Monday, March 22, 2010

Barrel Tasting

We had a wonderful weekend of Barrel Tasting in the Livermore wine country this past weekend. It was quite fun because we got to taste the wine straight out of the barrel. It's interesting to taste the wines in the process. The weather was absolutely GORGEOUS! Adam and his girlfriend Katy along with several of their friends came out to meet us on Saturday and join us in wine tasting. Our little Eli was quite the hit as well, both with Adam's friends and with everyone we saw at the wineries! He was so calm and well behaved; people kept commenting on how lucky we are to have such a little angel and we agreed with them whole heartedly! We started at Wente which always offers up delicious wines. We then went over to Les Chenes, a somewhat newer winery. The owners were quite friendly, but we weren't very impressed with the wines. After that we moved on to Big White House which had opened three barrels and was offering the rest of their wines out of the bottle. It was packed! The tasting room is very charming and it was interesting being able to talk to the winemaker about his different wines and how they were named. It turns out his sister is an artist and all of the wine labels were originally her paintings. Their 2006 Dolcetto was quite delicious :-) Tasting in Livermore is a lot of fun because all of the wineries are very close together and most are small and family run. We were able to hit about 5 wineries each day. The Barrel Tasting weekend also allowed us to visit wineries such as Wood Family which are not usually open to the public.

Jason, Adam, myself and Eli at Wood Family Vineyards
Wood Family Vineyards

Concannon Barrel Room

Concannon Barrel Room



Eli getting lunch at Big White House


Adam and Katy spent the night with us and after breakfast at a local diner out here, we headed back into wine country. It was another beautiful day. Eli was very happy to be able to ride all day in the back seat with Katy. I think he is in love! On Sunday we were able to go to several wineries that we had never visited before, which was quite a treat. We were particularly impressed with the people at Eckerty Winery. While it is a very, very small winery, the staff were incredibly friendly and helpful. We then headed over to Deer Ridge which had a delicious Moonstruck Reserve Red accompanied by some equally delicious chocolate cookies :-) We got to taste a couple of ports here, which are not usually my favorite, however out of the barrel they were not quite so sweet yet. We ended our weekend at my favorite Livermore winery - Page Mill. I love everything about Page Mill, from the tasting room to their delicious reds. Of course I couldn't leave without buying a bottle :-) All in all, it was a fantastic weekend! Can't wait for next year's barrel tasting weekend!

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