Category Archives: Napa Valley

Chiarello Family Tasting Salon

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Chiarello Family Vineyard Tasting Salon

Chiarello Family Vineyard Tasting Salon

6525 Washington St, Yountville, CA 94599

Website: http://www.chiarellovineyards.com/

In addition to my infatuation with learning about wine, one of my guilty pleasures is watching food shows.  I will tune into any food competition on TV.  I get excited about meeting a celebrity chef like someone would meeting a movie star.  One of my favorite memories of Napa Valley is getting to meet celebrity chef Michael Chiarello at his restaurant Bottega and taking home a signed copy of his cookbook.  I actually didn’t stop into his tasting room until a later visit.

Chiarello Family Vineyards Tasting Salon is located in downtown Yountville across the way from Bottega restaurant.  It is located inside the historic V Marketplace which is a specialty mall that includes Napa gifts, art galleries, wine and culinary delights.  Michael Chiarello seems to have it all going for him.  He’s been a chef and restauranteur for 25 years.  During that time he has developed over 10 restaurants, written 8 cookbooks, hosted cooking shows on PBS and Food Network and appeared as a contestant on Top Chef, Next Iron Chef, and Iron Chef America.  Somehow he also finds the time to run his small farm and family vineyard in St. Helena.  He has partnered with acclaimed winemaker Thomas Brown to produce limited production wines from 100-year old vines on his property.  He practices sustainable farming and focuses on wines that pair well with his food style.

The tasting salon is like a rustic boutique.  The ambiance is very casual.  In the center of the salon is several tables where guest can relax.  On each table is a simple vase with flowers.  On the side walls there are shelves lined with oils, food items, cookbooks, and other culinary gifts.  One section of the wall is lined with wine bottles.  Straight ahead from the entrance toward the back of the room is a small bar that 3-4 people can stand around.  Behind the bar are curtains hanging down from the ceiling and large vine stalks as decoration. 

I sampled five of the wines, including Chiara Bianco White, Rosé of Zinfandel, Giana Zinfandel, Bambino e Mamma Cabernet Sauvignon, and Roux Old Vine Petite Sirah.  The white wine is made from Italian varietals Ribolla Gialla and Tocai Firulano and has a light peachy flavor.  I was delighted by the red wines.  The Cabernet Sauvignon was dark ruby with a flavor of rich plums, cherries, and nice brightness.  It was my favorite of the tasting!  The Old Vine Petite Sirah was a close second.  This is not a wine for the light hearted. It has an inky color, made from 120-year-old vines, with good tannin structure and a mouth full of blackberries and blueberries. 

If you are looking for a true culinary experience, I’d recommend building in some time in your schedule to visit V Marketplace, stop in for a tasting at the salon, and wrap up with a fabulous dinner at Bottega.  Be aware that the Marketplace closes down at 5:30 p.m. and the salon at 6 p.m. There are several other tasting rooms in the downtown Yountville area if you want to make an afternoon of it.

Girard

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Girard Tasting Room in Yountville, CA

Girard Tasting Room in Yountville, CA

6795 Washington St, Yountville, CA 94599

Website: http://www.girardwinery.com/

Girard is a fun tasting room in downtown Yountville.  It is literally in the center of town surrounded by homes and a gas station.  My husband and I visited this tasting room at the end of the day.  I had checked in with my in-laws at home to make sure the kids were doing ok.  I was feeling happy after a day of tastings.  This is a hangout type of place with a hip vibe.  It used to be an art gallery converted to a tasting room.

 

Girard Tasting Room

Girard Tasting Room

This winery started in 1975 with a father-son team.  It is currently owned by partners Pat Roney and Vintage Wine Estates, the same group that now owns Clos Pegase and Cosentino Wineries in Napa, as well as Windsor Vineyards, Sonoma Coast Vineyards, Kunde, Viansa, and Cartlidge & Browne Winery.  The exterior of the tasting room is a modest building with dark wood paneling.  There is a patio in front next to the street shaded by trees.  The tasting room has dark wood plank floors, a couple of high tops for people to gather around, and a bar made of weathered wood.  It is not very large inside.  There’s enough space for about four people to stand at the bar. This tasting room’s focus is less on having guests huddled around the bar and more on getting people to hang out at one of the tables inside or out, or just stand around with friends sipping wine away from the bar.

The inside tasting room was busy when I visited, so we went outside to one of the tables on the patio. One of the woman servers brought the wines out to us and explained each one.  She was very amiable.  My husband and I sampled six wines that included a Viognier, Old Vine Zinfandel, Petite Sirah, Cabernet Sauvignon, and their red blend Artistry.  One of my personal favorites was the 2013 Old Vine Zinfandel made from over 100-year-old vines mostly from Calistoga.  It was jammy and chocolatey.  I also really liked the 2012 Artistry Bordeaux blend with rich black fruit and well balanced tannins, as well as the 2012 Oakville Cabernet Sauvignon that was so big and rich that it should be paired with a dish like short ribs.  This winery requires advance reservations.  It is easy to do online.  They are open until 7 p.m. with the last reservation starting at 6 p.m.  It was a nice way to wrap up the day.

