Wine Dude: Hello and welcome to the Wine Dude, tasting as you go, a podcast to those excited about wine tasting but too poor to be a snob, we’re taking you all over to California to all different wineries we can find. We’re going to educate you and introduced you to all the different wines that you probably wouldn’t normally find. We’re going to interview wine makers, we’re going to interview people who work here, managers of the tasting room, the whole idea behind this podcast is to show you that wine tasting is a lot of fun and join me, the wine dude, tasting as you go. Welcome to Artiste winery, this place is just dripping with creativity. One of the most wonderful wineries that you’ve ever seen, by looking around, you can see that there’s all types of art up on the wall, stuff created by local artist, if you even come in, you can paint your own painting. Try some of their wines, they’re awesome. We’re here at the tasting bar with Bion Rice, Bion Rice is a winemaker and the owner of Artiste winery. How’s it going Bion?
Bion: Excellent.
Wine Dude: Yeah, having a good time?
Bion: Oh yeah.
Wine Dude: Alright, cool.
Bion: This wine is called Neli Cline, which means, in the hills. And the image is a, this beautiful woman, you know, picking foods for the dinner table in a place called Barola. Barola’s norther Italy, near Pidmont, pidmonte and the, there’s a famous producer there named Enrico Estibino, he’s very famous, he’s called the King of Barola. This wine pays homage to his style of blend, so it’s a blend of coccheto, the rare grape of the United States, and barbera and merlo. My new favorite artist, somebody very dear to my heart Christina LoCascio, who actually works here at our teachers resident artist, she accidentally discovered painting with wine.
Christina: Yeah, I started painting with wine about year and a half ago; I think first and foremost I just became a wino or wine geek, whatever you want to call it. I love how wine tells a story, everything about a wine is a story of a place, of a blend, of a art, of a winemaker, of a region, of a history, it’s so exciting and of course what I like to do is tell a stories thru my art. The first thing that you look at when you taste wine is the color, is it clear, is it dark, is it purple, is it red, is it garnet, is it brick, you know brown, old wines are brown, so, it’s a little of all that, you know.
Wine Dude: You look at the wine here artistically; you’re perfect for this place.
Christina: Right, yeah.
Wine Dude: We’re over here at Foxen with one of the winemakers and owners Bill Wathen. So what are we drinking here?
Bill: This is a 2003 vintage Vienacido Vineyard Pinot Noir from a block that is planted for Foxen called block 8, the ocho.
Wine Dude: Foxen’s pasty grim. We’re here with Jenny Dore. She’s one of the wine owners, she’s gonna go through a couple of the wines, may be give us some history of Foxen Winery. How you doing?
Jenny: Hi. It’s good to see you. This is a magical spot, original Mexican land grab property, only 2000 acres, the shack, that we actually call it, that is a former blacksmith shop. This building here is a 180 years old, it has been on the family all that time.
Wine Dude: So we got quite a bit of history here.
Jenny: We do. I have you to taste probably what we’re best known for, our Pinot Noirs. We make four, three vineyards designate and a blound, and this is what we call our Sun way valley. And this is a blend of our Vienicido Vineyard, the Julius Vineyard. Just grown, just a few miles from here, up on the Sta Maria bench…
Wine Dude: So, it’s always in Sta Maria…
Jenny: All within a few miles, yes exactly. So, this is a Sta Maria valley appellation Pinot Noir, everything we do here is in very small lots, our Pinot Noirs, any, all of our reds. Nothing is fined or filtered, which is very hard to do unless you’re doing your small lots. So that’s a, that’s a pretty good line up.
Wine Dude: I think so.
Jenny: And there you go.
Wine Dude: I’m happy. Wine Dude here, I’m here with Len Gelfand, of Gelfand vineyards. How’s it going Len?
Len: I’m doing fine, how are you?
Wine Dude: Good. What was this stuff?
Len: This wine, this wine and this, these three bottles are three blends that I made out of the grapes that we grow here.
Wine Dude: Tell me about this one first.
Len: This one is called, quixotic, quixotic, after Don Quixote the dreamer. That dreamers becoming a reality for us.
Wine Dude: That’s great man.
Len: Yeah, that’s all that’s to it, that’s all this is. That was this wine was made after, Don Quixote, quixotic. One-third cabernet, one-third sera, one-third petite sera, sent it down there at the orange county fare, won a bronze medal, first year out.
Wine Dude: All right.
Len: I want you taste it first, and I want you to tell me what you think about it.
Wine Dude: Ooh, I like that one.
Len: Why do you like this one?
Wine Dude: You can drink a lot of it.
Len: I swear to god, everybody says exactly the same thing. We call it our breakfast wine because, to me you could actually drink this wine with cheerios.
Wine Dude: Ha! Ha! Ha! Cheerios.
Len: As you’ll see.
Wine Dude: Okay, here goes (slurry) from Len. This is great with cheerios.
