I am going to hold you people accountable.
I am going to tell it like it is and try to explain why your so-called "wine country" is 85% trash.
On a recent trip to Temecula, California it became crystal clear why to really experience California wine country you must go North of Los Angeles. For those of you not familiar, Temecula is a small town located in the Northern San Diego County but I consider the place more Riverside adjacent (the only trash here is white).
About 5 years ago Nina and I made our first trip to Temecula. Being winos and fond of drinking and driving (just kidding) Temecula was a way to do some wine tasting and not have to drive for more than an hour. Back then we visit about 5 wineries and heard the classic comment from a trailer dweller as she re-entered her rented limo "That place has the best wine. One drink and your toasted". This trip include mediocre wine, high fees for tasting, and overpriced crappy food and the then Premier Temecula Winery Thorton Vineyards. A meal that we had to wait 3 hours to get. Needless to say Thorton was not on our list to visit this time.
The art of wine tasting is about sampling the subtle differences between one winery and another comparing it to what you are used to. It's about discovering a new flavor, it's about finding a wine that you like the taste.
IT'S NOT ABOUT GETTING DRUNK!
In the next few posts I will describe what happened at the various wineries we visited. The good the bad and the ugly.
Friday, April 01, 2005
Baily Winery
We started our visit at Baily Winery. Having arrived around Noon we decide to have lunch at Carol's Restaurant on the Baily property. I had a Salmon Salad and Nina has a Steak. The Salmon was prepared well and served over a bed of greens with grapes, gorgonzola cheese and candied pecans. It was a tasty combination of flavors but the salmon itself didn't have much of a punch. A little seasoning or perhaps a wine marinade may have helped this. The steak was ok but you would think at a winery based restaurant all steaks would be marinated in red wine to bring out the flavor. When you cut into a steak that hasn't been properly marinated it's blah. You shouldn't have to add salt to a steak that has been properly prepared.
This being said overall the lunch was tasty. I enjoyed a glass of the Baily Rose' with my salad and it was delicious. The Rose' was very fresh tasting and reminded me of a sparkling wine, somewhat effervescent. The service was also very good.
After lunch we entered the tasting room. The wine at Baily's is pretty tasty with their standouts being the Rose' and a Muscat Blanc. The tasting fee is $5 for 5 tastes from a list of about 10 wines not including their Cabernet Franc and Meritage. If you want to taste these you pay $10 but you still only get to try 5 wines. Since we were focusing on whites we decided to go for the $5 option and were not able to try all the wines they had to offer.
I have to say this whole # of tastings for # of dollars is crap. I understand why people charge for tasting but don't make the bookkeeping difficult. Just charge one price for basic tasting and another for "premium", 'reserve", or "extended" tasting. Don't make me have to figure out what wines I get to taste from a list. How the hell do I know what I want to taste if I haven't tasted it?
At the tasting room we met Phil Baily who seemed to be a nice guy. He asked us if we enjoyed our lunch. It's this kind of consideration and customer service that makes you feel good to patronize a store. The fact that he remember seeing us and was courteous was great and it was the last we would see of customer service in this wonderful valley. I also noticed that he was very tollerant to the guy standing next to me who was bragging about how he was the president of some pasta sauce maker and how because of Phil he now had a 2000 bottle wine cellar in his house. Yet you know that he probably drives a 81 Chevy Nova. His hoochie girlfriend looked like she used to work the local strip joint until the truck accident that somehow disfigured her horribly (insert your own image here).
This being said overall the lunch was tasty. I enjoyed a glass of the Baily Rose' with my salad and it was delicious. The Rose' was very fresh tasting and reminded me of a sparkling wine, somewhat effervescent. The service was also very good.
After lunch we entered the tasting room. The wine at Baily's is pretty tasty with their standouts being the Rose' and a Muscat Blanc. The tasting fee is $5 for 5 tastes from a list of about 10 wines not including their Cabernet Franc and Meritage. If you want to taste these you pay $10 but you still only get to try 5 wines. Since we were focusing on whites we decided to go for the $5 option and were not able to try all the wines they had to offer.