The outdoor patio at Girard Tasting Room

The outdoor patio at Girard Tasting Room

 

Frank Family Vineyards

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Frank Family Vineyards

Frank Family Vineyards

1091 Larkmead Ln, Calistoga, CA 94515

Website: https://www.frankfamilyvineyards.com/

I first heard about Frank Family Vineyards through a guide book and was intrigued by the history of the winery.  I then went to the winery’s website to learn more about the place.  There are several aspects of this winery that made me want to visit.  First, Frank Family Vineyards now sits on the site of the Larkmead Winery that was constructed in 1884.  The original stone building still stands on the property and is on the National Register of Historical Places.  Second, the owner Rich Frank is a long-time Disney executive.  Third, the winery proudly boasts that they have been voted as “Napa’s Best Winery” on the Bay Area A-list for seven years in a row.

The historic Larkmead Winery

The historic Larkmead Winery

Frank Family Vineyards is located in the southern end of Calistoga.  To me, the most impressive part of the winery is the history behind it.  At the entrance to Frank Family Vineyards stands a stone building that was built in 1906 after John Battista and Felix Salmina became owners of the Larkmead Winery that was originally started in 1884.  The Salmina family was very influential in the Napa Valley wine community before Prohibition and after Repeal.  According to Charles L. Sullivan’s Napa Wine: A History, Larkmead Winery became one of the most prosperous wineries in the Valley in the early 1900s.  Felix Salmina passed away in 1940 and the family sold off the winery in 1943.  It changed hands a couple of times before Hanns Kornell purchased the winery in 1958 and named it Kornell Champagne Cellars.  Kornell was one of the first winemakers to introduce the traditional French method of making sparkling wine to California and turned the winery into a multi-million dollar business.  He produced his sparkling wine in the old stone Larkmead winery.  Sadly, things went downhill for Kornell in the 1980s when he was unable to compete with the large European Champagne companies and he ended up going bankrupt.  This presented a new opportunity for Rich Frank, a well-known executive for Walt Disney, who spent many weekends in Napa Valley before purchasing a home in Rutherford in 1990.  He heard about the sale of Kornell Champagne Cellars in 1992 from his friend Koerner Rombauer and less than 24 hours later they became co-owners of the winery.  Later in 2007, Rich Frank took sole ownership of Frank Family Vineyards.

Prior to purchasing a winery, Rich Frank had a long career in Hollywood.  He was President of the Paramount Television Group, President of Chris Craft Television, and one of the Founders of the USA Network.  He went on to become Chairman of Walt Disney Television and Telecommunications and then President of Walt Disney Studios for a decade overseeing the development of The Disney Channel.  Famous television shows and movies like “Cheers”, “Taxi”, “Family Ties”, “Entertainment Tonight”, “Golden Girls”, “Home Improvement”, “Dead Poet’s Society”, “Pretty Woman”, and “The Lion King” all achieved great success under Frank’s leadership.

On top of all of the history of the winery and current owner, this winery is proud to boast about being voted “Napa’s Best Winery”.  As my husband and I pulled up to the winery off Larkmead Lane, we immediately saw a large white sign indicating that they were voted “Best Napa Winery”.  I suppose that if I were a winery owner who received this recognition that I would want to share with everyone, but I found the sign to be a bit tacky.  It also raised my expectations of the winery because I would expect a winery that is voted the best to really stand out from all the others.

Picnic area at Frank Family Vineyards

Picnic area at Frank Family Vineyards

There were some aspects of the winery that I liked, but I would not rate it as my favorite one.  I enjoyed the property which I would describe as a combination of old world meets new world.  On one side of the property are the old stone Larkmead building and a large red barn that serves as a tank room and warehouse.  On the opposite side is a picnic area shaded by large oak trees that looks out at a beautiful view of the vineyard with mountains off in the distance.  The tasting area is located inside a yellow bungalow that has a very homey feel with a porch and chairs outside the front entrance.   This would be a lovely place to spend the afternoon on a sunny day sitting outdoors with a bottle of wine.

Unfortunately I was not as impressed with my wine tasting experience.  When we entered the bungalow, there was a tasting bar to our right and a cash register immediately to our left.  There were two guys standing behind the cash register.  Instead of giving us a warm greeting, one of them asked, “Are you here for a tasting?”  When we indicated that we were he explained that we could choose from a Classic tasting that included 4 Napa wines or a Premium Tasting that included a sparkling wine and 4 Reserve wines.  We opted to split a Reserve tasting.  After my husband paid for the tasting, he instructed us to walk down the hall to a room on the left.  The tasting room is divided into three different tasting areas.  There is the tasting bar at the entrance and two other rooms in the back.  One of the rooms was not in use when we visited.  The room that we were directed to was small.  There were 4 other people in the room when we arrived and just enough space for my husband and me up at the tasting bar.  I think I would have preferred tasting at the front bar because it was brighter and more open.  Although there weren’t a lot of people there at the time, I found it to be a little loud.  While we were waiting for the group in front of us to finish up, I was taking in all of the paraphernalia on the walls from Rich Frank’s Hollywood career.  On the plus side, once the group of 4 left, my husband and I were the only ones left in the room and were able to get 1:1 attention.  Our server was friendly but not very forthcoming with information until we started asking questions.  We did get to taste a couple extra wines.  I felt that all of the wines were high quality and especially liked the 2010 Carneros Reserve Chardonnay, 2007 Napa Valley Zinfandel, and 2008 Winston Hill Rutherford Red Wine.  However, we didn’t end up taking any home with us because I felt the wines were a bit overpriced.  The Winston Hill was well over $100.

In summary, if I were to judge this winery as the best in Napa it would fall short of what I consider “the best” to be.  Yet, I would give this winery a definite thumbs-up for its history and outdoor atmosphere.  It is a nice place to relax and try some good wine.  Due to their popularity, it is recommended on their website to make reservations in advance.  Reservations are required between Friday to Sunday.