Twenty Acres and a Merlot

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April Richmond is a former colleague of Kathy’s, and April (her, not the month) has set in motion a whirlwind of shindigs, parties, special events and, I wouldn’t be surprised, TempranilloWare parties. It’s everything that I hoped we could do; she did it.

Kinda gave us a flashback to Cali’s Vision Cellars, one of the, perhaps the first, African-American vintners to showcase their wares. Kathy and I first encountered Vision when the owner was pouring at McMinnville, Oregon’s International Pinot Noir Celebration. The Sunday tasting, outdoors, at IPNC was crazy; they had to take a break to bring the second squad onto the field. Nothing based on merit: they just had a big lineup.

Ms. Richmond ushered us into the San Francisco Vintner’s Market the other day. Motto? “Try it. Buy it.”

So, we motor to San Francisco’s Fort Mason, a decommissioned naval-slash-commercial base, that has become the home to many, many small biz. It’s also a facility to which Kath and I took the bus to attend the ZAP Zinfandel bacchanal when we lived there, several lives ago.

FYI, City of SF: Stop having your parking lots spout tix if there are no spots available. Nice revenue stream, but it reinforces why folks live in the burbs.
But enough about CoCo’s Oakley ‘hood.

April treated us to a wonderful afternoon of artisan producers (we heard, repeatedly, the phrase “we do 300 cases”), bad fashion amongst the patrons and amazingly unique wines. A vineyard manager who wanted to grab a few blocks and maybe see if he could possibly go into biz for himself. Some one who lived abroad, fell in love with the native grape, and wanted to do it her way. And the folks who do an outrageous Fume Blanc, neutral oak, but a sop to the people who visit their tasting room in Murphys Gold County. Small production, nicely done.

Here’s what we bought: a Frog’s Tooth Fume Blanc, barrel fermented because their clientele wanted a Chard (with oak). Their riff is “If wine has legs, frogs have teeth.” It’s homage to Mark Twain’s Calaveras story, and their price point is akin to what Mr. Clemens’ juice would have sold for.

We scooped up a couple of Pinot Noirs from vineyard managers who have the hook up. Kathy and I love this groove: Dude knows the blocks, oversees what to prune and crop. Who better to approach the owner and offer to buy a ton when the market tightens? Sweetness. Encanto from Carneros fruit, and farther north, Fogline with stuffing from Russian River, really do the do.

And then we get to chat with Allison at Edelweiss. Her Riesling, based on a single block at Napa/Carneros is luscious. I may say, again, “sweet,” but it is dry, with layers of stone and fig. Suddenly, I know why 1) Winemakers abandoned the Riesling grape, and 2) Winemakers had to add “Dry” to the Riesling label.

Dude, it’s like Chardonnay: Belly up to the bar and get a by-the-glass pour that has you chewing on lumber, or an unoaked thang that people send back.

One stop is Simple Math, a tiny producer who sources grapes up and down the West Coast, including Cabernet from Washington state. He was overwhelmed, props to Ms. April Richmond.

Our final stop is a sparkling label, BHLV. It stands for Beverly Hills Las Vegas, and the reps behind the stick could not tell us what the grapes in the blend were. Lindsay Lohan, welcome back: Your reps are calling. Assuming that you have any reps. Guys, this was so wrong; obviously a brand without anybody to tell us what was in the blend.

Marketing v. Making. You tell me.

Washington Squared

Napa. Yeah, we’ve been there, both literally and figuratively. But it’s always best when you get a treat.

Kathy and I are now members of the Hess wine club, based on the fact that they have a line stringing to Frank Evangelho vineyard stretching to our CoCo ‘hood.

That was the impetus for our jaunt this weekend to the Napa Valley. It’s a different kind of “weird’ for us. We’ve lately steered clear; a tasting room may be open, but at what cost for said tasting?

We were armed with a bit of 2-for-1 Internet scrip, but were still skeptically inquiring (props to The Amazing Randi).

Funny how the first blush of romance gives way to mere tolerance, eh? As members of Hess, we can taste, tour and traverse the art gallery that Donald Hess has put on permanent display.

That was Kathy’s plan: Mourvèdre, Carignane, Stella, Rauschenberg. At the least, two of them are grape varieties.

