Yesterday I said that we had geeked out on data to figure
out where to go, which is true for the rest of the trip. But today, we started
out without a plan. I thought this post might be a time to outline what we’ve
learned about visiting wine country in case you’re looking to plan a trip and
aren’t sure where to start.
1)
Have a plan, especially on the weekends.
Particularly in Napa, it’s tough any more to just walk into anything that isn’t
humongous without an appointment. If you don’t have a plan, you can end up
spending the better part of your day driving north to south and not tasting
wine. Bummer!
2) Go during the week – avoid weekends like the
plague. Weekends are crazy out here! Wall to wall limo buses, hen/stag parties,
wedding (heh,) and traffic jams. I’m not saying it can’t be fun, but especially
if you’re going to ignore rule #1, it can be tough.
3)
Go to a place you know and love and go somewhere
you’ve never heard of. This is the place to branch out. You can drink all of
Kendall-Jackson or Nickle & Nickle or Opus One’s portfolio in Ohio, and
there’s nothing wrong with that! But you won’t get the chance to meet the
winemaker or grower or owner in Ohio and have her explain why she chose the
blend she did for that bottle, or why he chose to harvest those grapes a little
later than everyone else for that vintage, etc. Have the experiences you can
only have here at least a couple of times.
4)
Ask the locals what they like. Especially during
the week and before noon (Oh…yeah, rule 2.1 is take those 10am tasting slots
during the week. First, they are usually available, even at the last minute and
second you usually get the place to yourself. You’re on vacation! What’s a
little day drinking!?!) when the tasting room is quiet. Like the wines you’re
tasting? Ask the person doing the pouring who’s doing something similar and
interesting. Don’t like the wines they’re pouring? Tell the person ‘These are
great, but we’re looking for something more (fruity, drier, funkier,
accessible, etc) or less (arid, pricey, vanilla, buttery, etc.) Where would you
go?’ We’ve found some great places this way and occasionally get reduced or
waived tasting fees.
5)
Have a code. So, getting away from the big
famous houses is hard, but really rewarding. Dirty secret? It’s a bit
intimidating the first time you do it, especially when you realize that you’re
sitting down with someone intimately involved in making the wine. Why would
that be intimidating you ask? Okay, picture not being in LOOOOOOVE with that
wine. And sitting across from the person who poured their blood, sweat, and
tears into the bottle. Right? Hard. So, Kris and I have a system to share our
opinions with each other but still maintain face when we don’t like something.
I’d suggest using something that speaks to you, but ours is as follows:
i.
‘That’s
nice or Oh, that’s good’ = firm pass. Could be anything from I hate it to
meh, but we’re definitely not buying any of it and it’s not open for
discussion.
ii.
‘I like
that!’ – I would be open to buying a bottle of that, but it’s up to you.
iii.
‘I really
like that!’ – At least one bottle of that IS coming home with us.
iv.
‘I think
we should buy a bottle or two.’ – Negotiations have started on how much we’re
going to buy.
Today we had no plan, so the plan became to head up to
Sonoma to a winery we had been to before and use rule #4 to get some recos. We
headed to Stryker only to find that it had been purchased by the guy who owns
the Las Vegas Knights, Bill Foley (No relation to Robert Foley.) A bit bummed,
but already there, we head in. ‘Super’ Mario ran a great tasting at Foley Sonoma even though we weren’t
super impressed with the new direction their headed. From there, we headed up the
road to deLorimier, a sister to the
Rockpile Vineyards that we tasted at last night. Again, not super excited about
their wines, but they did a nice tasting.
We decided to head into Geyserville because we were running
out of road and it was lunch time. I highly recommend Diavola for lunch. It’s still cool
enough here that we were able to sit out on their back patio to eat. Yummy ‘za
and a series of house cured salumi makes for a nice repast.
Based on Mario’s reco, we hit up Pech Merle. We were fortunate enough
to meet the winemaker for this vineyard while we were tasting. From here we
walked a couple of doors down to a great little tasting room called Locals. This is actually a tasting
collective repping 8-10 small vineyards/winemakers. The gentleman behind the
bar helped us set up a bunch of side by side comparisons and gave us some
really cool compare and contrasts. Locals has a really chill vibe and some great
wines. It’s a great way to learn more about Sonoma. Oh! And did I mention no
tasting fees?
We decided to head back towards the hotel; today we moved
from the weird place out in Windsor to a cute little boutique place in downtown
St. Helena called the Wydown. As we
worked through Calistoga, we stopped by Summers
Winery, based on the recommendation from Locals. Summers has an excellent
Charbono. We headed into St. Helena and checked in to clean up for dinner.
Kris booked us in at Press. We brought a bottle from Pech
with us for dinner (Okay, maybe a bit more wine!) Press has a beautiful space
and a tidy menu. We opted to split a salad, a strip, and a trio of sides. The
salad was delightful.
The steak was good; the sides stole the show. Next time
around, I’d skip dinner and sit at the bar with an order of fries. They are
amazing! We decided to wrap up dinner with a chocolate soufflé. The soufflé was
good, but the rosemary/thyme ice cream with it was divine. When I told the
waiter I though the gelato was sublime, he quickly apologized and offered to
bring me something I might like better. We’ll blame it on the wine and proffer
that perhaps I had mumbled a bit.
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