I have to say this whole # of tastings for # of dollars is crap. I understand why people charge for tasting but don't make the bookkeeping difficult. Just charge one price for basic tasting and another for "premium", 'reserve", or "extended" tasting. Don't make me have to figure out what wines I get to taste from a list. How the hell do I know what I want to taste if I haven't tasted it?
At the tasting room we met Phil Baily who seemed to be a nice guy. He asked us if we enjoyed our lunch. It's this kind of consideration and customer service that makes you feel good to patronize a store. The fact that he remember seeing us and was courteous was great and it was the last we would see of customer service in this wonderful valley. I also noticed that he was very tollerant to the guy standing next to me who was bragging about how he was the president of some pasta sauce maker and how because of Phil he now had a 2000 bottle wine cellar in his house. Yet you know that he probably drives a 81 Chevy Nova. His hoochie girlfriend looked like she used to work the local strip joint until the truck accident that somehow disfigured her horribly (insert your own image here).
Mount Palomar Winery
"Could you move closer to the wall so we can get these other people in to taste".
This was one of the wonderful one liner's from the snobby bitch that served us. The fact that she tolerated our presence was so delightful of her. I would not judge an entire wine tasting experience strickly based on the staff but for Mount Palomar I'll give it my best shot. We walked into the dimly lit room with the wonderful sounds of a dishwasher surrounding us as a hint of swamp gas from it gave us that Feng Shui feel. Bitch-Monica I will call her, though I never even asked her name, told us the rules. 6 tastings for 5 dollars from a list of 12 wines. After I paid BM (Bitch-Monica) she put down a glass and a card that had 6 little perforated pieces on it. As she poured each tasting she would rip off one of the strips. This must be a god send to her because after I cosied up against the wall there must have been 10 people tasting. Heaven forbid she lose track and give someone 7 tastings instead of 6! Once she finished tearing off the strips she would deposit the left over card into a large glass vase. CHA-CHING!
This all being said Mount Palomar did have a few good wines, the highlight being their Sherry. Apparently they have some sort of deviced to make the sherry that no one else in Temecula has. I don't know what it is. I don't know why they need it and BM was not too interested in explaining it so I didn't push it. Needless to say this sherry had a taste of a fine brandy without the bite. Very nice.
Mount Palomar also has a deli with some great smelling pizza. The woman who works the deli was very kind an accommodating but she had too much to do and not enough help. A world of difference from BM. That's Bitch-Monica in case you haven't kept up with the theme of this post.
You know it's called wine tasting. Not wine drinking. Maybe if they didn't pour so much then they could offer the whole line of wines to taste without all the punch cards, torn perfs, body modification for a tasting, etc. It must cost a lot of money to make up those little deals and the liability insurance for the tattoo artist must be astronomical.
One last comment. We spent $80 on wine at Mount Palomar. Did we get one thank you?
NO.
I know that there are some people that spend hundreds of dollars at each visit to a winery but these people are few a far between. The most common in Temecula are the "One sip and your toasted" group so you would think that when some spends some money that even the most snobbish, cynical Bitch-Monica would at least throw out a "Thank you for visiting Mount Palomar".
This was one of the wonderful one liner's from the snobby bitch that served us. The fact that she tolerated our presence was so delightful of her. I would not judge an entire wine tasting experience strickly based on the staff but for Mount Palomar I'll give it my best shot. We walked into the dimly lit room with the wonderful sounds of a dishwasher surrounding us as a hint of swamp gas from it gave us that Feng Shui feel. Bitch-Monica I will call her, though I never even asked her name, told us the rules. 6 tastings for 5 dollars from a list of 12 wines. After I paid BM (Bitch-Monica) she put down a glass and a card that had 6 little perforated pieces on it. As she poured each tasting she would rip off one of the strips. This must be a god send to her because after I cosied up against the wall there must have been 10 people tasting. Heaven forbid she lose track and give someone 7 tastings instead of 6! Once she finished tearing off the strips she would deposit the left over card into a large glass vase. CHA-CHING!
This all being said Mount Palomar did have a few good wines, the highlight being their Sherry. Apparently they have some sort of deviced to make the sherry that no one else in Temecula has. I don't know what it is. I don't know why they need it and BM was not too interested in explaining it so I didn't push it. Needless to say this sherry had a taste of a fine brandy without the bite. Very nice.
