint Cosme (2003 and a Deux Albion 2004) + a Beaujolais Villages 2004. Sorry but «Vino» on California and Fillmore took my heart.

I prefer to go to The Jug Shop (415) 885‑2922
because Adel can be pushy and is mean to me cause of my South African husband. I mean come on my husband was a kid during Apartheid and is married to a Asian-​American soon to be Anthropologist and can hardly be considered racist!
Also HELLO there are native owned and operated wineries there now! INDABA anyone???
Besides I could say some things about the Egyptian government’s sucking of money and redtape for anthropologists and archaeologists who want to futher the study of mankinds origins.