We love the experience at Hess, but this time, befitting my comment a couple of lines ago, we wished that we had settled in a different location along the tasting bar. Did I ever mention our diss up in Washington state? Man, we had just endured the hammer to join this particular wine club when, on our next visit AS MEMBERS! were made eye-contact with, and professionally ignored. The pourers obviously had their “section” and even when someone on adjoining real estate had an empty glass, not only could the pourer not cross that imaginary line, they had to avert their gaze to deny your existence.

That really happened to Kath and me at a relatively newly built, well-reviewed winery in Woodinville (And based on his fawning reviews for this joint, Harvey Steiman from Wine Spectator apparently gets the VIP treatment at this winery: no stinking tasting bar for him).

OK, so it was a bit disconcerting at Hess to not get the pourer that you see on the other side. Ad nauseum, I say that, the person behind the stick determines whether or not that is YOUR winery. But hey, tasting was free. And the burning typewriter up in the gallery was still consuming that QWERTY vibe. And probably making Pacific Gas & Electric a packet.

We soon hooked up with our cool pourer, Kerry, at Cornerstone and Steppingstone Cellars on Washington Street in beautiful, bountiful downtown Yountville. We’ve written about Washington Street before, having redeemed an Internet coupon chez Cornerstone last fall. But I have to say that this little avenue is no secret to wine limousines. Of course, The French Laundry, Bouchon and Bistro Jeanty might have something to do with that. Never mind that there are something like 10+ tasting rooms within the 3-block downtown.

Kath and I were, uncharacteristically, heading north in the Napa Valley. We had a coupon for Girard (more in a sec) situated just before our turn back onto the 29 main drag. But, as many cool tasting room folk do, Kerry asked where we were heading next; we mentioned Girard up the street, and she told us about Beau Vigne directly behind them.

Beau Vigne’s wines were superb. Oscar was pouring four selections from their small production, but I wonder if it was Kerry’s biz card that allowed us to escape the $20 (that’s why we’re afraid of Napa!) tasting fee. As it was, we loved a $55 Chardonnay; can you imagine being levied a $20 tasting fee atop, even if you bought? That’s what scares us Napa v. Sonoma.

So we mosey and meander (I the latter, Kath the former) to the street front tasting room of Girard. Now, most of the guides, maps and other wine lit say that Girard is Appointment Only. I had phoned the day before, and Kevin told me that they are indeed open and that “we’ll see you tomorrow.” Sweetness. We walk in the next day, and would you believe it, Kevin turns out to be the first staffer we meet.

Dig this, y’all: It’s the day before Easter, an early April Saturday in Napa Valley’s Yountville, CA; Kathy and I are sitting outside a winery tasting room under a sunny, cloudless sky. We are watching limos, bicyclists and other tasters in our same periphery. All on one little street. We’re tasting a delicate Chard, a restrained Sauv Blanc, before moving on to the reds. But, let me get to punchline first: We had a 2-for-1 printout, but were not charged for the “1” part. In fact, we were poured a couple of selections off the list. Lovin’ it!

“Awesome” is a crazy word that gets bandied about, but when you taste a wine that embodies the root word, “awe,” you think about that stuff. For me, I’ve long had a beef with the term “field blend” ascribed to a wine whose label explains the exact percentages of each grape variety. Hello? The very nature of a field blend is that you don’t know how much of anything is in the mix: You picked the ripe stuff that was in the field, and then you made wine from it.

Welcome to Girard’s “Mixed Blacks.” It’s a deliciously funky-fresh amalgam of 100-year+ Napa Valley vine produce comprising Zin, Syrah, Petite, Grenache and a couple of strains that even University of Cali at Davis couldn’t pinpoint.

Field. Blend.

Does it get any closer to the Valley than this?

The Ware-ing of the Green

A little late for St. Patrick’s Day, a bit tardy for the advance of spring. But our neighboring city of Brentwood has advanced the opening date of the Farmers Market to the last day of March.

Man, these Contra Costa County burgs have gots the hook-up. Century-plus-year-old grape vines in our city of Oakley, and an equally venerable agricultural tradition in Brentwood, Byron, Antioch and Knightsen: first of the season, first in our hearts.

So, Kathy gets her hair cut at this groovy salon in downtown Brentwood, mere steps from the Saturday market. I’m not sure which was cuter: her haircut or the slender stalks of fresh asparagus. (I’m kidding, y’all. I kid because I love.)

