So, Saturday morning, Kathy and I loaded the wine carriers into the hatchback, and took a relatively quick motor jaunt up to the Sonoma Valley. Kath had had the presence of mind to make a lunch reservation, through Open Table, at the Mayo Family Winery Reserve Room, an elegant little bistro and tasting room on the Sonoma Highway south of Santa Rosa.
Mayo Family is a small producer of super-premium varietals, and the Reserve Room offers a seasonal multicourse prix-fixe menu of small bites paired with matching wines. Their spring menu offers a seven-course progression; courses include a celery root “linguine” with fava leaf and Meyer lemon butter, a bit of pan-seared duck breast with blood orange and chili oil, and a broth of charred corn and bacon with truffle cream and crispy prosciutto. Pretty heady, and very tasty, stuff.
Our reservation up north was for 2 p.m., so we set out from Oakley around 9 a.m., intending to taste our way from the south end of the valley and working our way up towards lunch.
We hit our first Sonoma stop, Cline Cellars, an hour later, minutes after they opened: just the way Kathy had timed it. Kath had planned all along to take this opportunity to join Cline’s wine club, what with their commitment to Oakley fruit, and some small-production bottlings available for sale and tasting only to club members. They have a limited “Small Berry Mourvèdre” made from the grapes of Oakley’s old vines, and we wanted to get our mitts on some. We did, as well as on five additional selections, all deeply discounted as a welcome to the club. We opted against having our quarterly selections shipped, as an incentive, like we need any, to visit the winery in person for future wine pick-ups and tasting.
Working northward, we discovered a few pleasant surprises in the form of co-op tasting rooms, where multiple tiny producers who could never afford to set up their own visitor facilities band together in one location to pour their wares for the public. Boutique wineries such as Cass, Keating and Enkidu were just a few that truly impressed with offerings ranging from a Napa Petite to a Malbec from Sonoma’s Rockpile AVA to a Paso Robles Viognier.
By the time 1:45 p.m. rolled around, we found ourselves draining our last drop of said Enkidu Petite Sirah, loading our purchases into the car, and all ready for lunch at Mayo located one block south. A nice confluence of timing and navigation.
Kath and I came home with a bottle of the Viognier that was paired with the corn/bacon/truffle cream broth. The 2007 Mayo Family Saralee’s Vineyard Russian River Valley exhibits a really delicate pale straw, almost wheat, color in the glass, with a honeyed nose of light oak and hints of butterscotch. A lot of Viognier can be overpoweringly cloying on the nose and palate: all flowers and over-ripe peaches. But this Mayo has a nice acidity and medium viscosity showcasing subtle apricot and stone fruit notes on its long finish.
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