Sonoma wine country
Today was definitely wine day. No new mammals today, just us as drunk as skunks. Well, we visited five different wineries and tasted more than thirty different wines!
Actually, it’s not as bad as it sounds. In California you pay for a wine tasting ($10 is usual for a small winery, but the fancy places go $15 or more) and yet each taster really is just a wee drop of wine, maybe half as much as a French winemaker will pour you out for free. I was driving too, and so spitting, and so we often shared a tasting; they don’t mind that at all.
Yeah, the fancy places. So it’s pretty clear that there are two kinds of winery. The ones that make wine, and do tastings, and the ones that seem to want to be a sort-of wine theme park for adults. With a delicatessen, and a restaurant, and a pizza bar, and vineyard tours, and cellar room tours, and who knows what else. I feel kinda pleased that we only actually tried one of these places (despite the fact that most of the advertising, the guides, the blogs and even the tourist office will tend to push you at them); it was the most soulless tasting experience and the least exceptional wines of all the ones we tried. Ha! They even had us taste a sparkling prosecco that they get shipped in from Italy… so, wait… I’m visiting your winery and you’re offering me tastings of Italian prosecco?!?
My favourite winery that we found all on our own, through the tried-and-tested formula of randomly picking a place that isn’t on the main road or in the middle of town, was Wellington Winery. We were the only customers that morning, and they allowed us to taste rather more than the five we paid for, including pulling out a bottle of their 1994 Victory red (they’d opened it yesterday for an event) and getting us to compare with the 2004. Oh, and also giving us a side-by-side comparison of the 2004 in single bottle and magnum form. D’you know what? The difference is really noticeable. The single bottle was absolutely damn perfect, whereas the wine from the magnum had clearly aged less (more fruit, less balance) but was going to end up even better in a few more years.
All this was courtesy of their general manager, a big character who had been in the music industry before dipping into wine, and who could hold forth with great authority and complete ignorance about almost anything. Yorick was Hamlet’s brother, apparently.
The homes of Sonoma
I mustn’t forget to mention Sonoma itself. It’s a lovely town, set (almost uniquely, in my small American experience) around a grassy town square. The surrounding residential streets are veeeery well-to-do, with rosy bowers and painted verandas, and little glimpses of tastefully expensive furnishings within. You could certainly get sozzled without getting in your car too, as there are almost thirty wineries and bars offering tastings around the square! Though it’d be a shame not to get out into the wine country.
Our meal at the famous(ish) The Girl & The Fig restaurant wasn’t as good as last night’s, although being sat outside when it was a tad too cool and being a bit fuzzy from plonk may have negatively impacted our memory of the food. Then again, our lunch at The Fig Cafe in Glen Ellen (same owners, see?) was more style than substance so perhaps it’s rather over-rated. Then again again, this was actually quite grown-up food compared to most of what we find to eat in America, so good for them.
The effect of wine
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