Browse Category

travelogues

Cask & Tangent

yachtsWine Cask – Too much touristy wandering of Santa Barbara’s ultra-deluxe streets leads to missing most of the lunch hour, and thus it’s a sort of act of charity that they let me sit and eat anything at all…though I’m restricted to the cold-prepped portion of the menu. The wine list is said to be interesting, and a quick perusal seems to verify that, but I just don’t have much basis for an elaborate opinion of this place.

Tangent 2010 Albariño (Edna Valley) – Tired of my grumping and grumbling about New World wines, the brave few who are actually willing to hear more of the tiresome lecture are sometimes moved to ask what I’d change. One of the things I always mention is that there’s a really wide world of grapes out there, suitable for all different soils and climates, and that I think there’s a lot of (say) pinot noir planted where something like nero d’avola might be more at home. The luxury of saying this, of course, relies on not having to sell something like nero d’avola to a public that loves pinot noir. In any case, I’m pleased to report that even though such wines are little more than a rumor on the East Coast, there’s actually been a fair bit of progress towards this goal in some sub-regions. And I have to say that, on balance, I like what I’m tasting. There are plenty of missteps, and for the usual reasons (more ripeness is always better, everything tastes better with new oak, wine should taste like fruit, acid can always be added later), but there’s plenty to like, as well. Here, for example, is a pretty albariño. Note that I didn’t type “little” in between those two words. It ain’t little. Though I suppose in the context of the region’s whites, it might be thought of that way. It doesn’t yell and stomp and carry on, but presents itself with plain simplicity and leaves the interpretation to the taster. Swirly yellow fruit with both green and peachier notes, some nut oils, a decent bit of acidity. Nothing special, not bad, just…nice. (11/11)

Margerum 08 Pinot Gris “Klickitat” (American) – When I was a kid, there was liquid saccharine that came in a little tip-and-squirt bottle, in case you wanted add some to food or drink in lieu of sugar. I only remember the one bottle, because of course there was the whole (overblown) cancer scare, and who wants to be offering carcinogens as a condiment? (This in a part of the country where pretty much everyone would have been puffing on cigarettes throughout the meal.) Anyway, this wine tastes like that. (Liquid saccharine, I mean. Not a carcinogen. Lawyers, stand down.) (11/11)

Epiphany 2010 Grenache Blanc (Santa Barbara County) – Fat and happy nectarines wearing bronzer and some out-of-date Ray-Bans™. (11/11)

 

santa barbara sleeperDinner with friends – Despite all the eminently mockable distractions of the internet, one clear benefit is the ability to bring people together across geographies. I have “friends” – certainly predating Facebook, and in many cases even predating the web – all over the world, and when geography is removed as a barrier it’s always pleasant to make or renew acquaintances in a less digital way.

And drink their decidedly analog wine. Let’s not forget this crucial element.

Delamotte 1999 Champagne Brut Blanc de Blancs (Champagne) – My long-standing preference for noir-based Champagne has taken a fairly major hit over the last few years from a passel of grower-producers doing unquestionably brilliant work, but this reminds me why I once held the preference in the first place. Grapey, lemony, gauze-wrapped apple, filtered and only lightly yeasty…I’m sure there’s more to come later in its life, but this is a sip-while-conversing Champagne that doesn’t hit any of my sweet spots. (11/11)

La Valentina 2010 Trebbiano d’Abruzzo (Abruzzi) – One can, on occasion, ask much of certain variants of trebbiano and receive much in return, but in general it’s best to ask not what your trebbiano can do for you. The result is that you won’t be disappointed in wines like this: good, clean, green fruit in a tart, linear, narrow-gauge cylinder. Perfectly decent and undemanding, yet the wine geek in me demands more. (11/11)

Lageder 2009 Vigneti delle Dolomiti Pinot Grigio (Trentino) – Pinot grigio for those who don’t like pinot grigio, and this is only the basic version: firm, rock-infused, with restrained, polished fruit and just enough grip. (11/11)

