Young and I spent this past weekend in Sonoma, attending the wedding of our friends Karen and Nino in Healdsburg. We decided to make a weekend out of the trip, with the intent of doing a day of wine tasting on Saturday.
After a bit of googling, I signed us up for a winery and tasting tour organized by John Burdick. He only takes groups of up to 10 people, and he seemed very entheusiastic about wine and the Sonoma wineries. Our expectations for the tour were high, and those expectations were generally exceeded in every respect. All of the wineries on the tour would be considered botique wineries that specialise in small production (< 10,000 cases/year) high-quality wines.
We met the group at the Fairmont in Sonoma, and headed out to our first winery, Moon Mountain Vineyard. They claim to have the best view of any tasting room in Sonoma, and I agree with them. As with all the stops on our tour, we were the only group at the winery, meaning we had a private audience with the wine makers and their wines. Although Moon Mountain did not have our favorite wines, their Cabernet Franc was very good.
Next we went to Glen Lyon Winery, which is owned and operated by Squire Fridell. Squire has the distinction of being a retired actor and the very first on-TV Ronal McDonald. Needless to say, he was a gregarious host. At the same time, he definitely takes his wine seriously. All of the vineyards are cared for by Squire and one partner (planting, watering, picking, etc.) as is the entire wine making process. Here, Young and I really loved the Shiraz (we bought three bottles) and his desert wine.
Our last winery stop was Deerfiled Ranch Winery. They don't grow many of their own grapes at Deerfield, as we learned, instead they purchase specific varieties from a diverse set of growers in the area. Here, we tasted a large selection of reds and whites, although Young and I didn't find any of them all that amazing.
We had a wonderful gourmet lunch at Deerfield, overlooking the valley. John brought out his guitar and played a few blues tunes for us, which was really wonderful.
All in all, we had a great time.
