Sonoma Wine Road
Sonoma is a wonderful place to go wine tasting and a worthwhile place to visit. The wineries in Sonoma have a welcoming down home feel and lack the commercialness that sadly have overtaken many other wine regions.
In Sonoma you really feel like you are in wine country. You can see beautiful countryside, grapes, vines and often organic gardens grown in many cases by families who also run family owned wineries. The people in Sonoma are friendly and welcoming and the wine is delicious!
Sonoma Wine Road encompasses not only the town of Sonoma but Alexander Valley, Dry Creek Valley, Russian River Valley, Healdsburg and Guerneville. The diversity of the terrain and climate on the Sonoma Wine Road create a plethora of amazing wines including outstanding Cabernet Sauvignon from Alexander Valley. noteworthy Zinfandel in Dry Creek Valley and amazing Pint Noir from Russian River Valley.
Three times a year the Sonoma Wine Road puts on events that cover all of Sonoma. These events are a wonderful chance to visit Sonoma during different season to see the changing views and landscapes and to visit lots of wineries and taste their wines all for one set ticket price. March is a weekend of Barrel Tastings. November is A Wine & Food Affair where wineries pair a delicious dish with one of their wines and the recipes are then complied into a cookbook that is included in the price of tickets for the event. Finally in January there is Winter Wineland where wineries pair their wines with food.
Last weekend I had the opportunity to participate in A Wine & Food Affair and what an affair it was! With 103 wineries participating there was a need to map out a route and make choices about where to stop. We decided to start in Windor and work our way up to Healdsburg on Saturday. On Sunday we started in Geyserville and worked our way down thru Dry Creek & Anderson Valley ending up in Healdsburg. Some people pick a few wineries and taste thru all their wines. We decided to focus on the food and wine parings each winery offered allowing us to experience more wineries.
There were tons of great wines and lots of delicous food but the food and wine pairings that deserve mention are the following: Dutton Estate Lamb Stew with Cabernet Sauvignon , Martinelli Wild Game Stew with Syrah, Mazzocco Beef Ribs with Zinfandel-Maple Reduction Sauce & Zinfandel, Merriam Drunken Duck with Cabernet Franc, Sapphire Hill Steak Sapphire with Sautéed Spinach, Crab & Béarnaise Sauce with Cabernet Sauvignon & Ridge Ricotta Malfatti with Sweet Italian Sausage, Spinach & Peppers with Zinfandel.
Tags: A Wine & Food Affair, Dutton Estates Winery, Martinelli Winery, Mazzocco Winery, Merriam Winery, Ridge Winery, Sapphire Hill, Sonoma, Winter Wineland