Oddero 1998 Barolo (Piedmont) – I admit to struggling with this wine, never quite sure if it’s corked (if so, it’s sub-my-threshold) or just being a typically antisocial mid-life Barolo. The only thing of sure of is that, based on numbers and history rather than organoleptics, this is probably a suboptimal age to be drinking a traditionally-styled Barolo. It is not, in any sense, giving of itself, except with clouds of obscurative tannin and an angry snarl. Structurally and temporally, all seems to be right with the wine, and my worries about taint are not shared by anyone else who tastes it. So if this bottle is representative, this is no time to be drinking it. If it’s not, then I just don’t know. And there’s always the possibility that the current problem is the taster and not the wine. (11/11)

Texier “Domaine de Pergaud” 2009 Côtes-du-Rhône St-Julien en St-Alban “Vieille Serine” (Rhône) – Absolutely singing. This isn’t like drinking a really good Rhône blend…which, by the way, it isn’t. It’s syrah. This is like drinking a fireworks extravaganza designed to celebrate the the fact that wines like this exist. It’s sizable without being big, it’s concentrated with plenty of light and space, it’s serious but breaks out in periodically goofy grins, and it’s rather spectacular from start to (a much-extended) finish. (11/11)

Longoria 2009 Syrah “Vino Dulce” (Santa Barbara County) – 375 ml. Corked. (11/11)

Hitch a ride

beckmen & treeTastes of the Valleys – Most of the wine bars along Solvang’s main drag are rollicking in what otherwise appears to be a slow time of year, spitting out wandering clots of weaving wine tourists to – one hopes – the safety of hotel rooms rather than automobiles. But this one, a cozy basement with a few tables and a short bar, is empty when I arrive. Just me and the proprietress.

I’m here because this particular bar is specifically noted as a place to taste Arcadian and Au Bon Climat wines, which aren’t the easiest to find opened elsewhere in the area. Only the latter is actually available amongst today’s selections, but after a long day of tasting and with plenty of pinot in my post-sunset future, it doesn’t really matter.

Au Bon Climat 2007 Pinot Noir Los Alamos (Santa Maria Valley) – There is a particular quality of pinot noir that, in New Zealand, I’ve used – with some success – to guess at Central Otago (specifically Bannockburn/Cromwell) sourcing: blood orange, plum, and beet. But it occasionally shows up elsewhere, there and abroad, and here’s an example. If I hadn’t seen the label, I’d probably once again guess Central Otago, except that there’s a little more sophistication and delineation to the fruit (a consequence, perhaps, of New Zealand’s generally young vines and still-limited clonal palette). It’s really quite a gorgeous wine, overall, and as it finishes a graphite-like minerality…very unusual in pinot noir…starts to rear its particulate head. This is still very young, and yet there are already mature-tasting elements within, so as to its actual future prospects I wouldn’t dare venture a guess. (11/11)

Babcock 2009 Pinot Noir “Rita’s Earth” (Santa Rita Hills) – 13.6%, but tastes much, much bigger…a good lesson in how fruit intensity and extractive winemaking can fool the palate into thinking that excess body is alcohol-derived (which, to be sure, it often is). Purple, black, swollen…this is like drinking a bruise. (11/11)

 

beckmen roadHitching Post II – I have no idea what things were like in the immediate post-Sideways era, and I’m sure the relentless waves of tourists have made it difficult to retain a true neighborhood feel here, but the reputation of this restaurant as a place where locals do indeed still go is merited. I recognize a few winemakers here and there, though I suppose the biggest celebrity is the one who enters just in front of me, patiently awaiting his usual table: David Crosby. Nice to see he’s putting his new liver through its paces.

The food? No misteak. (Sorry.) Really, though: it’s beef or bust for the most part, though on my night they do some nice things with chanterelles and artichokes (not together). Basically, if it can be done in a single pan or over a fire, it’s probably worth ordering; otherwise, exercise caution. As for the steak on which one facestuffs here, it’s cooked with confidence and skill exactly as I’d have wished it. I could, I suppose, quibble with prices that seem a bit lavish, but then again it is a steakhouse, and is also as much a site on the tourist map as an actual restaurant these days. Best, I think, to just assume that the premium is for the experience rather than just the food.

And as for the experience…my waitress is worth any premium they wish to charge. For every quip she has a comeback, for every challenge a hilarious, smart-assed reply that would split my sides had the giant piles of meat not already accomplished same. Stories of tossing drunks in the back of her pickup abound. I’d have been pleased with the meal in any case, but she’s responsible for its elevation to pure joy.