Len: Great with cheerios.
Wine Dude: Wine Dude here, tasting as you go. We’re at Clautiere winery with Terry Brady, and Claudine Blackwell. Correct?
Terry and Claudine: Correct.
Wine Dude: Okay, they were right. Why do I have this wig on? Well, that’s part of this winery. I think I look pretty good actually.
Terry: This is our cabernet…
Wine Dude: I notice this one’s got blue in it.
Terry: Ha! Ha! Ha!
Wine Dude: I like the blue.
Terry: Yeah, it’s, it’s, the blue also…that’s wonderful.
Wine Dude: What does the blue stand for? Oh… that’s what the blue…
Terry: That’s it, let’s have a taste, chavegnon. And it’s a beautiful expression we carry…
Wine Dude: Wait a second, she’s not drinking the same wine.
Terry: She’s drinking something.
Wine Dude: Come back here and drink some of this red.
Terry: Seeing this, you got the classic chabornnay chevignon, they were the blue berry, black berry, but you also get some really nice coffee, touch of chocolate on it.
Wine Dude: That’s what I tasted. We’re up here at Ravens Wood winery. We’re here with Bruce Mackay, how you doing?
Bruce: I’m doing good and welcome to Ravens Wood.
Wine Dude: Thank you.
Bruce: We are known for big bold wines, our motto is no wimpy wines…
Wine Dude: No wimpy wines?
Bruce: … but I’m sure you’ve seen that everywhere.
Wine Dude: Give me five with that, no wimpy wines.
Bruce: And it’s translated on so many languages, in Spanish is lovinos su uevos, so it’s a little edgy. But that’s what we are, we make serious wines, but we’re very irreverent in how we go about it. As you can see here it says to err is human but to zin is divine, and here lies the last wimpy wine and R.I.P.
Wine Dude: Ha! Ha! Ha! Peter Griffith.
Peter: Wine Dude.
Wine Dude: How are you?
Peter: Nice to meet you. What we’re going to do is, we’re going to taste some of the cook, this is an ’05 so this is still a baby, it’s less than 2 years in a barrel. This will give you a glimpse of where the wines starts, so. This is an absolute incredible wine.
Wine Dude: I heard that if you’re quite, quite a few zins.
Peter: 15.
Wine Dude: 15? So which one is this?
Peter: This is the cook zinfandel. It’s coming from the hills of Botsanowa.
Wine Dude: Really glad we’re up here.
Peter: It’s nice to have you here. What we’re trying here is, this is the cook, this is an ’02 cook.
Wine Dude: Again, this is the one with the ashy soil.
Peter: Volcanic ash, yeah, so that’s the cook.
Wine Dude: Well I felt bad you did spit it out, now I got to do the same thing, you know.
Peter: No.
Wine Dude: I like the wine though.
Peter: Are you in your motorcycle today?
Wine Dude: I am on my motorcycle.
Peter: We’re going to have some of the baloney.
Wine Dude: Baloney!
Peter: Baloney.
Wine Dude: I never thought baloney went with wine before.
Peter: Well, it does now.
Wine Dude: Wow.
Peter: Wine goes with just about anything now.
Wine Dude: I can see that. Yeah. You guys have so many zinfandels. I’m in love.
Peter: We’re in heaven.
Wine Dude: Alright, we’re here at Geyser Assintia vineyard, this is Mick Schroeter, he is a wine maker. You have a nice place to work here.
Mick: Doesn’t get much better than this.
Wine Dude: That’s for sure.
Mick: Great wines come from great places, and have a look at this, it’s spectacular.
Wine Dude: It’s a great place, absolutely, absolutely. Alright, so let’s check it out.
Mick: You want to try some?
Wine Dude: Sure.
Mick: 2002 assintia vineyard cabernet.
Wine Dude: Hey guys, check out this reserve room, it’s really cool, come on. What’s really cool about this room is the barrel room, it over looks, check it out. Now that’s really cool. I think you’re right. So far, everything that we tried up here is good, especially from your winery. Hey, it’s Mick.
Mick: Get a rid of that one, take this one.
Wine Dude: You’re back. Oh…
Mick: This is really wild, this stuff, probably never had this before, sparkling charaze.
Wine Dude: Sparkling charaze?
Mick: Ooh, careful, don’t do it that high. Have a look of that stuff.
Wine Dude: It’s purple.
Mick: Exactly.
Wine Dude: It’s purple champagne.
Mick: Go on.
Wine Dude: Remember our philosophy here at the Wine Dude, drink what you like and like what you drink. You don’t have to be an expert, you don’t have to be an connoisseur, don’t let anybody tell you what to like or dislike, just trust your own palette and have a great time. So pour yourself your favorite glass of wine, sit back, download our podcast, and enjoy yourself, and join me, the Wine Dude, tasting as you go.
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