SOME ADDITIONS TO THE PART ONE LIST

46 East Wineries (pasorobleswinerieseast.com)  - Not a large group of wineries (13) but some large and well known producers are mixed in with some smaller gems that begin just east of Hwy 101 and are easily found right along Hwy 46E or just off it on parallel roads. This was where many of the original vintners and growers began the Paso wine boom. Either planting ranch land to acres of grapes destined for the big brands or starting new wine labels such as Estrella, Eberle and Martin Brothers. Eberle continues successfully, Estrella became Meridian and recently changed to 360, Martin Brothers picked up a partner, failed and its tasting room is now operated by LA based San Antonio, the winery itself is now a Chinese owned operation, focused on exports for distribution in China.

46 West Wineries (46west.com) - Starting about a five minute drive west of Hwy 101 and extending just a few miles to Vineyard Dr., there is a concentration of wineries that easily rival parts of Napa Valley for density. On the main road, Hwy 46, and on side roads to both the north and south, more than four dozen wineries are cheek by jowl.

Back Roads Wineries (backroadswineries.com) - This group includes 25wineries on the east side of Paso Robles, most of which are off the well beaten path of highway 46 and smaller producers than the 46E group. There are some excellent member wineries and on fun and scenic roads to travel. The main group is located north and south of Hwy 46 on side roads, see map on the web site.

Event Notes for these organizations - Friday October 19 is set for the first Taste of the Back Roads event. Fifteen wineries will be pouring, olive oils from the area are also available for tasting and a panel of winemakers will hold a seminar & tasting from 5 to 6PM. Music and food is included and ticket details are available on the above web site.

The 46 East group is sponsoring a motorcycle Poker Run on Oct 27/28 to benefit Zoo To You, an animal education foundation. They will have animal ambassadors in each of the 13 wineries. A game board can be purchased at any winery for a $20 donation. Best Costume awards with additional discounts are part of the fun, so dress in your scary best. More info is on their web site.

PRWCA (details at pasowine.com) will hold its final local event of the year, Harvest Wine Weekend, on Oct 19/20th. There are over 120 events planned with most wineries doing their own food-wine=music parties and wine sales and special tastings are common. An online brochure is available at the web address above.

VINO ROLLS OUT HARVEST 2012 ISSUE AT TASTING

            The wine lifestyle publication VINO , hosted its latest group of Rockstar Winemakers at an issue roll-out and tasting last Friday. The winemakers pouring, and profiled in the harvest edition of the magazine, included; Joey Arnold of Pozo Valley, Lood Kotze from Cass Vineyards, Carmine Rubino and Mike Mooney of D'Anbino and Chateau Margene/Moody Family wineries respectively. Halter Ranch's Kevin Sass and Guillaume Fabre from Clos Solene L'Aventure were also included in the six "rockstars" in the latest issue. The (dare I say) pressing demands of harvest kept them from participating in the tasting but are wineries with which I am familiar. Check out the group on line or in print and plan to add a visit to your next tasting tour of the area.

Without going into a lot of tasting note details, it was a great group of winemakers with vastly different methods of entering the business. Pozo remains a working family cattle ranch and offered a selection of 2006 Zin, Cab and Black Rock blend. It is rare to see that vintage being poured or even for sale in these days of three years and out the door being the standard sales cycle. Yes, Joey told me, "I have the hat and we still have the cattle.

Carmine uses his music production background and that of his nephew/partner John D'Andrea to style his wines with musical references on the labels at D' Anbino. These included Quadrophonic '07, a four wine Bordeaux blend that adds Syrah to the mix and a Syrah, Cab &Petite Syrah combination, Orchestration '07.

Lood (a South African moniker) opened the Cass '09  Flying Nymph, a blend combining Syrah, Mourvedre and Grenache. Other recent Rhone bottlings were also sampled and he discussed his formal education in wine and travels throughout the world in perfecting his skills.

Mike Mooney came from a corporate tech sales background and is determined to make a very few thousand cases of really nice Pinot (under the Family label) and Cabernet with the occasional experiment with other varietals just to keep things interesting at Chateau Margene. Meritage and a super Tuscan style are offered as Chateau Margene while Rhone varietals fall under the Moody Family label.

RESOURCES (PART ONE) FOR PLANNING TOURS & TASTINGS

            Paso Robles Wine Country Alliance (pasowine.com) – The PRWCA is the organization  that represents the largest group of wineries in the region. It is a membership group that markets the destination on a national basis and is responsible for several large wine events throughout the year. The web site is very well done and a great tool for those coming to area and locals alike. Tour planning, maps and in depth profiles of wineries are there as well as lodging options and dining recommendations. Details on events and ticketing is also included. There is so much to tell, I'll do a separate posting on the organization soon. When looking at the site, just know that only about 50% of the area wineries are members. There are four other Paso centric subset organizations, shown below.