Hartley Ostini “Hitching Post” 2008 Pinot Noir “Hometown” (Santa Barbara County) – Squared-off, blocky pinot noir in a varietal straightjacket. That’s neither criticism nor praise, exactly, but this wine tastes like someone averaged out all the pinot noir from “here,” left out most of the adjustments and/or trappings, and just presented the results as wine. (11/11)

Hartley Ostini “Hitching Post” 2001 Pinot Noir Julia’s (Santa Maria Valley) – Dusty morels and more intense, freshly-plucked porcini bind with pie fruit (that is to say: there’s an oven-warmed quality to it). This is fully knit and, I’d say, fully mature, even though I don’t expect it to fall apart immediately. A lack of full expression is, I think, inherent to the wine rather than to any artifact of age or storage; while I welcome the fact that the wine wasn’t pushed towards the caricature that afflicts so many of its neighbors, it also tastes as if it wasn’t pushed to the fullest expression of its own inherency, which is something I’d identify as somewhat of a house style at Hartley Ostini. In a way it’s a good thing, considering the alternatives, but one could also wish for just a bit more. (11/11)

Hartley Ostini “Hitching Post” 2006 Pinot Noir Bien Nacido (Santa Maria Valley) – Bruising. Only a vague sense of restraint (or fear) separates this from the punishing perils of Pinot Port. The alcohol isn’t too unrestrained given the overall burl of the wine, but the fruit is dark and somewhat gelatinous, the structure an almost cartoonish 100-pound falling weight, and the body the kind one fears is only achievable via the sort of secretive modern science for which athletes must pee in cups. Not that I think that’s what they’ve done here. But I do think this is a wine for people who usually find Hartley Ostini pinots overly transparent, and I am not one of those people. (11/11)

Disclaimer: the last wine is an off-menu selection offered by the hostess and poured by the glass for the entire table, but for which we are not charged.

Are we not men? We are Beckmen!

harvest at beckmenBeckmen – It’s November 17th, and newly-harvested grapes are awaiting their crush.

November 17th.

Pushing blackened opinions about Californians and “ripeness” aside – and Beckmen is hardly considered a prime offender in this regard – I proceed to the last tasting of what’s been a relatively full day on the tourist (rather than wine pro) schedule. It’s nice, at least, to be at an actual winery surrounded by actual vines, rather than in a purpose-built tasting room in a cold warehouse or over-quainted village center.

As closing time approaches, I’m forced to race through the wines. I certainly don’t blame them for wanting to go home (or more likely, in this case, go help with the grapes), but it does make for much shorter encounters – and thus, notes – than I’d prefer.

Beckmen 2010 Sauvignon Blanc (Santa Ynez Valley) – Ripe and green, heavy on the gooseberries. Solid.

Beckmen 2007 Roussanne Purisma Mountain (Santa Ynez Valley) – Rich and smooth. Spiced nuts. This wine reeks of confidence.

Beckmen 2010 Grenache Rosé Purisma Mountain (Santa Ynez Valley) – Very fruity. A bit of a bomblet, really. A raspberry neutron bomblet.

Beckmen 2009 “Le Bec Blanc” (Santa Ynez Valley) – Roussanne, marsanne, grenache blanc. Faded grass. Exceedingly simple-minded.

Beckmen 2008 Grenache Purisma Mountain (Santa Ynez Valley) – Spiced bubblegum. A strongly fruit-dominated wine – hello, grenache – that carries right through a fairly long finish. It’s one-note, but it’s a pleasant note.

Beckmen 2009 “Barrel Select Cuvée” (Santa Ynez Valley) – Wonderfully pure fruit. With meat. And tannin. The brevity of what precedes understates the quality: this is a very good, albeit forward, wine.

Beckmen 2009 “Estate” Syrah (Santa Ynez Valley) – Juice. Very acidic (in a good way), but this is more like syrah-ade than it is a wine. I don’t mind, really, but it’s…eclectic.

Beckmen 2008 Syrah Purisma Mountain (Santa Ynez Valley) – Big shoulders carrying heavy tannin, and bending a bit under the weight. A touch weedy. The peppery finish is pleasant, but everything isn’t in sync here.

