CoCo “Fore!” Clarksburg 3

Man, we have got to hit that Prohibition-era Ryde Hotel on the Delta levees on our way to Clarksburg. How else to escape with our 3 Wine Company allotment of Contra Costa County-grown Zinfandel and Petite Sirah, done a few miles up the road in Clarksburg at das Old Sugar Mill? And one more really young CoCo Zin released at source.

Kathy and I restrained ourselves: We tasted only our selections at 3, located at the Mill. Winemaker Matt Cline gets cagey with his sources sometimes, but his tasting notes that connote Delhi Sandy Loam soil and grape variety Alicante Bouschet along with the usual Zin, Mourvedre and “Kerrigan” lead us to the vineyards. That’s our neck of the woods. OK, there’s nothing labeled “Oakley.” Frankly, I’m getting tired of the non-appellation. And OK, if one wanted to really wanted to buy into the whole federal AVA thang, there is no such thing as Contra Costa County; only a San Francisco Bay appellation. Props, I guess, to the folks who want to focus the viticulture to CoCo. And here’s what Matt’s contacts brought us: An Old Vines Zin and an Old Vines Petite. Delicious, from old ‘hood vines. http://www.threewinecompany.com/

So, we’re on our way to the semi-annual tasting back toward home at the Discovery Bay Country Club. But first, we stop at the major highway junction; we break for a “Wine Tasting Today” sign at our major intersection of SR 160 and Highway 12. We pick up a couple of bottles of CA Malbec. The Scotto Family 2008 Lodi Malbec exhibits a light cherry effervescence in the pour and the light, but a nice medium weight on the tongue.

We motor to the Discovery Bay Country Club for their semi-annual tasting. As befits a golf club community, it’s "tee-time." We tasted a couple of varietally designated Touriga and Tempranillo wines, and several of the usual faves from the many distributors’ international portfolii. We dug that “T” time. It was cool to revisit a few selections from Washington state, whence we moved two-point-five years ago, that were featured on assorted distributors’ tables. The Indian Wells vineyard Chard from Chateau Ste. Michelle was as crisp as we remembered it, and the Columbia Crest “H3” (Horse Heaven Hills, I’m thinking, named for a WA vineyard, and now, AVA) Merlot brought Kath and me back to a drizzly 1998 afternoon in San Francisco, wherein the only thing that could save us was to step into a now-defunct Hayes Valley wine bar off Market Street for a bottle of the grape that initially put Washington state on the wine map.

“Twas a beautiful, sunny day in Contra Costa and adjacent Sacramento counties. 3 Wine Company, with its CoCo selections, as usual, hit it onto the fairway. The Disco Bay CC, hosting another vinous mingler, was, and I mean this golf-talk, not vox populi, sub-par. A good thing, y’all. Oh, and I’ll talk about my broaching an “Oakley Wine Country” idea, in person, at a city forum, in a future post.

But enough about me and Kath here in CoCo: What Zinfandels are youse drinking? And do you know whence they came? Keep swinging.