Vintner Michael Mondavi knows what he wants to put in the bottle, he's just not sure what he can put on the label, reports the Modesto Bee.

Two years after leaving the family business in a messy internal squabble and subsequent corporate takeover, he has purchased a winery in Napa Valley , where he plans to produce a high-end cabernet sauvignon that would reprise the famous Mondavi name.

One hitch: Constellation Brands Inc., the world's largest wine company, acquired the name when it bought Robert Mondavi Corp. of Oakville for US$1 billion from the family and public shareholders.

Michael Mondavi's uncle Peter Mondavi owns the rights to make wine under the CK Mondavi Family Vineyards label. The unrelated company dates to the 1943 purchase of Charles Krug Winery in St. Helena by family patriarch Cesare Mondavi.

That leaves Michael Mondavi in a quandary over what he can call the new premium wine, which will be made at the Carneros Creek Winery he acquired from Francis and Kathleen Mahoney in a deal announced last Monday.

Carneros will become the permanent home for Michael Mondavi's I'M, Oberon and Hangtime labels, previously produced there on contract. The grapes will come from several hundred acres of vineyard he owns elsewhere in Napa County as well as the winery's 10-acre vineyard.

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