Beckmen 2008 Syrah Purisma Mountain Block 6 (Santa Ynez Valley) – Dark, sweaty, and dense. Tarred, but definitely not feathered. The finish is distressingly reminiscent of paper turning to ashes.

Beckmen 2008 Syrah Purisma Mountain “Clone #1” (Santa Ynez Valley) – Big, round raspberries. Other than that, it just sort of sits there. I’d think more of this wine if I didn’t know its price.

Highs & lows

pelicanAlta Maria – A pure drop-in, at a winery (it might be slightly more correct to call this a project) of which I’ve never heard after the beyond-enthusiastic recommendation of the behind-the-counter guy at Qupé.

Unfortunately, his description does not fully, or in fact even partially, conform to what I taste. The wines aren’t bad at all, for the most part, but there’s nothing particularly special about most of them either. Euphemasia quickly sets in, and by the end there’s also a sort of strange fascination…like being tied to a chair while watching a Michael Bay film.

Alta Maria 2010 Sauvignon Blanc (Santa Ynez Valley) – Grapes. This tastes like grapes. Mixed apples, crisp enough but softening residual sugar (not, analytically, much at all…yet it’s quite detectable), and grapes.

Alta Maria 2009 Chardonnay (Santa Maria Valley) – Green fig, ripe tangerine. Good acidity and a deft use of wood. Long and solid.

Alta Maria 2009 Pinot Noir Rancho Ontiveros (Santa Maria Valley) – Blood orange and plum. Medium-bodied. Central Otago-ish. I like it, but it’s a bit of a stumbler.

Native9 2009 Pinot Noir Rancho Ontiveros (Santa Maria Valley) – Big and leathery, with just about the darkest fruit one can extract from pinot noir. Very long, with steady and impenetrable density throughout. This is massive, but it’s also a very good wine.

Native9 2008 Pinot Noir Rancho Ontiveros (Santa Maria Valley) – Liquorous cough syrup heavy on the menthol, plus massive tannin that hasn’t quite escaped its green stage.

Alta Maria 2006 Cabernet Sauvignon (Santa Ynez Valley) – Were this from a more recent vintage, the appellation would apparently be Happy Canyon. A mix of ripe and green tannin…and if the first thing I write about a wine is a description of its tannin, one can assume they’re prominent…chocolate, and cloves. Note, also, that I haven’t actually mentioned anything in the fruit realm; between tannin and barrel, there’s not much else to this.

Autonom 2008 “Rhône Cuvée” (California) – The winery web site’s description of this wine:

A subtle Violettes de Toulouse aroma is captive to a prominent Chambord and white pepper presences which makes this wine appear like a beast. On the palate, however, the Grenache and Mourvedre expand the richness of the Syrah to create salivating flavors of strawberries, pomegranate and cranberry relish which all transition into a brandied char which gives lift and added dimensions to the finish.

While I suppose I can’t top that (and why would I try? it sounds disgusting, like someone let an arsonist loose in a speakeasy), I also can’t endorse it. Can I? My notes speak of chocolate, booze, chocolate, spice, chocolate, blueberry and blackberry syrups, chocolate, jam, chocolate, makeup, and chocolate. So, actually, maybe I’d prefer their version.

Autonom 2008 “Law of Proportions” Syrah (California) – Smells like breakfast: bacon, blackberry syrup, brioche. Pretty good acidity (hmmmm), spice, and berry skin tannin in pulsing waves. An assault rifle of a wine.

Do not go gentle into that good Nacido

santa barbara mission urnQupé/Verdad/Ethan – Old reliable and the interlopers. No, not really. But as venerable as the Qupé name is, ’round these parts, the two relatives – for that’s what the other wineries are: labels belonging to scions and shoots of Qupé’s Lindquist family – create a somewhat jumbled picture when viewed (or tasted) together. Stylistic threads are hard to untangle.

Plus, there’s a lot of wine being made here. I don’t even scratch the surface, despite a fairly broad tasting, and as the genesis seesaws between the Rhône and various parts of Spain, I leave less sure of what I’ve experienced than I was before I entered. But this is why one tastes, right?

Verdad 2010 Grenache Rosé Sawyer Lindquist (Edna Valley) – Raspberry bubblegum. Texturally rich (aided by the strong impression of sweetness) with decent acidity. Not bad, not great.

