It seems like it has been a while since I posted on here so this is an attempt to catch up on the personal side. First, Mr. Beau and I took a little trip up to the Santa Barbara area for some wine tasting. This was in part to just get out of town for a couple of days and in part to provide a wide selection of wines for Mr. Beau to taste and help me gauge where his wine preferences lay. Over a three-day weekend we traveled to and tasted wines at the following wonderful wineries:
Brander Winery (excellent all around offerings)
Gainey Winery (very good wines, nice chardonnays this year)
Kalyra Winery (a fun winery with some excellent lighter and dessert wines)
Beckman winery (top-notch Syrahs and and tasty Grenache... and the hottest pourers)
Bridlewood Winery (they seem to have come up a notch in their offerings since the Gallo buy-out)
Firestone winery (Good wines, nice Riesling)
Fess Parker Winery (Davy Crockett knows his wines, but watch the alcohol content on the new Syrahs)
Curtis Winery (wonderful Rhone-style wines)
Zaca Mesa Winery (a new one for me, great offering, don't pass up the Z Cuvée or the Z Three from them)
We dined at the consistently great Hitching Post and discovered another fantastic place to dine at the local casino Willows.
As usual the trip was too short but it was relaxing and wonderful to get away from "the real world" for a couple of days.
For the Fourth we spent a lot of time together taking turns taking care of each other. On the Fourth we went to the San Diego Zoo, saw a movie, took a walk along the beach talking about what the day meant to us (and how we both tend to say "Independence Day" instead of "Fourth of July" when mentioning the holiday), had dinner at a local cantina and sat on the beach while watching one of the best fireworks presentations I can remember. On Saturday we used my San Diego Art Museum membership and took our friend Sarah to "get some culture" and then spent time relaxing at The Prado having appetizers and drinks and enjoying each person's company. I can think of very few ways of passing time than just being with friends and loved ones and I hope that you had the same privilege this weekend.
3 comments:
Mike,
Thanks for posting about SB wines . . . always nice to see anyone coming up here and enjoying our offerings!
Hope you enjoyed the Fess Parker wines, where I am an asst. winemaker . . . Just wanted to note that while our alc levels are above 14% on average, the wines truly are balanced . . . It's one of those situations where to get the flavors and concentration we strive for in certain varietals, the grapes do need to hang a little longer to fully develop . . .
Cheers and let me know next time you are up our way!
Thanks for the comment! You know, y'all got a bum deal in Sideways. I really do like the FP wines (I thought your 2003 "Big Easy" was great). What stunned me though was finding out the alcohol content was pushing 16% on a couple of the Syrahs I tasted. While still nicely balanced, it makes it difficult for me to drink as much. But FP is always on my list whenever I take friends up for tasting.
Oh... and congrats on that 90 pt Viognier and that stunning Clone 115 Pinot (96 points I think). Well deserved. I can't wait to get my next wine club shipment!
hey..I have plenty of culture thankyouverymuch :)
And it's not in the yogurt in my fridge either.
-rw
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