Tasting Favorites

(By Guest Author, Brian Shapiro) Last night we had a fantastic opportunity to enjoy the wines from Stryker Sonoma. The winery is located in Alexander Valley and in our opinion typifies the types of wines being produced in that region of Sonoma County -- big, bold reds with a focus on the Bordeaux varietals. Stryker Sonoma brought us five wines; each was a single vineyard 100% varietal wine. The theme of the evening was the “Five Great Bordeaux Varietals” and the winery did not disappoint!  Fresh off of harvest Winemaker Tim Hardin joined me (Stryker P.R. guru) in describing the [...]

Even competing with the Giants game and the rain, we had a decent turn out last night for the “Wines of the Lake” tasting, featuring eight wines from Lake County.  The tasting was led by Pietro of Rosa d'Oro Winery and John McDermaid of McDermaid Family Wines.  They began with an overview of what makes Lake County unique; describing the higher altitude, the impact of Clear Lake on the vineyards, and the swings in temperature from the low 100F’s during the day to a drop of 50F overnight.  We also learned that Lake County has 5 AVA’s (American Viticulture Appellations). The [...]

I love October in Sonoma County, because it means the Harvest Fair is here!  I've attended every year for the past 10 years to taste the top scoring wines.  In addition, I enjoy checking out the monster-size pumpkins, the decorated cakes, visiting all of the sheep, goats, cows, horses, and pig pens, listening to the music, and always catching the Grape Stomp before I leave. Afterwards, I head to some of my favorite wine stores in Sonoma County, because they have great deals on the Harvest Fair medal winning wines.  The two stores I always hit are Bottle Barn and Olivers, [...]

“Who doesn’t like chardonnay?” was one of the daring questions Jessica Schmit, Chateau St. Jean Tasting Room Rep and recent SSU Wine Biz grad, asked the audience of 40 Millennials who showed up to last night’s SSU Wine Sense Club tasting.  When only one person was brave enough to raise his hand, Jessica dared him to a taste off of two CSJ chardonnays.  In the end, he selected, along with the rest of the Millennials, the 2008 Ch. St. Jean Chardonnay from Durell Ranch ($28) as the favorite of the evening. This was the Magic of White Wine Tasting (red [...]

Last night we had our first tasting of the semester for the SSU Wine Sense Club.  Approximately 30 students turned out for the “Savoring Sonoma” tasting featuring famous Sonoma County varietals.  In order to represent the range of Sonoma grapes, we invited two wineries to pour.  Peterson Winery in Dry Creek represented the warmer appellations and Nicholson Ranch Winery located on the border of Carneros and Sonoma Valley highlighted cooler regions. Nicholson Ranch Wines Charles Whittaker, tasting room manager with Nicholson Ranch, described how their wines were made and the different locations for sourcing grapes.  We started with the 2007 [...]

The last SSU Wine Sense Club tasting of the semester featured pinot noirs from enchanting Arista Winery in the Russian River Valley.  Approximately 30 Millennials showed up to taste through several different Arista pinot noirs, ranging from the classic 2007 Russian River Valley Pinot Noir ($42) with appealing raspberry fruit and silky body to the massive and complex Longbow Pinot Noir with dark berry fruit, earth and tobacco and the Mononi Single Vineyard Pinot Noir with brambly fruit and spice.  When we took a vote at the end of the tasting on favorites, it was split evenly around the room [...]

Each semester our Intro to Wine Business class schedules a fieldtrip to a local winery in order to see and hear about cost/quality issues with the various vineyard farming methods and cellar operations.  It is always more useful to see actual equipment and trellising systems, and hear about their impact from vineyard/operations managers than just learn about it in class, from a book, and/or via video.  In order to be fair, we generally flip-flop back and forth between Napa and Sonoma wineries, as well as change winery size each semester.  This Spring we were scheduled to visit a large winery [...]

The classic red wine tasting this week was fabulous.  We had some great wines that were donated – and in fact, two of those won top favorites for the night with 47 Millennials present at the tasting and final voting.  Of course, there are only 4 classic red wines:  pinot noir, cabernet sauvignon, merlot, and syrah.  However, being that we live in California, we had to throw in a Zinfandel.  For the mystery wine of the night, I selected a Malbec from Argentina….because Malbec is so popular now.  The students did a great job of guessing the varietals correctly in [...]

This week in Bus 305W, 48 millennial students tasted through 6 excellent California white wines.  It was the beginning of the semester introduction to classic white varietals:  chardonnay, sauvignon blanc, riesling, chenin blanc, and semillion.  We also threw in a 6th “extra credit” wine, which was a gewurtraminer.  The class did very well guessing the varietals correctly – even though we tasted blind.  Just to refresh your memory, there are only 5 classic white varietals in the world, even though there are more than 24,000 different names for grapes, and 150 commercially produced varietals.  However, in order to be considered [...]

One of the highlights of this semester was the SSU Wine Club tasting with Iron Horse Vineyards located in the Green Valley AVA of Sonoma County.  Green Valley is a small special section of the Russian River Valley which has a cooler climate and more fog than surrounding areas.  Located just 13 miles from the Pacific Ocean, it is an ideal place to grow chardonnay and pinot noir.  Iron Horse is one of the largest of the 8 wineries in this appellation, and has become quite famous for its sparkling wines.  The wine tasting was hosted by Joy Sterling, CEO [...]

If you haven’t visited Anderson Valley yet, in Mendocino County, you are missing a magical wine region of California.  About an hour’s drive north of the Sonoma State University campus (and 2 hours north of San Francisco) you will enter the enchanting Anderson Valley.  It is filled with rolling vineyards tucked into the hillsides and hollows of the valley, with many charming small family wineries.  Legendary for their highly rated pinot noir and chardonnay, the cooler climate of the Anderson Valley also sets itself apart by being one of the only wine regions in California to specialize in white Alsatian [...]

What better way to start a new Fall semester on campus than with a wine tasting of Sebastiani wines.  For this first tasting, the room was filled to capacity with over 50 Millennials.  Julie Butler from Sebastiani’s Hospitality group brought 6 wines to taste.  Three were from Sebastiani Vineyards and Winery located in Sonoma, California, plus an additional 3 wines from Firestone Winery in Santa Barbara County.  You may not be aware that the 100+ year old Sebastiani Winery was acquired by Foley Family Wines in December of 2008.  Foley Family also owns 8 other wineries, including Firestone, Merus in [...]

With the hot weather we’ve been having this summer in Sonoma County and other parts of California, I had a craving to taste some summer wines such as dry roses and off-dry muscats. I’m sure that some of this had to do with the fact that I’m currently reading the book, Extremely Pale Rose, which is a fun romp through the wine regions of France looking for the lightest pink colored rose wine. Anyway, I headed to some of my favorite wine stores and also had some wines donated by friends and we had a relaxed tasting by a swimming [...]

You’ve heard of food and wine pairing, but have you heard of music and wine matching?  According to an informal focus group of 42 Women for Wine Sense members and guests at Nicholson Ranch Winery, the right type of music really can impact what you taste in the wine.  We experimented with two wines – a chardonnay and pinot noir, and matched them to different music genres.  Focus group members were asked to vote on their favorite.  The results were amazing!  The 2007 Estate Chardonnay on its own has a lovely nose of orange blossom with peach and butter on [...]