Mount Palomar also has a deli with some great smelling pizza. The woman who works the deli was very kind an accommodating but she had too much to do and not enough help. A world of difference from BM. That's Bitch-Monica in case you haven't kept up with the theme of this post.
You know it's called wine tasting. Not wine drinking. Maybe if they didn't pour so much then they could offer the whole line of wines to taste without all the punch cards, torn perfs, body modification for a tasting, etc. It must cost a lot of money to make up those little deals and the liability insurance for the tattoo artist must be astronomical.
One last comment. We spent $80 on wine at Mount Palomar. Did we get one thank you?
NO.
I know that there are some people that spend hundreds of dollars at each visit to a winery but these people are few a far between. The most common in Temecula are the "One sip and your toasted" group so you would think that when some spends some money that even the most snobbish, cynical Bitch-Monica would at least throw out a "Thank you for visiting Mount Palomar".
Maurice Car'rie
Maurice Car'rie reminded me of Knotts Berry Farm.
They have all this crap all over the place. Jam, jellies, chocolate, gold panning supplies. Oh yes they are big fans of the color pink.
Maurice Car'rie is the only winery in Temecula that doesn't charge for tasting. The reason from my perspective is that their wines are nothing special. We tasted the whole list of wines and despite the fact that all were good, nothing really stood out. The fact that the woman that served us was complaining that she wanted to go on a break and that she hoped another tourist bus was not pulling up just added to the ambiance. She was kind enough to offer us a reserve cabernet that was not on the list but when I asked her what the difference was she said that it was grown in a different place (inside joke for wine tasting fans). The one bright spot is their Pineapple Champagne which is not on the tasting list but I asked to taste it anyway. There is no distinct pineapple flavor or aroma but this sparkling wine was quite refreshing. The older lady who helped us after the break woman took her break in the middle of our tasting mumbled something about how we were supposed to taste the whites first so she doesn't have to use another glass but poured us the sample anyway.
Lets put this into perspective.
Nina and I buy one taste at each winery and share it. They pour so much that even after we taste the wine we dump half of the sample. So even though every other couple didn't share a glass this woman was bitching about our choice of sampling champagne after tasting all the other wines. We would have been ok with rinsing out the glass we had used but there were no pitchers on the bar to rinse out the glass with. There were sinks that this woman could use to rinse out the glass and we would have been fine. Yet she took the road to complain to the customer.
When I went to the Maurice Car'rie Website to reference this post the site crashed my browser.
We bought the champagne.
They have all this crap all over the place. Jam, jellies, chocolate, gold panning supplies. Oh yes they are big fans of the color pink.
Maurice Car'rie is the only winery in Temecula that doesn't charge for tasting. The reason from my perspective is that their wines are nothing special. We tasted the whole list of wines and despite the fact that all were good, nothing really stood out. The fact that the woman that served us was complaining that she wanted to go on a break and that she hoped another tourist bus was not pulling up just added to the ambiance. She was kind enough to offer us a reserve cabernet that was not on the list but when I asked her what the difference was she said that it was grown in a different place (inside joke for wine tasting fans). The one bright spot is their Pineapple Champagne which is not on the tasting list but I asked to taste it anyway. There is no distinct pineapple flavor or aroma but this sparkling wine was quite refreshing. The older lady who helped us after the break woman took her break in the middle of our tasting mumbled something about how we were supposed to taste the whites first so she doesn't have to use another glass but poured us the sample anyway.
Lets put this into perspective.
Nina and I buy one taste at each winery and share it. They pour so much that even after we taste the wine we dump half of the sample. So even though every other couple didn't share a glass this woman was bitching about our choice of sampling champagne after tasting all the other wines. We would have been ok with rinsing out the glass we had used but there were no pitchers on the bar to rinse out the glass with. There were sinks that this woman could use to rinse out the glass and we would have been fine. Yet she took the road to complain to the customer.
When I went to the Maurice Car'rie Website to reference this post the site crashed my browser.
We bought the champagne.