Now, we’ve had a very dry winter (I’m sure that you’re all boo-hooing for me). Yeah, 65-degree temps in January, not a cloud in the blue sky, but no rain.

But here it is April, in like a baby cougar and out like a sheepie.

Lots of precipitation, but still not goofily so. Just meant that I could turn off the automatic irrigation thang. (Since we turned the drip thing to “2 Zones, v. 5 Zones with the previous pop-up sprinkler heads, I have been conflicted.)

BUT! Here we are with our April bounty: fresh, green peas as a side last night. And fava beans that rival that stuff at the Farmers Market. And we pulled baby’s first carrot from seed.

FYI: The peas were absolutely delicious.

The other green is completely outrageous.

Dropping a Lodi

I hadn’t heard from my cool neighbor, Syed, in a while. On Monday mornings, whoever gets to the curb first brings each other’s garbage and recycling bins up to the respective garages. Today, I did run into him outside, and he asked me if I wanted some lemons. Turns out that his girlfriend, Karen, who works at the San Francisco Chronicle, has a colleague with a citrus tree, and was sharing the bounty. Karen asked Syed if Kathy and I might like some. Hell yeah!

To “Lemon Lady” down our street: “Screw you, Grandma!” But I mean that with all love and respect. See you at the Neighborhood Watch meeting!

Oh, and then, after not hearing from Syed for a week and a half, he phones within an hour to ask if we want/need any eggs from his chickens!

It is beautifully crazy where we live in Oakley: eggs and lemons for the asking, and the Farmers Market in neighboring Brentwood set to open this coming Saturday.

Kathy had a rare Friday off last week, and we gassed up the Lisa Marie for a wine jaunt eastward into the Central Valley, Lodi in particular. It had been over a year since we’d visited, and we were so impressed with the burg’s transformation from jug-wine/Gallo serfdom to “I’m Doug. Solamente Doug, and I’m outta heeeeeere.” (Apologies to “The State” comedy troupe) independence.

Now, you pay your toll at the Antioch Bridge, and then cruise along the Delta levees. But a right turn onto Highway 12 will take you, 25 minutes later into the gift of the Lodi. State Route 12 will serve as a cool gateway to more than a couple of well-appointed tasting rooms on its periphery. That’s pretty much what we did last year on our 2011 expeditionary mission.

The winery map published by the local wine “alliance” is generally excellent (take note, Santa Cruz), and even allowing for new cross-street construction and nomenclature thereof, Kath and I ran into some wonderful tasting surprises.

OK, woulda thunk that the giant industrial plant that is “Woodbridge by Robert Mondavi,” available in magni at a Walgreens near you, would have a tasting room pouring varietally bottled juice available nowhere else? Very strange to taste a Port-style blend vinted from true Portuguese grape varieties and poured from a bottle enfolded in an elegant label heretofore unseen by us. And then one goes back to the car, and sees shift change at the plant: an amalgam of Homer Simpson chez nuke reactor, and every “show your badge” joint you may or may not have toiled in.

But we were very glad we stopped in to Woodbridge; a true, welcome, surprise.

So, Cycles Gladiator Winery down the street from Woodbridge. Crazy story, crazy juice. CG takes its name from a Belle Époque bicycle poster whose trademark expired, so now adorns the Cycles Gladiator bottling, courtesy public domain. CG is under the umbrella of Hahn, a Central Coast winery that Kath and I had visited 15 years ago in the Santa Lucia Highlands down Monterey way. Smith & Hook is another of their labels, and pourer Dennis was hooking us up with all of the above. Apparently there is even a “Banned in Alabama” bottling from Cycles, because the state legislature there forbade the perceived nudity from the bike poster to be used on the label. Heaven forbid what was actually in the bottle, huh?

Their landlord is old-skool, as may be inferred from the faded sign. But one must give props to the cornerstone. Barkeep, a grape brandy for everyone in the house!

A hundred are afraid to do it; one actually does it.

Talk soon.

What Ya Gonna Do?

It’s been a few days shy of when Otis the Cat died a year ago. So stupid; we’d been managing her kitty chemo for years in Seattle, made great promise here in Northern Cali (one of our first visits to the East Bay was driving The Wee to her first appointment mere days after we all had arrived). We moved to the new house; Otis and our other kitty, Taz, adjusted to multiple residence levels (the little place in Seattle was a bungalow).