Qupé 2010 “Bien Nacido Cuvée” (Santa Maria Valley) – Viognier and chardonnay, the former deliberately picked ripe and the latter deliberately picked underripe. I understand why they do this, even absent their explanation, but to my palate they’re still not getting what they appear to want. Peach blossom and the typically lurid flower-based soap aromas to which viognier is so susceptible and into which it is so easily pushed. Dense and sticky. The acidity comes through on the finish, but by then it’s a bit too late. Whatever trick they wish to use to re-introduce acidity into a blowsy, lurid viognier, they’re going to have to find a way to get it better-integrated with the wine at a far earlier stage.

Verdad 2010 Albariño Sawyer Lindquist (Edna Valley) – Big, sticky almonds with spice and preserved lemon. A bit of almond skin as counterpoint. Very bronzed…almost ambered, in fact…with a heavy, beeswax-textured finish. Good acidity. This is quite credible.

Qupé 2009 “Los Olivos Cuvée” (Santa Ynez Valley) – Syrah, mourvèdre, grenache. Sweat, bubblegum, peppered mushroom. Thanks, varities, for each contributing something. Fairly deft, with good balance. Marred by green-tinged tannin.

Verdad 2009 Graciano Ibarra-Young (Santa Ynez Valley) – Burnt aromas, tutti-frutti flavors. Are we sure this is graciano? Because it tastes like Purple Nurple (the drink, not the bullying technique). Finishes short and bitter, and ultimately that’s kind of a blessing.

Ethan 2009 Syrah Sawyer Lindquist (Edna Valley) – Black pepper and coal (in rock, rather than its usual dust, form). And then things get ugly: well-toasted spices heavy on clove, spiced cherry pie, and all the sickly trappings of modernity. There are wines (though few syrahs) that can take this sort of theatrical makeup, but this isn’t one of them.

Qupé 2007 Syrah Alisos (Santa Barbara County) – Luscious. Blackberry smoke, morel, earth. Gorgeous and very elegant. This is how to do a modern-leaning syrah while not losing one’s soul in the process.

Qupé 2008 Syrah Bien Nacido (Santa Maria Valley) – Rich mixed fruit, crushed black and blue berries, soft coal dust, some lingering toast, and a persistent touch of finishing oxidation. I inquire, but the bottle hasn’t been open long; perhaps the damage existed before uncorking. In any case, I don’t think this is fully intact.

Qupé 2007 Syrah Bien Nacido Hillside Estate (Santa Maria Valley) – Ripe. Blackness of both the berried and peppered varieties. Lots of tannin. This is not only made for the long haul, it’s already holding a non-refundable ticket.

Petered out

santa barbara mission baptismal fontPetros – Silence. Dark, anything-but-decrepit silence. Such a change from the Lazy Ox…

I’d assumed that lunch in the midst of heavy-duty wine tasting would be some sort of California cuisine accompanied by a glass or two of local wine. I didn’t expect ambitious Greek food in an elegant setting. And I certainly didn’t expect to be dining in what I now find, poking about the internet, is a Fess Parker establishment. Will I ever live it down?

But what’s more baffling is the utter lack of patronage. I mean, sure, it’s neither cheap, quick, nor casual, and I suspect all three are what many wine country tourists are after. But there is only one other table occupied during my lunch, and its occupants…well, let’s just say that as they sit in utter silence, gnawing the decaying threads of a meal, it’s possible that after ninety-plus years (each) they’ve run out of things to say.

I hope, at least, that they enjoyed lunch. Because the food here is really very good. Greek cuisine has not, as a rule, scaled well in the…pardon me…pantheon of borrowed European cuisines. It does not take to fancifying or airs, and while I don’t know if that’s the fault of the practitioners or the cuisine itself, I rather suspect the bulk of the blame lies with the source material. As with certain regional Italian cuisines (though not all of them), Greek dishes really seem to prefer to be left to their own relatively simple devices. At which point the entirety of one’s success with the cuisine comes down to shopping and basic cooking techniques. Both are done well here.

