Red, red wine...

The first wine club that we joined after moving to Santa Barbara county was Beckmen Winery.  They make some very nice Rhone varietals and have even had one of their grenaches chosen as a wine for a white house dinner.   We discontinued our wine club membership a few years ago - not because the wines aren't wonderful but because there are so many wonderful wineries here in the Santa Ynez Valley.  We still have a number of their wines in our "cellar."  They produce some wonderful syrahs and grenaches in their biodynamic vineyards.  They do grow some white varietals and a few other reds as well but are known for the Rhone reds.   If you're ever in the Santa Ynez Valley, their tasting room is well worth a visit.

Tonight for Mother's Day, I made a nice dinner for Cheryl - filet mignon and zucchini, yellow squash, tomatoes, and Romano cheese.  For desert I made cannoli (I purchased the shells and made the filling). We opened a bottle of 2005 Beckmen Purisima, their flagship wine which is a blend of grenache and syrah from their best grapes, and is only made in the best of vintages.  What a wonderful wine!  It reminded me why we joined their wine club.  We have another '05, two '07s, and 2 '08s.  I expect that each bottle will be wonderful too. 

Neither of our children were with us for dinner as both have partners and they needed to be with their families.  They were all in church this morning though - Alexis, her husband Christian and my favorite person in the whole world, my grandson Corwin, and John and Monique (who is due in September with my second grandchild - a girl who will also be my favorite person in the whole world).  I'm concerned about the future, especially for John, Monique, and Khloe, but I am feeling so blessed to see my family and to know everything we share.  More than anything I am thankful for Cheryl, for all that she does for her children, and most of all just for who she is.  The Purisima is an expensive bottle of wine (at least for us) but it was more than worth it to drink it in celebration of Cheryl and the family she has birthed.

Life is still hard in SB

One side event we're planning around Alexis' wedding is a wine tasting tour for friends attending from back east. We have a couple of wineries chosen already but a tasting is always worth doing.

One of our family's favorite wineries is Beckmen, so much so that we're members of one of their wine clubs. They're first on the list for our tasting followed by Stolpman (big, tannic Rhone style reds) and Mandolina (CalItal wines) but we needed at least one more and maybe two for the day.

We've been thinking about one of the larger wineries in the area - either Firestone or Fess Parker (yep, the Daniel Boone Fess Parker). Both of these wineries have decent wines at a lower price point than the others I had chosen. The women folk in the family prefer the tasting room at Firestone so we're leaning that way.

Last Friday, we had to pick up a few bottles of wine that we had ordered at Beckmen so we took part of the afternoon for a tasting. We started at Beckmen and had some wonderful wines from both their estate wines and the higher end Purisima wines. We tasted two Grenache's - an estate and the Purisima Vineyard wine. Both were wonderful and very drinkable now or worthy of a few years of cellaring. We also had two different Syrahs - the Estate Syrah and a Barrel Select Purisima. Again, wonderful big wines... a bit more fruit forward than the Grenache. We finished our tasting with a taste of a blend just called Purisima. Heaven in a bottle!

From Beckmen we headed to Zaca Mesa, one of the first wineries founded in Santa Barbara County after prohibition. We had heard good things about some of their wines but hadn't tasted any before this. We began with two Rhone style whites, a viognier and a roussanne. We don't drink a lot of white wine and I don't usually care for either of these varieties but both were very, very nice. If we were on a shopping trip, I would have come home with a bottle or three of the viognier. From there we went to the reds. Their Estate Syrah was very nice, but not quite as good as the Beckmen estate version. Our final wine was the Z Three, a blend of Syrah, Mourvèdre, and Grenache. It is a wonderful wine. We had to purchase a bottle.

Our last stop was Babcock. One of our wino friends really likes their Pinot Noir so we thought we'd try a tasting to see whether we should add them. Many who've seen the film Sideways, associate Pinots with Santa Barbara County. I guess there are a few good ones here (I don't particularly care for Pinots) but they really do pale in comparison to the Rhone style wines which are perfect for this place. So... we went to Babcock and began with a few whites - a Pinto Gris and a Chardonnay. Neither were "wows" but both were reasonably good wines. Then we had their rose - Big Fat Pink Shiraz. It was simple, but fun and we bought two bottles. This was followed by a Pinot Noir (still not my favorite varietal) and a Cabernet. Again, passable but not something I would purchase. We ended with a late harvest Chardonnay. Late harvest wines are very sweet, almost syrupy. The grapes are left on the vines until they begin to turn into raisins. The concentrated sugars make very complicated wines that can be amazing in small quantities... too much and you go into diabetic shock. Usually late harvests are made from Riesling, Muscat, or Gewürztraminer. The Chardonnay version was much more simple without the floral flavors one expects especially from Gewürztraminer... again not bad but not anything I would purchase.

So... we may add Zaca Mesa to the list along with probably Firestone although, we may do another tasting or two just to be sure. Life is hard.

tastes great!

