April 4, 2001
I don't get out as much as I should. Last week I got away and went up to the Livermore Valley, a viticultural area with about 15 wineries, east of the Bay Area. The Livermore area is a pastoral place. The terrain reminds me a lot of the landscape around Los Alamos. The City of Livermore itself has a population of about 75,000 people. Going to Livermore is an easy drive from San Jose and the east bay-just take Interstate 680 east toward Sacramento. It took us about 30 minutes with no traffic from Los Gatos.I went up with Doug Coleman, a good friend and home winemaker. Several months back, I met Kimball Jones, the executive chef for Wente Vineyards Restaurant in the Livermore Valley. When I told Doug I met this guy, Doug said "let's go," so we took a three day junket up to Livermore and the Bay Area.
We had lunch a week ago today. I think the food, service and winelist was the best I've ever experienced. The winelist alone was a 24 page marvel which included a wine from every local producer in the Livermore Valley plus great wines from Napa and, yes, Santa Barbara County and San Luis Obispo County-wines on the list from Alban, Qupe, Longoria, Au Bon Climat, Lane Tanner, and Cold Heaven.
It turns out, too, Kimball Jones is an author as well as the executive chef at this most marvelous of restaurants. He co-authored with Carolyn Wente, "Sharing the Vineyard Table", a celebration of wine and food from the Wente Vineyards Restaurant published by Ten Speed Press.
The two oldest wineries in the Livermore Valley are Wente and Concannon. Charles Wetmore brought in semillon and sauvignon blanc cuttings from Chateau Yquem in 1883, and these cuttings were planted by Carl Heinrich Wente when he founded the winery in 1883. Still going strong 118 years later, Wente is still producing great wine. Back in the 60s when I was in college, Wente wines-especially their semillon, grey riesling, and "chablis" were among my favorites. In fact a Wente semillon which I had in 1963 was one of the most memorable wines I have ever had.
Livermore has a long and distinguished history in the annals of California wine. Two decades ago when I was program director of KTMS and we interviewed the late Andre Tchelistcheff at the Hitching Post restaurant in Casmalia, Andre told us that when he graduated from the Pasteur Institute in France he was considering several viticultural areas-Chile, the Shantung province of China, and California. He told us he decided to come to California to work, that California showed great promise for its wines. He told us he made this choice based on some pre-Prohibition wines he had tasted from California's Livermore Valley.
Of all the wines I tasted on the junket, I was most taken with Concannon's offering of Rhone varietals. Their winemaker, Tom Lane is doing impressive stuff and at very reasonable prices. Wines I'd look for are the soon-to-be-released 2000 vintage "Righteously Rose," the 1998 Rhone-style white (52% marsanne, 36% roussanne, and 12% viognier), their 1997 reserve petite sirah, and their 1998 Santa Ynez Valley late harvest johannisberg riesling, made from grapes grown in the Santa Ynez Valley.
Concannon's petite sirah has long been considered the benchmark for petite sirah produced in California.
Tom Lane was winemaker at Navarro in Mendocino County before coming down to Concannon in the Livermore Valley.
Over lunch at Wente, Doug and I met Nick Nardolillo. Nick, it turns out, owns a lovely two room B&B in the valley called The Vineyard Inn at Crane Ridge. Late afternoon, we stopped by to check out the Inn on our way back to Oakland. If you are planning a trip up there, call Nick for a brochure. (925) 455-8085.
Besides impressive wines in a bucolic setting, the Livermore Valley has a great plan which works with landowners, citizen groups, developers and viticulturalists. With intense pressure to develop this pastoral place from the neighboring Silicon Valley, the plan's intent is to preserve the remaining wineries and vineyards in this pastoral valley of Alameda County. I'll talk about the plan in the next column. Stay tuned.
Bob Senn lives in the pastoral Los Alamos Valley and owns the Los Olivos Wine & Spirits Emporium.