I’ve no complaints about the service either, though I suppose it’s not hard to manage a nearly-empty dining room. As for the wine list, it’s neatly balanced between the local and the non-formulaic Grecian. Someone has put some work into this list, some curation to help ease these unfamiliar wines onto diners’ tables. Of course, I can’t quite resist either temptation…

Brander 2009 Sauvignon Blanc “au Naturel” (Santa Ynez Valley) – Green, biting sauvignon blanc with some razors thrown in for structural intensity. Yet surprisingly expansive, for all that cutting and slashing. Good? Hmmm… (11/11)

Monemvasia 2009 Peloponnese Moschofilero (Greece) – Light and insubstantial, offering a wan gesture in the direction of flowers and white sand. Is this a contextual effect from drinking it amidst a bevy of blowsy California wines? Perhaps in part, but there’s still just not much to it. (11/11)

Livin’ on Blues power

jesus & maryLongoria – Many years ago, Rick Longoria brought a few of his wines to a tasting in Boston. I remember being extremely impressed, across the board. The Blues Cuvée label I remember well was for the 2000 vintage, so I’d guess it was shortly after that. In any case, I remember the wines, and specifically the pinot noirs, as being exemplars of the counter-argument to what became the region’s dominant identity: that restraint was an available choice, rather than a rejection of the demands of the terroir. By now, just about any interested party knows the names of the ripeness-seeking and the names of the alternatives, but back then it was a little less clear to those of us who didn’t live in the region.

The demands of the market were a different story, of course, and eventually my local availability dried up and the wines existed only in memory (and in the few bottles still resting in my cellar). A very fond one, though.

Longoria 2010 Pinot Grigio (Santa Barbara County) – Herbed green apple, crisp and clean. Very, very clean. There’s as much light in this wine as there is fruit. (11/11)

Longoria 2009 Pinot Noir Rancho Santa Rosa (Santa Rita Hills) – 13.4%. Rough and rustic, definitely unpolished; a wine more about potential than form. The balance and material (quantitatively) seem to be there, but it’s all a jumble at the moment. (11/11)

Longoria 2008 Pinot Noir Fe Ciega (Santa Rita Hills) – 14.2% Earthen, blossoming into a more expressive form of earthfruit (morel and cèpe, that is). Supple, complex, and decidedly Old World in inspiration. I adore this wine.(11/11)

Longoria 2008 Tempranillo Clover Creek (Santa Ynez Valley) – 15%. Huge black fruit, round and polished. Wonderful, but it’s a decadent sort of wonder; those in search of restraint will find only a modicum here, though there are certainly much bigger tempranillos being produced elsewhere in the area. (11/11)

Longoria 2009 “Blues Cuvée”(Santa Barbara County) – 13.7%, a blend of cabernet franc, syrah, cabernet sauvignon, merlot, and malbec (according to the web site; in the tasting room I’m told something quite different involving tempranillo). After a decade between tastes of this cuvée, it’s interesting to come back to what I thought I knew, filtered through all the intervening experiences into the context of what I know now. The wine’s just as good. No, actually, it’s better. Herbs, blueberries, terrific acidity, and fetish vinyl tannin stretched but not strained by the fruit. Excellent balance for such a big wine. Very impressive. (11/11)

Longoria 2008 Syrah Alisos (Santa Barbara County) – 15.2%. Somewhat reduced, which makes it difficult to taste. But there’s muscularity to the blackberry-dominated fruit that powers through the difficulty. Smokes up a bit at the end. This might be excellent, but I’d need a less reduced sample to know more. (11/11)

Longoria 2009 Syrah “Vino Dulce” (Santa Ynez Valley) – 375 ml, 18%. Moderate volatile acidity, blueberry, blackberry. Sweet, fruity fun. (11/11)

In the Ghetto

brother juniperPalmina – I’ve watched what this winery has done over the years with a certain interest, because a bottle here and there has been worth the attention (rarely the same one, year to year), but also with a certain hesitance (for reasons spelled out here). Nonetheless, if one is at the semi-infamous “Lompoc Ghetto,” passing on Palmina seems like an extremely arbitrary snub when there’s very likely to be something worthwhile within. So why not?

