San Marcos Creek Vineyard and Clavo Cellars:
As I mentioned previously, only four of our group of eight were going to the Turley party.
Gloria and Larry and Chuck and Heidi went off to San Marcos Creek Vineyard, to enjoy a Paella lunch and taste the winery’s latest releases.
www.sanmarcoscreek.com
The winery’s website is very interesting, as there are separate tabs for selling bulk grapes to other wine producers, as well as the selling of the wines they produce themselves. There is also a lot of interesting information about winemaking and the history of vineyard and winery.
Since I did not visit the winery, I asked my good friend Chuck Wiedeman for his comments. Here is what he had to say:
“Heidi and I had visited San Marcos Creek once some time ago, not expecting much, but found the wines quite impressive. So when our friends Larry and Gloria wanted us to join them for a paella lunch and wine tasting with Brady, the owner and assistant winemaker, we were quite excited. The entire flight of wines being served were excellent and the Syrah paired beautifully with the paella. The ambience of the tasting room with a cozy fireplace, and sleeping dogs on a rainy day made us enjoy the wine even more….hence another wine club is joined!!!”
Sounds like they had a great time and I am sorry I missed it!
In the meantime, we finished up at Turley. Karen, Vic and I went to check into our hotel, Robert coming along for the ride. After that, we had time before our next appointment, so we cruised around looking for trouble, uh, wine. We ended up just south of Paso Robles, in downtown Templeton, on Main Street, at the tasting room for Clavo Cellars.
www.clavocellars.com
I had previously met owner/winemaker Neil Roberts at the Family Winemakers tasting in Pasadena. At the time, I wrote that he obtains grapes from some of the vineyards he manages, and the quality of the fruit shines through. In addition, All Corked Up carries some of their wines.
While Neil was not in the tasting room that day, Marketing Manager Julie Kuhnle took us through their lineup. After leaving Turley, our palates were pretty much just ready for reds, so our tasting was mostly of Bordeaux blends, along with a Syrah and Petite Sirah, as well as a Zinfandel Port. The wines were paired with chocolates that had other flavors mixed in to best pair with the wines, such as orange, chilis, and, of all things, red hots, not to mention bacon! In addition to these, we sampled a Zinfandel Port Sorbet that was outstanding. I was particularly partial to the Syrah and a Bordeaux blend called Enigma and purchased two bottles of each.
We were then off to meet up with our four other friends at the famous Dusi vineyard…
Michael Perlis provides outsourced controller services to businesses that do not need a full-time controller. He balances this with his interest in wine: reading and writing about it and, of course, drinking it. He is still trying to figure out how to combine these two pursuits. Feel free to contact him about either at mcpfinancial@aol.com or michaelthezinfan@aol.com. “It is common practice for wine industry workers, wine writers and winery club members [and members of their party] to receive complimentary tastings and discounted purchases. Unless it is otherwise noted, it should be presumed that this is the case.”
