I'm writing this after consuming a considerable amount of wine, so please excuse an incoherency and cussing that may make this post fdkign awsseome.
We made an early exit from San Fran and were in Napa for around 9:30, traffic wasn't bad at all, but I can't say that for the people going into the city! Part of our drive was across the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, which some of you may remember looked like this in 1989. I made sure to remind Claire of that fact mid-span.
Our first winery visit of the day was at The Hess Collection. The drive to the winery was quite pretty, off of the main road and up the side of a big hill. The winery itself was gorgeous but had a completely insufficient amount of parking, including some asshole who thought his rental Mustang from Hertz makes him cool enough to take 2 spots. I should have kicked his azz. I ended up parking on top of a low-hanging branch of a tree. Take that nature.
The Hess Collection is a family estate winery that was founded 25 years ago. The winery is located on the volcanic slopes of Mt Veeder. Hess produces a wide variety of wines that I don't feel like typing out, so see here
http://www.hesscollection.com/wine/index.html
While the wines were good, the winery experience was quite disappointing. It was an in-and-out shuffle with no added value. Not a great way to start the day, but good wines regardless. While I'd recommend their wines, I wouldn't waste your time with a visit.
As it was approaching noon, we figured we'd stop for lunch before heading to the next 2 wineries on our list. A quick google search revealed a Diners Drive-Ins and Dives stop at a place called Gott's Roadside Cafe, formerly known as Taylors Refresher (when it appeared on the show). We ate at one of their locations in San Francisco and it was good, there we sampled the fish and shrimp tacos. This time, we felt like a more healthy meal, so I went for a Wisconsin burger (basically a burger on sourdough) and Claire went for a standard cheeseburger. An all around thumbs up.
Our second stop was the one I was most looking forward to- the Andretti Winery. A hidden-away winery off the main drag, it has an old world charm reminiscent of an Italian village designed to bring owner Mario Andretti back to his boyhood days of being the OG of racing drivers (for those of you that don't know what OG is, its an Original Gangster, someone who's been around the block, someone who played the game before the game was a game)
The winery was founded in 1996 and now produces a variety of wines from their 42 acres of Chardonnay, Merlot, Pinot Grigio and Sauvingon Blanc vines. There area a few great things about this winery that stand out-
- It isn't packed with tons of people in the tasting room. You get lots of personal attention, if you want it.
- Extra tastings...they gave us some off-menu options to sample
- They let you roam free through the vineyards, art gallery and other areas of the property
- Its' the f-ing Andretti family. Lets get real here.
We sampled a Pinot Grigio, Riesling, Sangiovese, Dolcetto and Cab Sauv. These were among the best wines we had all day! The 2009 Riesling is their first production Riesling, and from someone who usually won't touch a Riesling, it was far and away my favorite of the whites and we purchased two bottles. Mama and Papa Jones can look forward to this one coming home. We also purchased a Dolcetto.
The tasting room is full of great photos of memorabilia from Mario's racing days which are fun to look at while sampling the juices.
Our final winery stop was up the Silverado Trail a short distance, to Silverado Vineyards. Interestingly, this winery is actually owned by Ron and Dianne Miller...not ringing a bell? Maybe I should have said Dianne Disney-Miller. As in Walt Disneys daughter. As in Mickey Mouses's sister! When they purchased the property they had no intention of producing wine, but they sold off the grapes as any dried up & dead grapes deposited in the soils would eventually destroy the soils production ability. After realizing that their grapes were winning awards all over the world for some other dude, they said what the hell, lets build a freakin winery! While touring the property, we actually walked past Ron Miller. Before I could say anything to him, he said, holy s***, you're Brad Jones? No kidding.
This winery was a nice little drive up a hill with fantastic vistas of the surrounding valley and 1 of their 5 vineyards in the Napa area. To our disappointment, the building looked nothing like the Disney Castle. What a sham.
We had pre-booked a tour, so upon arrival we were provided with a glass of their Zinfandel, which I wasn't a fan of so Claire added that to the pile of booze she'd been drinking throughout the day. The tour was very nice, taking us through the main building of the winery, as well as through the entire wine production process. We returned to the sampling room and sampled a variety of their wines including a Sau Blanc, Sangiovese, Merlot and 2 Cab Sauv's. We came home with an 07 Mt. George Merlot. Their wine list is available here
http://www.silveradovineyards.com/wines/
After Silverado, we did a drive around the 30 mile Napa Valley to see wineries in St Helena and Calistoga as well, both of which have beautiful little downtowns.
For dinner, we decided to shake up our trend of Italian restaurants and go for some good ole barbecue, but not at your typical barbecue joint. Bounty Hunter is a combined Wine Bar/Shop and Restaurant.
Their wine shop is unbelievable, with a few hundred wines to pick from, many from Napa but also all over the world, there are great selections for every price range. Their restaurant wine list is extensive as well, featuring many bottles from the wine shop with a number of wines by the glass or half bottle as well. As far as food goes, we went for a pulled pork and beer can chicken sandwich (not combined, 2 sandwiches) with salads and a nice 2009 Pursuit Pinot Noir. The food was excellent and well paired with the wine. For dessert, we decided to have another 6 glasses of wine and and ordered 2 Wine Flights. Claire chose a selection from the Streamside Vineyard in Napa and I went for a "Three Way" with a Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Proprietary Red.
At the end of the day, we figure Claire had about 9 glasses of wine! Not bad. As expected, I'm the responsible one and kept it legal as I was driving (except for dinner).
Tomorrow we're off to Lake Tahoe and Reno. No, we're not driving a DeLorean and going back in time, we're actually going to Reno in 2012.
