Tasting visits...trifling questions.

Questions regarding tasting visits:

  1. If you go to a place you already like, are on their mailing list, or have made an appointment to visit, do you ever take an older wine made by that winery to share during your visit?

  2. My wife and I like to do that, but at some places, our cellar is not exactly deep enough to manage that feat. Would you ever bring a pleasurable wine to share that is from a different winery? This is purely hypothetical, but I was thinking about what would someone bring to a visit at one of the newer wineries where we wouldn’t have a mature wine to bring that was produced there. If you were going to visit MacDonald winery, would you take a mature Mondavi To-Kalon? If you went to visit Roy Piper, would you take as old a Houyi or Moulds vineyard wine that you could find? We like “honoring the host,” but some places we wouldn’t be well equipped enough to do that.

I am not experienced in this, but I would go at it another way. I would bring something the vineyard doesn’t produce. Maybe a champagne to someone poring Cabs, or an old Riesling to a Pinot or Syrah focused place. I would avoid direct comparisons.

I would probably not share, but then I don’t normally (ever?) taste with an owner or wine maker either. I’m curious, when you share, do you still get charged for the tasting fee? Cheers!

For places where we are members, we don’t usually get charged as part of the list benefits. (Small groups: just my wife and I, or maybe 4 total people.)

If we are visiting a place with our family group, which is usually a place my wife and I already like and we are trying to turn the group onto it (we can range up to 8 people,) then we pay, but more often than not, our group ends up buying ample bottles to satisfy the “no charge with XXX purchase” part of some places. If there is a straight up fee, regardless of purchase, we still pay the tasting fee and share the bottle. We know people are taking time out of their day to be nice to us, so we just look at is as ‘being nice in return.’ Our ideal tasting visit is one where the winery people we met would like it if we came back. I realize that sounds a bit naif-ish.

This seems a bit odd to me unless you have some sort of lunch or other set up with a winemaker or other important individual.

Even then, I would want to bring something the person that lives those wines every day probably doesn’t get to drink every day. Unless you had some super rare bottling from decades ago that the current individual may not have ever had a chance to try. It kind of feels like re-gifting just bringing them their own products.

On visits in the Mosel and Piedmont we did our best to open special wines with our hosts. A couple examples- ar Egon Muller we opened one of their 76 Ausleses (thx to Izzy) at Willi Schaefer we gifted them a bottle of 1976 Angelus (thx Marc) , at Conterno a 1966 Monfortino was opened (thx Izzy). In almost all cases, the hosts were extremely thrilled by our gift and would usually come back from their cellar with something equally special to open with us.

If you can swing it, I’d highly recommend doing this or something similar.

Agreed with Matt

But also agree it has to do with the nature of the visit

If you are one of 20 people here that half hour skip it

Just you and the winery team do it

Tis always better to give than receive

Bottom line: if you have the kind of relationship or established appointment where it seems like a good idea, it probably is.

I have done this before - when it felt right.

I agree with Robert. I’ve never brought a wine to the winery that made it in the first place. That would seem weird. OTOH, I’ve never brought a wine to any winery in the USA either. In Europe, I’d bring people wine from the US that they couldn’t get there, and in those cases, only if I knew someone at that winery. As a casual tourist, I wouldn’t do it. That would be like going to a restaurant with a slice of your favorite cake that you wanted to share with the owner.

I’ve brought an amazingly good 25 year-old wine that James Laube awarded 68 points on release, shared it with the winemaker and other interested parties.

A multi-party visit on one occasion turned up that the mature off-vintage wine that was a favorite of a couple of us for current drinking was one the winery had not libraried and it had been 15-20 years since the winemaker had had it. Brought a bottle of that on my next visit to share.

Sometimes picnicking we’ll have mature bottles. Those can be fun to share with staff who may never have had a chance to taste what the wines turn into.

On the ITB side, it’s common to bring a gift wine (or a few). That can be something you made or something you know the winemaker would otherwise be interested to try. Some wineries have regular staff blind tastings which gift wines can be slotted into.

my wife and I are visiting some places in Volnay in April, and I was planning on going a totally different route of bringing an interesting gift from where we live. specifically, since we’re from SC I am planning on bringing them Sean Brock’s cornbread mix. I debated pretty hard about bringing them each a bottle of Kelley Fox’s wines, since I feel like she makes some very Volnay-esque wines outside of Volnay, but decided that these are people who are around wine all the time.

another example, next time I visit Patricia Green I’m bringing Jim a bottle of bourbon, not wine.

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We’ve become friends with a producer in Barbaresco. When he is here, he likes to drink IPA’s and wines from the USA, if he is not pouring his wines. We take or send him IPA’s when visiting there. Like others, I’d recommend something special or unique from where you live unless you know of something they are particularly fond of.

I wonder if this is even allowed by the alcohol regulators? I know in California (wait, they have excessive regulations?) you cannot open consumer packaged beer like bottles, cans and even growlers in the brewery’s tasting room.

In Virginia it is against the law to bring in outside alcohol. Probably one of those situations where the wineries paid for protection. But, I would not bother bringing anything at least where I’m paying to taste.

It does seem odd bringing something the owner makes and probably has had multiple times. If you feel like bringing something, gift something from your area, be it crabapple sauce or chicharrones. I imagine a winemaker would be quite sick of anything alcoholic working with it 30-60 hours/week.

I like the idea of something from your area. Perhaps another way to present it, instead of bringing something, you could follow up with a thank you shipment. Being from Chicago, sending a thank you note for the hospitality included with a Lou Malnati’s frozen pizza might leave a nice, lasting impression. Also avoids having to lug thank you’s all over wine country.

I wouldn’t be too quick to assume that a winemaker has a lot of experience with older vintages from the winery. I’ve been to a number of tastings where winery owners were thrilled when people brought older wines from their wineries. Just a few examples include Evelyn de Pontbriand from Closel when I brought wines that her mother made, Barbara Selbach when a friend brought two bottles of the same wine except that one was under screwcap and the other under cork, and a local co-owner of a BerserkerBusiness when I brought one of their very limited production pet nats to a dinner since he got very few bottles himself.

Some examples of what we have done…

We visited Jarvis last fall and took a 1992 Jarvis Cabernet Sauvignon and Cab Franc. The wines were from the first year they released wine and the new winemaker and the tasting guide had never experienced them, so it was a fun reason to open those bottles in a place that would share our enthusiasm.

When we go to Williams Selyem, we take an old WS wine or two, because people come and go. In 2018, my son turned 21 and his first tasting was at WS, so we took some '97s.

We took a 1982 Bonny’s to Silver Oak when we visited in 2018.

Every time, the new staff had not experienced the wine and even new winemakers may not have had it.

We think of it as a way of sharing our enthusiasm and it hasn’t really seemed like a recapitulation for the people who are there now.

I like the idea of alternative gifts for wineries we can’t bring mature samples to!

We visit far more frequently in France than in the US and the wineries generally have cellars of their own wines so, even if we decided to bring an older vintage from the US to France, it would be more like coals to Newcastle. To places we visit frequently we do bring gifts, ranging from US wines that we might think would be of interest, to the kinds of housegifts one brings in France, which runs to homemade goods, flowers, etc.

As always it depends!

If you visit Latour there’s little point taking an 80s vintage along.

If you visit Vilmart there’s every point in doing so.