Taz was older, too (the kind of kitties that we wanted to adopt), but ultimately succumbed to the same hit that claimed The Wee. Tazo’s was a bit more torturous to witness. Gradual isn’t cool. But neither is an Otis “Death Watch” that you know is not going to end well.

OK, so it didn’t.

Now, I know for certain that I posted about this stuff before: I was looking for a respite from scooping poop, and from sweeping wayward kitty litter a half-mile from the litter pan, up the carpeted stairs. Enough, man!

Apparently, I am not loud enough, and do not voice enough of my opinions on any topic, because Kathy thought that the house was too quiet last year.

Fritter and Baklava (far be it from us to change adoption names {Hell, we kept “Otis” and “Taz” because those were the monikers they came with}) are our little girls now. And it took a long time.

So here Kathy and I are. Kath will pull up a Cheetah-print throw blanket to watch television. There is always a certain kitty smashed up next to her. Maybe it’s seasonal; maybe it’s some sort of solar flare thang.

I want warmth in the blanket? I need water from the bathtub faucet? I just want you to stop petting me? Oh, sure. All of the above.

And here I am. No, wait, here she is. Damn.

Kathy and I gave a toast to Otis, The Wee. Kathy and I toasted the little last night. We have docs that had her outdoors in Southern Cali, but much loved indoors in Seattle.

I would have loved to have said that she was toasted with some red from Evanangelho, or Duarte, or a Cline Bridgehead, Big Break or Live Oak.

Unfortunately, it was an austerity-plan everyday red. The toast was better than the impromptu wine.

And little Fritter, pictured here, is still trying to figure out just what is going on. Nine months later, baby girl gots it going on. And I have the claw prints to prove it.

Welcome home little ladies.

Livermore Spots

Kath and I headed south again to the Livermore Valley, this time to pick up baby’s first wine club “shipment” from La Rochelle. It’s our first and only club membership down here, and we were sold on their Pinot club program upon a visit, avec coupon, to their neighboring sister winery Steven Kent.

But clubs have gotten so complicated now. Used to be, the only choices one had re: clubs was red v. white (or a combo of the two) or the number of bottles per shipment. The amount of discount sometimes varied as well: 20- to 25% off the shipment, and maybe 30% off if you reorder any of the selections. Now, we’re discovering everything from “Here are your selections, but you can swap anything out for anything else available, at the same discount” to even more convoluted club algorithms.

Which, unfortunately, seems to be the case at La Rochelle. Don’t get me wrong; the wines are awesome. The Pinot Noir program, especially, is dedicated to Pinot (Meunier, too) sourced from up and down Cali. Tasting a few in the Steven Kent Barrel Room tasting facility, hosted by Jim, is what drew Kath to sign up for the club. However, the wines are somewhat spendy, the club discount is a mere 15%, and the Rochelle stand-alone venue offers only a wine-and-bites menu, no wine-only card. Off of which, club members get to save a whopping 50%.

To me, it smacks of paying your annual dues to the country club and then, when entertaining out-of-town guests, being charged a cover at the door. Let’s be honest: There are not a whole lot of advantages for you to a winery having your credit card on file.

But #1 is that you should be able to walk into the tasting room without even thinking about fees: There shouldn’t be any.

Kath and I picked up our allotment, inquired about additional tasting at our club facility (“Half off for members!”), and asked if a bottle of a particular variety was open for pouring (“No, sorry, only the four that we’re pouring for the release.”)

Need I say that we bailed?

Bailed to the wine route that we’ve traveled a lot before. Kathy and I were not on a Livermore Valley Port Run this time, but we managed to hit a few joints off Tesla Road that merited a little more of our attention; some that we hadn’t visited in a while. And a new discovery too.

A couple of years ago (Gawd, have we been in CoCo County that long that we can use that phrase now?), we’d stopped in at Bodegas Aguirre, off Tesla. The tasting room sitch was a bit odd: Dr. Aguirre was our genial host, pouring us top shelf when we showed particular interest; the wrath of god ensued when another usurped ring-up duties. Tasting fees! Oh no, grl, she din’d!

And this is how a new adventure begins. We stop at Bodegas and are greeted by Norm and Kenna, not to mention one of the two winery kitties that do or do not want to be in the picture. I rant about this all the time, but man, the people behind the bar determine whether or not you want to come back.

