Greetings! Sharing a new word I picked up on a recent wine tasting holiday – “terroir”!

Seems fair to pronounce it something like “tehr waar” – or to add a little phlegm to those r’s as you’re able. Terroir has to do with the environmental factors where a wine is produced that contribute to its character and flavor – things like climate, soil, sunlight, habitat and topography, all of which assert influence on a growing grape.

Um. As suggested by my not knowing such a key viticultural term, I should admit right away that I’ve mainly approached wine the way John Cleese’s Pope approaches art in the Monty Python “Last Supper” sketch – I don’t know much about it, but I know what I like!

So a legit treatise on the subject, this is not going to be…

I really respect and envy people who’ve cultivated a serious knowledge of and passion for this historic beverage! From my English major days, I remember poet Alexander Pope wrote that when it comes to learning, one ought to “drink deep”. That’s why I figured a gathering of good friends from throughout the state for a wine themed weekend in Sonoma, California, would be a great chance literally and figuratively to do just that!

Being nerdishly into words (hence, the Pope quote – and use of the word “hence”…), I usually take a run at new disciplines by studying their terminology – and I’ve quickly caught on that when it comes to describing wine, it’s a lot of terms! Some have an anatomical bent – like a wine might be considered flabby, full-bodied, round or lean, and even have legs and a nose. It can be described as having aromas and flavors which sound pleasing to me, like buttery, smooth and spicy – or not so much (in my opinion) like coarse, musty and leathery. It became clear to me that knowing – not to mention applying – these terms was a huge oak barrel to dive into! So on the coming trip, I figured maybe I’d just stick in a toe…

As a Northern California native, I’d visited the Sonoma area before. My big brother went to Sonoma State University. Mum and I celebrated a Mother’s Day by dining and drinking on the Napa Valley Wine Train. And while cruising the winery-lined Silverado Trail around Napa and Calistoga, I once committed the strategic error of ordering a flight of sparkling wines to taste on a completely empty stomach. (I also don’t happen to be fond of dumping perfectly good booze into those little bucket thingies.) This caused me to have to stay longer until I felt up to driving, and to depart with many more bottles than I’d intended – but I don’t seem to recall having any regrets.

Anyway, the first stop on my little group’s self-curated tour was at the Silver Trident Winery’s tasting room on an idyllic-looking day in the town of Yountville – a wonderfully elegant beginning to a weekend of unwinding and indulging! 

City-based tasting room affairs like this one were great fun (we’d later hit Gehricke Wines in their repurposed Sonoma firehouse)! But I also appreciated the chance to visit an estate and learn about a wine’s terroir while gazing out the window at the terra itself! Like just over the mountainside from Yountville, we did some sampling at Imagery Estate Winery in Glen Ellen where not just the wine, but the local landscape was on display!

I also relished chatting and sipping a nicely balanced Pinot while overlooking the lush grounds of the Sangiacomo Wines Home Ranch in Sonoma!

Being women of many interests, my cohort didn’t limit its exploration of Sonoma just to things vino-ish. We also spent a delightful morning soaking up the atmosphere in and around Sonoma Plaza – a charming concentration of boutiques and restaurants, with some tertiary notes of the city’s roots that particularly attracted my history-forward palate!

Since folks shouldn’t live on nosh-y wine tasting food alone (or they risk that trunk full of bubbly…), we did have a proper brunch on our itinerary. On the way into the Sunflower Caffé, I noticed a small section of older brick exposed near its ceiling:

So I ducked back outside to discover from a wall plaque that we’d be dining in what was once the home of Captain Salvador Vallejo, whose brother Mariano founded Sonoma. The nearby city of Vallejo is named for Mariano – and his wife, Benicia, got herself a Bay Area burg too!

I read that the structure was built for Salvador and his wife in the 1830’s by “Indian labor” (this had long been the homeland of several Native American tribes). After the Bear Flag Revolt of 1846, the adobe abode was apparently put to a series of other uses including barracks for American soldiers, a boarding school, a post office, and a courthouse. Add to that list a place to get scrumptious avocado toast!

I strolled over to check out the town square with its City Hall and markers of a sometimes turbulent past – like one where the namesake of the short-lived Bear Flag Revolt is supposed to have been raised. 

I have to say a truly stunning finale to the weekend that checked all the Wine Country boxes for me was a visit to the Jacuzzi Family Vineyards! The grounds (pictured at the top) were beautifully tranquil. The art and architecture transported me right to the Old World. (There’s a “Terroir Tower” for bird’s eye views!) And I adored all the decorative nods to the Jacuzzi family’s heritage of innovation (yes, including the jacuzzi!), and to the art of wine making which, while new to me, carries on an ancient and storied tradition! To taste our wines in a courtyard in the midst of all this was pure joy!

To get back to my pretended topic, I’ll add that after applying a little of what I learned and a lot of what I liked, I headed home from my wine odyssey with a couple Pinot Noirs, a Cabernet Sauvignon, a Cabernet Franc and some sparkly Asolo Prosecco! As the (hopefully optimum number of) years go by, I’m looking forward to enjoying and sharing these souvenirs from one wholly rejuvenating adventure! 

And beyond learning the terroir of those selected wines, I like applying the concept of “terroir” to the trip itself! I’m savoring thoughts of the sunny days we lucked into, of my introduction to new sights and sounds and flavors, of scoping out the local lore as I love to do and, finally, of each person with whom I was fortunate to share the journey! As with fine wine (and throwing some terms around one last time), a group of fine friends can combine for a rich and expressive blend that by turns may be tart, sweet, complex, effervescent, full of depth – and which can’t ever be reproduced in quite the same way.

I sure do wish I could bottle the whole experience – what an exceptional vintage that’d be!

Cheers!