I've said before that one of the real joys of living in Santa Barbara is the availability of wonderful, local wines. On Friday we're going to a friend's house to do a tasting of Cabernet's at a variety of price points and I decided to go across the mountains yesterday to pick up a bottle from our favorite winery - Beckmen. Since we're members there, that means a free tasting. So, Cheryl and I along with Alexis and her significant other, Christian, drove to Los Olivos, got lunch at a little cafe and then off to Beckmen's to taste some wonderful red wines. We bought the cab and a bottle of their top of the line blend, jumped in the car and off for some more tastings.

Tastings are a wonderful social event... the pourers are all wonderfully social and informed people and it is great fun to taste some wines, learn about them, and meet some fun people. It is also interesting to feel the different atmospheres of the different wineries and to see the different clientele that is attracted. It was a gray and drizzly day but what better way to spend that than tasting some great wines and laughing with fun people?

We didn't feel like driving around a lot so we went to Solvang where we could visit a number of tasting rooms that we hadn't visited before, walk around a bit, and then head home.

Our first visit was Mandolina. One of the trends here is known as CalItal - growing Italian grapes and making Italian style wines and this little winery is one of the ones devoted to that trend. We tasted some very nice Italian varietals and ended up purchasing a bottle of their version of a super Tuscan - a blend of Italian and Bordeaux varieties of grapes. Yummy. It was a small tasting room and we were the only ones there for most of the time. We enjoyed talking with the pourer.

A short walk around the corner brought us to our next stop - Stolpman Vineyards. Stolpman is known more as a grower than a vintner and it isn't unusual to see other wineries with bottles labeled that the grapes came from Stolpman. I had drunk other vintners wines made from Stolpman grapes, but hadn't tasted their own wines before. When we got to the reds, we were struck by the huge tannins in their wines. I'm told that the vast majority of wines sold in the US are drunk within 3 days and most US wines are produced with that in mind. It would be a shame to drink these wines in 3 days. These puppies need to sit for a few years... and then they'll be amazing. The tasting room was a little larger than Mandolina and David, the pourer, obviously knew their wines. There were a few other people there. This winery is tempting me to join another wine club... but Cheryl says it is more than she wants to commit to spending on wines... I'll be working on her.

Around the corner and down the street and we stopped at Lucas and Lewellen, who also own Mandolina. I have wanted to taste their wines for some time as I pass some of their vineyards on 101 everytime I drive to Santa Maria for my clergy group meetings. This tasting room was full. Beth, the pourer, was a lot of fun. She obviously enjoys her job and the clientele enjoyed her. She described one wine to me as being so wonderful that one drink and the heavens opened and the angels sang... but that wine was sold out. Her second favorite, she told us was almost as good... the heavens still opened and the angels were there but no Baptist choir. You can imagine the look on her face when I told her that I am a Baptist pastor. We bought a bottle of Petit Syrah (her 2nd favorite).

I hate to sound like I represent the chamber of commerce or the visitor's bureau, but if you find yourself anywhere near the California central coast, do plan to do some tastings... and maybe encourage your favorite restaurant or local wine merchant to add some Santa Barbara wines to their wine list.

wino's unite!

I live in Santa Barbara, California and it is hard to not love wine here. Each year, wine grapes are the #1 or #2 crop in Santa Barbara county and they make some wonderful wines here. If you saw Sideways, you got a taste of that even though I think the Rhone style wines here are better than the Pinot Noirs. It is always a fun day to hop in the car, drive over the mountains and do some tastings.

One of our favorite wineries is called Beckmen Vineyards. They are a family owned and run, biodynamic winery that makes wonderful syrahs, grenaches, cabernets, and Rhone style blends. In fact, we like this winery so much that we are members of their Purisima Club. I highly recommend their wines if you enjoy great reds.

Some time ago, a wine loving friend of mine from back east sent me a link to Gary Vaynerchuk's website and daily webcasts of wine reviews. He is fun, knowledgeable, and honest in his reviews even if his descriptions are not always what one expects from a wine lover - "who doesn't like jockstrap filled with pickles because let me tell you right now this is man sweat with pickles all around..." Yep, he actually said that about a wine he loved (2005 Guillon Gevrey Chambertin Pere Galland) on episode 353!

Even if you don't love wines or if you do and think he is insane, he is fun to watch... And jockstrap filled with pickles certainly removes any of the pretentiousness that often surrounds serious wine drinking. Click on the widget on the right to see his latest reviews.

futures

We aren't wine snobs but if we could afford it, we could easily become so... Cheryl and I are members of one of the wine clubs at Beckmen Vineyards. Yesterday we had a wonderful day at a tasting of futures (and a few current wines) exclusively for wine club members. Beckmen produces wonderful Syrahs, Grenaches, and Rhone style blends. We learned about Beckmen's biodynamic farming, had a nice picnic, enjoyed the tastings, and ordered a number of bottles of wine which will be released over the next year or so. Then, some we'll drink and some we'll hold for as many as 10 years. Buying good wine is a statement of optimism regarding the future.

Ecclesiastes was right when it tells us that "wine makes the heart merry." Good wine does it doubly