            Far Out Wineries (faroutwineries.com) - This is a group that promotes nearly 20 wineries on the western fringe of the AVA or along the Adelaida and Peach Canyon roads the connect Paso to Vineyard Rd., the westernmost north-south connector. They offer a brochure specific to the touring of their "out there" neighbors.

            Paso chapter of Rhone Rangers (RhoneRangers.org & email pasorobles@ rhonerangers.org) - Is a state wide organization dedicated to Rhone varietals and Paso Robles is a major grower of the well and lesser known wine grapes they promote. There are over four dozen wineries in the area that focus on these wines and most are members of the local chapter. While many also make wine from non-Rhone types, they are a good resource for those seeking to focus on that style. A tasting pamphlet for the group is available.  

            Pleasant Valley Wine Trail (pleasantvalleywinetrail.com) – Pleasant Valley is in the NE corner of the Paso Robles AVA and is easily reached via San Miguel off Hwy 101. Most are small family operations and some have limited hours of tasting room operations. Check the web site. Currently, there are ten member wineries.

            Union Road Wine Trail (unionroadwinetrail.com) - This small group of wineries is located on a road parallel to E Hwy 46 and offers some quality wines that are often passed by due to the large number of well known wineries on the highway. A dozen wineries are in the group, including a port style producer. Close together, they are a great side trip from the beaten path, mostly small and quiet with sometimes limited hours. The exception is the locally popular and old-west-raucous tasting room at Tobin James, open daily and usually busy with multiple tasting bars.

            Cambria Wine Trail - Likely the shortest set of wineries to comprise a trail, the four wineries involved seem to no longer run a web site. But all are within a couple of blocks of each other in downtown for those enjoying the lovely beach village of Cambria. The individual wineries can be found at Black Hand, Moonstone, Red Poets & Skyhawk Lane.

            Paso Robles Wine Grape Growers Association (pasorobleswinegrapes.com) - This organization is a trade group and the local branch of the International Grape Growers, a viticultural group dedicated to improving the quality of wine grapes and farming practices. They are a good source of information in that field and on current methods in use in the Paso Robles AVA. They do have social events as well and non-members are welcome. These are posted on their web page.

ON THE CALENDAR

Well, it's good to be back and blogging after nearly a month of tech headaches. But, new laptop and operating systems are now up and running and I'm trying to catch up.

Here are some of the big fun events coming up in the next week or two.

            VINO is rolling out the latest edition of its wine lifestyle magazine this Friday (21st) in conjunction with a "Rock Star Winemakers" tasting. Join the juice jockeys from 3 to 5PM at the Niblick Rd. Albertsons in Paso Robles. On hand will be winemakers from Pozo Valley, L'Adventure/Clos Solene, Cass, Chateau Margene, D'Anbino and Halter Ranch. Tastings of recent releases are available for those of legal age, and autographed bottles will be offered for sale. VINO is also developing a web site at www.vinopasorobles.com.

            Savor the Central Coast (www.savorcentralcoast.com), a major annual gathering of wine and food fans, takes place beginning Thursday the 27th and runs through Sunday.  The main location is Santa Margarita Ranch but events include many locations in the region.

Celebrating three years with Sunset Magazine as the title sponsor, the festivities include celeb chefs such as Susan Feniger of Mandalay Bay and Food Network stars Aarti Sequeira from Aarti's Party and Ted Allen from Chopped. The event has an array of events (many of which have sold out), beginning with a gourmet kick off dinner at Hearst Castle on Thursday. The 28th features a variety of small group adventure tours, with some still having openings, plus the international wine competition and grand tasting in Pismo Beach. This includes a dinner (also sold out) but still has room for the reception and after party available.

The Sat/Sun main event, with tickets available for $85 per day or $150 the weekend, provides access to the primary public tasting and associated seminars for a $20 charge from the menu of topics covered. Local residents can check the box when buying tickets and receive a 15% discount for the main event. Check the web site for those listings and various cooking demonstrations and contest style shows. Tickets remain for the Santa Maria BBQ seminar on Saturday (2PM) and the Lamb Jam at 2:30 on Sunday.

One of the still open (50 slots remain as of this writing) events could well be the most fun and a huge value. Known as Paso Glow, it is a wine/beer garden plus Santa Maria style BBQ event with a group of well regarded local chefs from restaurants such as Villa Creek, Thomas Organics, Paso Robles Inn and Artisan, features meats from Harris Ranch and the mobile smokehouse of the Dean Brothers. Grammy award winning recording artists Rio Salinas will provide a Tex-Mex groove for your dancing pleasure. Starting at 6 in the evening, the cost is only $75!

Mary Ann, event marketing guru, suggests you plan early for next year if your favorite event has booked to the max this year! I still see many opportunities remain for a great weekend of Central Coast culture at the main event and a few openings remaining for the Friday adventure tours. These run from 10 to 2 and include lunch with wine.

