Thought I’d post a few photos from a Sonoma / Napa wine trip last week with Eric Anderson of Grape-Nutz and another friend. Should have a Grape-Nutz write-up on all of this in a few weeks.
Two Shepherds winemaker / co-proprietor William Allen, Windsor.
Visit to the recently-closed Jimtown Store in Alexander Valley.
Soda Rock Winery in Alexander Valley - the main winery building burned down in the October 2019 fire but tasting goes on in a nearby old barn building.
We lucked into that one, really. We were able to make an appointment with Todd Newman of Dakota Shy. It turned out that Tom Garrett of Detert - he’s also the winemaker for Dakota Shy - was going to be there the same morning and he offered to taste us on the Detert wines. Detert is a fairly small operation and Tom seems to be a very busy guy so I’m not that surprised that it might be tough to arrange a visit with him. We had a really good tasting of the wines from both labels - they’re both made at the Dakota Shy facility.
I had a tasting at Dakota Shy in 2/2019 and requested to also taste Detert. It took a few days to coordinate and to confirm on Dakota Shy’s end but they were ultimately able to accommodate me. I had a tasting of Dakota Shy followed by the Detert Cab Franc. Dakota Shy’s wine making facility is new, starting with the 2016 vintage, and it is my understanding that Detert is made in Dakota Shy’s facility.
That’s weird. I reached out in the past via email and was able to set up a tasting w Tom at Detert. Love the wines and it was a very nice visit. This is the slow time of the year so normally you should be able to schedule something. I’ll shoot you his email via pm in case you don’t have it.
Really liked them. I’ve been very impressed with their wines since I first tried them about 18 months ago. Tasted barrel samples of 2018 Grenache Blanc, 2019 Viognier, and a tank sample of 2019 Picpoul in addition to five bottled wines.