Sometimes kitties have something to do with it, too. Just a wee.

Norm and Kath talked at length about the relatively new-ish tasting rooms in the Valley; we were going to head east to Fenestra, and Norm wrote his name on a Bodegas Aguirre cork, saying, “Ask for Meredith.”

Meredith wasn’t there, and Fenestra was hosting another of their monthly events. Sigh. We’re ready to close the day.

The Livermore Valley Wine Map is good, man. We could actually close out the day at the upper right part of the paper.

We pull into the address and are met by Rich, of Tenuta, just bidding Shalom to a limousine. He welcomed us, and was the coolest host.

Now, we’ve visited this site in the past, and loved the juice. But, wait’ll you see what the boys in the back room will have!

En Garde: a super-small producer with, no surprise, no estate. You do this stuff on a handshake, maybe a fountain pen. Maybe you get the fruit next year, maybe it gets sold to someone who offered more. That would be wrong; C knows how to do the do.

Csaba Szakál
Proprietor/Winemaker
En Garde Winery
http://www.EnGardeWinery.com/
633 Kalthoff Common
Livermore, CA 94536

Dude has nice price-point. Doesn’t hurt that his juice is outrageously good.

Eating, Reading, Writing and Arithmetic

With the price of gas being what it is, Tony and I stayed home on Sunday (I worked on Saturday) and didn’t have an adventure. California is pricier than any other place we’ve lived, no matter what you read in the newspapers, and gas is about $4.30 a gallon. Gulp is right.

Staying in has its advantages. I have a list of things I would like to do around the house (I still have flashbacks when I think of removing the wallpaper from the downstairs bath, but the two upstairs bathrooms are on my list) that I managed to complete and we also played a game.

When we met in Orlando—yep, we both worked for The Mouse—we had game parties at least once a month, and that continued when we were in Seattle. It is tougher here as we don’t really know anyone. We live in a neighborhood of retirees and families with small children. Old work friends live two hours away in San Francisco. And we can’t seem to hook up with folks who would enjoy a glass of wine and a good game of “Cue Me.”

So, we search out any two person games we can find. Sumoku, from Blue Orange games, is our latest and I wiped the floor with Tony. It’s good to be back.

Having had our own Slow Food type day, it was only fitting that I attended the East Bay Women’s Conference yesterday and lucky enough to hear Alice Waters speak.

Ms. Waters, of Chez Panisse fame, has a simple message:

What we are calling for is a revolution in public education - a Delicious Revolution. When the hearts and minds of our children are captured by a school lunch curriculum, enriched with experience in the garden, sustainability will become the lens through which they see the world.

Alice believes that we need to help children forge a positive relationship with real food if we are ever to make a dent in childhood obesity. And we do that through the classroom. Her ultimate goal is to have the students grow, cook and share the food. In fact, she would like the next President to declare a State of Emergency and require all schools to serve free breakfast and lunch to the kids. Hopefully from food they’ve grown on their own.

After a stint at UC Berkeley, Ms. Waters spent time in France and grew to love food. She talked about how children have two hours to go home and eat lunch. Can you imagine the luxury?

When she returned home and began Chez Panisse she starting searching out food that tasted good. This in turn led her to organic farmers and also eating seasonally. She said, “And what is in season now? Favas and peas.”

Yep. We’ve got them growing in our backyard. The peas are on their way and the favas are blooming. The favas are good ground cover during the winter as they return nitrogen to the soil. And favas blanched and served with olive oil, garlic , mint and balsamic vinegar are better than anything on earth.

At the end of her talk Alice took questions. The first one surprised a lot of us. Someone said, “A free lunch is not free. The money comes from my taxes.” Alice said, “Well, we can pay for it now or we can pay for it later. Every time someone goes to the hospital for a health issue our insurance rates go up.”

Oh, and Alice mentioned a bumper sticker that she saw in Texas:

If you are what you eat, then I am fast, cheap and easy.

That says it all, doesn’t it?

(Gloria Steinem also spoke. I am still processing her ideas, her utter brilliance. She’s Stephen Hawking brilliant. Make the MC cry brilliant. Standing ovation brilliant. Unforgettably brilliant.)

Look up Alice Water’s The Edible Schoolyard Project. And sit down and play a game.