Category Archives{Tasting Rooms}

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Red Car Winery Pulls Out Ahead of the Pack

by careysweet1 month ago in Tasting Rooms, Wine.0 Comments

Some winemakers start out small, with backyard tastings for friends. But when Red Car owners Carroll Kemp and Mark Estrin released their first wine in 2002, they went straight to the top, selling all 50 cases of their inaugural Syrah to big-time restaurateurs including the wine director of The French Laundry. That first wine came from Santa Barbara County grapes, {…}

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Stonestreet Cabernet Offers a Taste of Place

by jamesknight4 months ago in Tasting Rooms.0 Comments

The Alexander Valley is known for Cabernet Sauvignon, and justly so. The grapes ripen easily here, among the hottest of Sonoma County appellations, and the vines sink their roots into ancient gravel beds deposited by the Russian River as it indecisively meandered across the valley throughout the eons. But it’s the mountains that loom above the valley that have lured {…}

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Explore West Sonoma County and Taste Route 116

by careysweet4 months ago in Tasting Rooms.0 Comments

Join Taste Route 116 for New Wine Tasting Events in West County So the holiday season is barely over, and it’s already time to start thinking about the next celebration. That would be Valentine’s Day, which this year falls on a Tuesday. The happy holiday often involves wine, but leave it to the creative group of Sebastopol wineries to figure out {…}

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Truett Hurst Winery shows off Biodynamic roots

by jamesknight5 months ago in Tasting Rooms, Wine of the Week.0 Comments

While organic and Biodynamic farming is still perceived by some as a risky endeavor, who would have thought that the challenges would include belligerent sheep? When one of Truett Hurst Winery’s sheep – normally a docile sort – went errant in the parking lot, and decided that a visitor’s Lexus was its blood enemy, it went on the attack. Presumably {…}

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Ram’s Gate Winery Opens and Brings Food, Too

by careysweet7 months ago in Tasting Rooms.0 Comments

It was a sad day when Roche Winery closed, after years of welcoming visitors to its hillside perch along Hwy. 121 across from Infineon Raceway in Carneros/Sonoma. Then, construction began on the site last winter, and curiosity grew as passersby watched a dramatic new building take shape. The hammering and landscaping is now finished, and it’s happy times again: Ram’s {…}

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Kastania Vineyards

by jamesknight8 months ago in Tasting Rooms.0 Comments

Since 1914, travelers may have noticed a little dairy barn perched on a hill on the right side of the road, as they wound their way north of the Marin County line into Sonoma County. Some decades later, the landmark reappeared on their left, the Redwood Highway having been moved a little to the east and modernized with four lanes. {…}

claypool caboose

Grand Opening This Weekend — Sonoma rock star + Sebastopol railcar caboose = new wine tasting room

by careysweet8 months ago in Tasting Rooms.1 Comment

Given that Claypool Cellars produces just 500 cases of wine a year, a tasting room didn’t seem necessary, admits co-owner Chaney Claypool. But when the tasting room in question is in a former Old Southern Pacific Rail caboose parked at Sebastopol’s Gravenstein Station retail center, that changes the game. And so, this weekend, the official Claypool sampling salon debuts, celebrated {…}

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Whitetail Winebar & Big Bottom Gear up in Guerneville

by careysweet10 months ago in Tasting Rooms.0 Comments

This week, the talk in Guerneville is about tails and bottoms. Oh, get your mind out of the gutter. Specifically, the small West County town is celebrating two important openings of two creatively named businesses on Main Street — Whitetail Winebar, and right next door, Big Bottom Market. That’s a lot of hubbub for a tiny river town that the {…}

Family Wineries of Dry Creek Valley

Winery Co-Ops: Go for the Grapes, Use Less Gas

by careysweet11 months ago in Tasting Rooms.4 Comments

Visiting wine tasting rooms is a great way to spend the day, sipping and exploring. But what about the driving? For even the hard-core grape hopper, the adventure can get exhausting. Navigating, jumping in and out of the car, all of that. Happily, there’s a wonderful thing called a winery co-op. It’s when several wineries band together in a single {…}

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Russian River Vineyards

by jamesknight11 months ago in Tasting Rooms.0 Comments

To be fair to the new, or newish, proprietors of this joint, the time will have to come when we stop referencing the old owners. Meanwhile, longtime visitors to the area might recognize this best as the former Topolos at Russian River Vineyards, purveyors of high-proof Zinfandel, Alicante Bouschet, and sundry other varietals in a little tasting room beneath an iconic {…}