Detour For Cheese
We made a detour to Winchester Cheese to pick up some nice cheese combustibles.
They make Gouda. Just Gouda. 15 types of Gouda. It's Good-Ah! (sorry about that)
The lady who helped us was super nice and the pretzels were from walmart. Woo hoo!
They make Gouda. Just Gouda. 15 types of Gouda. It's Good-Ah! (sorry about that)
The lady who helped us was super nice and the pretzels were from walmart. Woo hoo!
Wilson Creek Winery
Wilson Creek was bustling with activity.
Sampling here was 5 tastings for 7 dollars with an extra $3 for a tasting of the chocolate port that comes in a small chocolate cup.
The wines here are good with the highlight being the White Cabernet. I have never tasted a white wine made from Cabernet grapes and it was quite tasty. It was one of the most unique wines I have had and it made for an instant sale. Other highlights were the Almond Champagne and the Chocolate Port. The Champagne had a great Almond aroma and taste, unique and delicious. The Port was good summer style port. There was not a strong chocolate flavor but was very light a airy.
I think the fact that they had tip jars on the bar was tacky. The staff was friendly and I did tip but after spend $10 to taste should I have to pay the server?
Sampling here was 5 tastings for 7 dollars with an extra $3 for a tasting of the chocolate port that comes in a small chocolate cup.
The wines here are good with the highlight being the White Cabernet. I have never tasted a white wine made from Cabernet grapes and it was quite tasty. It was one of the most unique wines I have had and it made for an instant sale. Other highlights were the Almond Champagne and the Chocolate Port. The Champagne had a great Almond aroma and taste, unique and delicious. The Port was good summer style port. There was not a strong chocolate flavor but was very light a airy.
I think the fact that they had tip jars on the bar was tacky. The staff was friendly and I did tip but after spend $10 to taste should I have to pay the server?
Ponte Family Winery
I think this place is called a "Family" winery because they let people bring the kids to hang out at the bar. There were so many people at the bar (tasting and not tasting) that when we arrived at 4:45pm we decided to look around a little before tasting. Around 5:01 I got the chance to step up to the bar and told the guy that I wanted to purchase one tasting. He told me that the winery closes at 5:00. I said that we were there 15 minutes ago but there was no room at the bar. He acted like he didn't understand what I was saying and repeated that they close a 5 and he can't serve me. I said that I thought this was a lousy way to treat customers and that we were here before 5 and there was no room at the bar because all these kids were hanging around. He then said that they need to clean up so they need to stop serving at 5pm yet it was 5:03 at this point and others at the bar were still being served. I told him to forget it. He then said that he could serve us while they cleaned up but it's going to be messy. I told him to just forget and walked out the door.
I guess the problem is that they hire snobs to work at these places and pay them minimum wage. There is no doubt in my mind that were we in Santa Ynez, Sonoma, Napa, or Portland we would not have been treated so rudely.
I guess the problem is that they hire snobs to work at these places and pay them minimum wage. There is no doubt in my mind that were we in Santa Ynez, Sonoma, Napa, or Portland we would not have been treated so rudely.
South Coast Winery
The woman at this place who poured called the Rose' (Rose-ah) wine Rose (rose) wine.
Did she think it was made up of roses?
Pompous bitch should get a little learning about accents and tildes and the like before she stands on her podium and declares how many tastes you get as she sharpies your card to keep track. Be sure and use the blue sharpie and circle the glass on the card if they try the port!
Yes Sir!
I will add some conclusions about the total experience in a future post.
Did she think it was made up of roses?
Pompous bitch should get a little learning about accents and tildes and the like before she stands on her podium and declares how many tastes you get as she sharpies your card to keep track. Be sure and use the blue sharpie and circle the glass on the card if they try the port!
Yes Sir!
I will add some conclusions about the total experience in a future post.
Slacker
Have I slacked off from my mission or what?
Anything I say will be thought of as an excuse but at least I am back.
To answer the deodorant question I use speed stick or old spice. I do not use anti-persperant because for me they are evil.
Anything I say will be thought of as an excuse but at least I am back.
To answer the deodorant question I use speed stick or old spice. I do not use anti-persperant because for me they are evil.
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