            Fans of things that fly, including one of the original flying wing concepts, are looking forward to the Warbirds Over Paso airshow (www.ewarbirds.org). Held at the Paso Robles airport's Estrella Warbirds Museum (with co-sponsor Planes of Fame Museum) on Saturday the 29th, gates open at 8AM. Children under 12 and active military with ID are free. The $20 regular admission fee provides access to the car museum and static aircraft display as well as fly-overs and the opportunity to see a variety of WWII fighters and bombers. Some aircraft are offering ride-along opportunities. Food and beverage vendors will be on hand, including a Firestone-Walker beer garden, to sustain all the pilots, vets and those who fly or wish they could.

Technology Vacation

Over a period of a few days a week or so ago, both my laptop and desktop computers had a meltdown. My laptop contained most of my draft postings and research on the subjects. So - I'll be back with you as soon as I buy a new box and attempt to offload files from the toasted machines. Hope to see you back here soon.

Hospice du Rhone Plans New Venue

After twenty years of meeting in the Rhone varietal rich Central Coast town of Paso Robles, the organizers of the Hospice announced that they are taking the event to Tennessee in 2013. This event had brought about 1,000 lovers of Syrah, Grenache, Viognier and other Rhone wine grapes to the region for seminars and tastings, detailed in a blog posted prior to the event earlier this spring. The three day event was a sell out this year. It brought together makers and fans of wine based on the twenty two varietals grown in the Rhone Valley, and included representative of the world-wide regions growing them.

The announcement was via email with a copy posted on the event’s web site and signed by John Alban, the winemaker who convinced Matt Garretson to move his fledgling Viognier event to the Central Coast two decades ago. Vicki Carroll, the director of Hospice also signed the letter, which laid out plans for moving the event to more outreach and education in other parts of the country. It appears the hub will be Blackberry Farm in Tennessee, well regarded for its lodging and food & wine programs including Hospice seminars for small groups over the past few years.

I may understand the decision from a marketing standpoint but have mixed feelings about the abandonment of the Rhone-ish capital of California. That may not be the case as the announcement does not say that the new concept would exclude the Central Coast. I hope not. It allowed the attendees to actually visit many wineries producing they style and kept the logistics fairly simple for the many small producers involved. Another plus is the lure of the area as a general travel destination. Those who came for the event (many from overseas) could easily justify the three days with extending their stay and having a long list of things to enjoy with all that the state offers between San Francisco and LA.

It may also prove a smart move to take a more evangelistic approach to spreading word of Rhone varietals. Despite our local fervor for the grape varieties of that region, even fairly knowledgeable wine drinkers can seldom name a half dozen of the wine grapes grown in the Rhone Valley. One thing that hurts moving the production is a lack of distribution. Increasingly consolidated over the past couple of decades, few of those who make less than 25,000 cases of wine are of interest to those who fill shelves in the major markets. That volume describes most of the winemakers who are dedicated to the purpose of HdR and since they can’t get the ear of the distributors, there is a lack of proselytizing on behalf of their product.

Wholesale reps are paid to move cases not spin tales of a tiny winery with a great $40 Syrah blend, of which they have only two cases and contains a couple of grapes unfamiliar to the buyer. It is often the other way around; good sommeliers and savvy wine focused retailers ask about the wines from places they’ve been or read about. Many are not available in their market, generally due to financial and logistic realities. It is also true that many wineries offering Rhone style wine have found it is just easier to blend something with Cabernet or Zinfandel to make it easier for the consumer to relate. Sales are easier if they can say, “This is our Cabernet blend with Grenache”, even if the ratio is 10 to 90%. In any case, it was a pretty good run for twenty years and I wish Hospice the best in taking the word to the street. I remain hopeful that now and then that will continue to be Spring Street, Paso Robles, CA.

You may wish to see Fred Swan’s take on this and an interview with the HdR director at NorCalWine.com

Paso Wine Fest Posts Successful Numbers

The Paso Robles Wine Alliance, a group of nearly 150 of the wineries in the area, reports that the 30^th version of the event was one of the best ever. Great weather and some tweaks to the main tasting event combined for ticket sales of 4,500. A “thirty years – thirty dollar” ticket to the afternoon tasting in the city park was provided for advanced sales to local residents. The idea was well received and accounted for about 25% of advanced sales with 500 people making a last minute choice and buying same day ducats.

PRWA stated that the combination of profits from ticket sales and the auction of wines in conjunction with the winemakers’ dinner on opening night provided over $30K to be used for their support of local causes. Attendees were pleased that despite larger numbers, access to the tasting tables and other vendors was better than in past years. In part this was due to a drop in the number of wineries pouring but few could successfully absorb the sixty that were available anyway. Lessons learned from prior events in how to handle the crowd, parking, food service and the like also helped. It made for a great overall experience.