Palmina 2007 Nebbiolo (Santa Barbara County) – Floral, with moderately solid tannin and surprisingly juicy fruit (cherry and blackberry, mostly); it’s as if the wine dips and weaves between what one expects from the grape and what one expects from the place. The texture is creamy at first, but as the primary aromatics fade just about all that’s left is corpulence. Not bad, but not particularly good either. (11/11)

Palmina 2006 Nebbiolo Stolpman (Santa Ynez Valley) – Mocha and blueberry confections with a solid wall of dusty tannin. Really, though, its inability to get one foot out of the dessert tray is its undoing.  A shame, too, as I’ve liked this wine a great deal in the past. (11/11)

Palmina 2006 Nebbiolo Sisquoc (Santa Maria Valley) – Freshly-crushed fruit, dark and forward, buried under a shower of funereal black lilies. Earthy and a bit bitter. Despite the forward fruit, there’s a persistent inner herbality and won’t – and shouldn’t – go away. It’s a little strange (OK, a lot strange), but I really kind of like it. At the very least, nebbiolo appears to be attempting to make some sort of contribution here. (11/11)

Palmina 2006 Nebbiolo Honea (Santa Ynez Valley) – Soft tannin and elastic juice, with layers of lacticity. Dead-ish; it’s still very present, but there’s no form or content to the presence. Completely uninteresting. (11/11)

A lineup of wines that, it seems to me, say an awful lot about Palmina, a reasonable bit about their sites, and really almost nothing about why nebbiolo rather than, say, agiorgitiko needs to be used here.

Counting sleep

santa barbara missionBallard Inn – Wine countries (by which I don’t mean countries that make wine) have their centers of gravity. Ideally more than one. And so it is that anyone visiting the scattered clusters of vineyards more or less near Santa Maria will probably choose from one of the most obvious basing options. Solvang’s nearly parodic Scandinavian revival, full of hotels both sleek and silly, yet dotted with wine bars, restaurants, and all the temptations of trinketdom? The artificial yet eminently sensible tasting room huddlings of Los Olivos? Or why not the lovely, albeit lengthy, drive in from Santa Barbara’s lavish luxury?

Hey…how about a innocuous little hamlet with no wineries at all, and what seems like one church per resident? Probably not. And yet, querying long-time locals, that’s exactly where I’m directed, over and over.

One comes to the Ballard Inn for several reasons, among them its tranquil isolation. Of course, there’s a major utility project going on right out front, and though attempts are made to mitigate the din it does shatter the promised tranquility somewhat. But a proper inn it is, with all the charming periodicity one could want, and some very comfortable rooms. I’ve had a soft spot in my heart for the inn ever since, several years ago, they’d volunteered a full refund despite a very last-second cancellation due to a family emergency. I vowed I’d return one day.

The natives, though, don’t just name the inn for its lodging. Nice rooms can be had elsewhere in the valleys. The primary focus is on the restaurant, said by more than a few to be offering the best cooking in the area. Well, let’s hope.

Before dinner, there are communal libations, a fine tradition to which much attention is rarely paid anymore.

Kalyra 2010 Sauvignon Blanc (Santa Ynez Valley) – Sauvignon-by-numbers. A little too big for its own good, but perfectly decent. (11/11)

Firestone 2009 Riesling (Central Coast) – Yep, tastes like riesling. Off-dry riesling. Not really much more to say about it, aside from the somewhat chemical turn it takes as it lingers. (11/11)

Carina Cellars 2007 Syrah (Santa Barbara County) – Identifiably pinot noir syrah, with smoke and dark berries. There are flecks of char and dark chocolate shavings, though, and in the end it doesn’t really amount to much. (11/11)

Though the cocktail hour is on the early side, most of the inn’s other residents proceed more or less immediately to dinner; not all of them have the excuse of belonging to the super-senior set, either. As a result, I’m the last one in and, inevitably, the last one out. At the entirely indecent hour of 9 p.m. Well, at least there’ll be plenty of opportunity to sleep.

As for dinner itself, it’s all that’s been promised. Nothing cantankerous, but with a surprising nose-to-tail element creeping onto the menu, everything cooked well and served knowledgably. That includes the wine list, which is a little on the pricey side but does fine work with the local fermenteds…any alternative to which I couldn’t possibly consider while in the area.

Calzada Ridge 2010 Viognier (Santa Ynez Valley) – This is entirely nice, with fresh, flowery fruit. Not much of a finish. (11/11)

Arcadian 2006 Chardonnay Sleepy Hollow (Santa Maria Highlands) – With the caveat that I rarely have much good to say about New World chardonnay unless it comes from Kalin, Rhys, or Varner/Neely, and with the corollary caveat that this is very much a New World chardonnay, there’s a lot here to like: the peachy fruit, thick and rich with roundness and polish, is fulsome enough to resist the minor trappings of caramel dip and buttery drizzle to which this grape is so often treated. Moreover, there’s acidity, and it’s well-integrated. It’s big – very big – and though I think the wine will develop and mature in a mostly pleasant way, I think that size will loom the greater as time passes. (11/11)

Arcadian 2006 Pinot Noir “Jill’s Cuvée” (Santa Maria Valley) – Starts pianissimo, with just a few little bursts of ripe, reddish fruit. These develop into a theme, then a theme with variations, as decorative contrapuntal nut shavings and wet soil aromas enter the work. What starts in subtlety ends in restrained lushness, full-fruited but with elegance that does not diminish even as a piercing trill of acidity rings and echoes long into the coda. There is still an air of rehearsal to this wine, and more work and refinement yet to come, and it will probably never be the most complex of works. But appealing? Oh, yes. You’ll find yourself humming the melody the following day. (11/11)

Gehrs 2008 “Fireside” Port (Amador County) – A very simple idea of port, sweet with dried berries and a late-palate burn of alcohol, but bringing little else to the concept beside the name and the fundamentals of technique. (11/11)

Breakfast the next morning is just as delicious. The following morning, however, is a bit of a disaster; despite arriving nearly fifteen minutes before the close of breakfast, they claim that it’s too late (as if I don’t own a time-telling device), then offer a decidedly uninventive fib that they’d done a head count and determined that everyone had already been served. Since there aren’t more than a dozen guests in the entire inn, that seems a dim view to take of their skill with arithmetic, but…well, rather than argue, I just take my coffee and leftover fruit and go. It does certain damage to my otherwise rosy view of the inn, however, and despite a complaint at checkout they don’t seem particularly apologetic. So while I would still recommend the place, I’d also recommend being on the very early side for breakfast. Or maybe buy the staff an abacus.

Ox, gored

huntington chinese garden stone tileLazy Ox Canteen – This is one of the loudest concerts I’ve ever been to.

The food? Small plates, like everywhere else, and really quite good; at a table full of choices running the gamut from vegan to organ, it’s only the latter (in the guise of liver) that disappoints through overcooking. A Robuchon-style purée of butter thickened with a little potato and black truffle is a decadent standout, but shishito peppers, lemon-laced broccolini (a dish that highlights Gjelina’s failure with a similarly sour preparation)…everything else is delicious. The one exception to small platedom is a fabulous, thunderously-sized burger with Cantal and green peppercorn mustard.

Alas, the wine list isn’t so special. Instead, it’s a jumble of largely unappealing yet quirky names without any apparent cohesion or philosophy.

Raventós i Blanc 2010 Penedès “Silencis” (Cataluña) – Very liquid, with white peppercorn and nut spices in an applewood broth. Starts off better than it finishes. (11/11)

Hendry “HRW” 2008 Zinfandel (Napa Valley) – 15.3%. I’m normally a big fan of Hendry, but I kind of hate this. Stenchy dark fruit with a twisted-off finish, like drinking wire one picked up off a dirty floor. (11/11)

But back to the elephant in the room…the one that’s trumpeting directly into my ear. Please, Lazy Ox: turn the music down. Way, way down. I don’t object to deafening music, I just don’t particularly want to dine with it. And it’s not just that I can’t hear my dinner companions, I can’t even see them because the pressure waves have numbed the vision center of my brain and are probably responsible for tectonic activity hundreds of miles away. I have made a certain peace with the modern restaurant fetish for assaultive noise, but this is purely elective, and thus particularly unnecessary. I’d go here again, but I’d wear noise-canceling headphones. I’m not entirely kidding…because yes, it is that bad.

Yuca’s on Hollowood – A micro-chain (of two) counter-service-with-seating restaurants, this one with a tiny patio and very good food executed with just a little bit more swagger than most similarly-operated Mexican joints. I can’t find anything bad to say about this place. The swagger may cover for a bit of non-traditional north-of-the-border exploration, but if not everything is authentic in form, it’s authentic enough in flavor.