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Rosé Wine Tasting in Los Olivos: 6 Stellar Rosés

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Spring has sprung, and that can only mean one thing in wine country: it’s rosé season. This is the time of year when wineries release their new rosé, to be enjoyed now and all through the summer (and if you can hold onto a bottle all the way until Thanksgiving, it’s superb with the food).

Larner rose wine
This time of year, rosé is fresh off the bottling line. It can be light and zingy with a hint of color and fruit, or it can have more body and complexity with nice acidity to keep it fresh. Gone are the days of heavy, sweet rosés…most wineries today are making a Provence-style rosé: dry, fresh, a little (or a lot) fruity with tons of acidity to keep your mouth refreshed. Just what we need on warm Spring days and Summer evenings.

In Los Olivos, look for these 6 ravishing rosés:

  1. Liquid Farm makes Rosé of Mourvédre from  Happy Canyon of Santa Barbara AVA. Bottled on Feb 5, 2020, the new vintage does not disappoint!! Apricot, orange zest, and river rock aromas are followed with flavors of peach skin, nectarine, and salty sea air. Due to replanting, production is down and we cannot guarantee we will be able to make it last all year.
  2. Larner Vineyard & Winery makes Syrah/Grenache/Mourvedre rosé this Easter weekend as well. This Rhone blend of grapes is really the classic choice for rosés from Provence.
  3. Kaena Wines makes a more complex rosé of Grenache, a pretty wine that can easily stand up to summer barbecues.
  4. Coquelicot has a Rosé of Sangiovese, and it’s light and crisp, like those from Provence.
  5. Andrew Murray Vineyards makes a nice rosé of Cinsault, which is its Esperance rosé, following in Andrew’s style of ripe fruit and bracing acidity.
  6. Blair Fox Cellars does a double whammy, making a rosé of Grenache, and also sparkling rosé of Grenache! They are also family-owned and organically-farmed. (In case you’re wondering, other wineries that also do a double whammy of rosé and sparkling rosé are Alma Rosa, Summerland, Riverbench and Palmina.)

Have fun with these wines and don’t forget to Drink Pink!

Bien Nacido Vineyards

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Bien Nacido Vineyards in Santa Maria Valley

Bien Nacido Vineyards are some of the most well-known vineyards in the world. 12 different grape varieties grow there and are famous for their ability to make high-quality, award-winning wines. It’s also the most-named vineyard across all branded labels in the world.

If you’ve never seen the vineyard, get a peek in this video tour of Bien Nacido and other Santa Maria Vineyards below. The historic adobe on the property was built by ancestors of Ranchos de Ontiveros viticulturist James Ontiveros, who is a ninth-generation Californian (and the reason behind his Native9 label).

Roll out the Barrels in San Luis Obispo Wine Country

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This yearly wine event happens every June, kicking off summer with a fun Thursday night food and wine event in downtown SLO’s Mission Plaza. At Barrels in the Plaza, sample farm-to-table cuisine from over 50 local chefs and wineries, with live music by the Cimo Brothers on Thursday, June 21, 2018, from 4:30-7:30pm.

Biddle Ranch WineryThen, Friday and Saturday, June 22-23, sip your way through SLO Wine Country with the all-inclusive Passport ticket good all day at most wineries. Walk the vineyards, sample wine straight from the barrel, try the Wine Aromatics Bar and enjoy food trucks, oysters, live music and more! There are lots of fun educational experiences and activities throughout the various wine trails, so check out all the offerings here, or download the booklet here.

The ticket includes 4 locations per day for a total of 8 visits – the Saturday only ticket is good for a total of 4 visits. Don’t miss this in-depth wine experience!

Flying Goat Cellars – Goat Bubbles

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Goat Bubbles: Santa Barbara Sparkling Wine from Flying Goat CellarsOne of the original sparkling wine makers in Santa Barbara county using the traditional method to make bubbles — méthode champenoise — was Flying Goat Cellars. Norm Yost and Kate Griffith have been picking early, fermenting grapes, providing the proper environment for a second fermentation in the bottle and disgorging in the Lompoc wine ghetto since 2005. Flying Goat is one of the few bubbles producers in the county to master handcrafting sparkling wine at its own facility, where every step of production is done in-house.

Norm’s been a Pinot Noir maker, drinker and fanatic since landing in the Santa Ynez Valley in 1979. But for him, the Sta. Rita Hills‘ and Santa Maria Valley’s high acidity, low sugars, and great flavors were perfect for sparkling wine.

Flying Goat is the first to open a Bubbles Bar in their tasting room in the Lompoc Wine Ghetto, where you can taste all 5 of their stellar sparkling wines. Sounds like you need a road trip to Santa Barbara’s OG of sparkling wine!

Goat Bubbles:

  • Rosé (a fruity Pinot Noir)
  • Blanc de Blancs (Chardonnay)
  • Blanc de Noirs (Pinot Noir)
  • Brut Cuveé (Pinot Noir and Chardonnay)
  • Crémant (a tart fruit Pinot Blanc)

The Great Grape Stomp – Kalyra Winery

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“Why are you all dressed alike? What’s with the polka-dots?”

Grape Stomping at Kalyra Winery in Santa Ynez Valley, Santa Barbara Wine CountryThe slightly tipsy woman was staring at the seven of us dressed in various impersonations of Lucy and Ethel stomping grapes from the classic “I Love Lucy” episode. I looked our group up and down. Some did look like Lucy & Ethel, but a few of us looked more like homeless waifs. And one was more on the Raquel Welch side.

But we were all aligned in our mission and armed with wine glasses in the Santa Ynez Valley to do one thing: a grape stomp. Ok, maybe two things: taste the new Kalyra releases (especially the sparkling Brut Rose) right out of the barrels. After a few rounds of spicy bratwurst sausages in the tasting room, we headed straight for the stomping area, which just happened to be adjacent to the sparkling stainless steel barrels.

First, we needed a few quick tastes of fresh Brut Rose in various stages of fermentation, which were poured by the winemaker himself, then we placed our shoes all in a line, held up our skirts and climbed into the big trays of grapes. The water was cold, the grapes squished between our toes like slugs and the unfiltered Brut Rose was deliciously fruity. The gracious owners of Kalyra winery let us stomp grapes to our heart’s content, until we heard the band strike up on the front porch and realized our glasses were empty.

Grape Stomping at Kalyra Winery in Santa Ynez Valley, Santa Barbara Wine Country“Look, there go the Lucys,” someone said as we traipsed to the porch, just in time to fill our glasses and jump on the winery tractor for a tour of the vineyards.

We had to explain ourselves to a few of the youngsters on the tour, but most people got our outfits that day. And stomping the grapes was great fun, but I’m glad the winemaker has enough sense to use different grapes in the wines (not stomped by these particular human feet). I wouldn’t drink it after seeing all the stompers that day; in fact, I’ll just wait for the Brut Rose to come out, thank you very much.

See more places to stomp grapes in Santa Barbara county.

Summer Wine: Sauvignon Blanc

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One of my favorite summer wines is Sauvignon Blanc. (The other one is Rosé, but that’s a whole other post). I would describe Sauvignon Blanc as fresh, lemony and grassy…it reminds me of a fresh-cut lawn, a big warm sun and long days of languishing in the heat needing a refreshment.

Sauvignon Blanc is that perfect summer refreshment! Here are some Central Coast Sauv Blancs to try:

Summer Recipes Sauvignon Blanc Food Pairing

Many of your favorite summer foods go great with Sauvignon Blanc. Here are some some summer recipes for you to try:

Recipe photos by Closet Cooking, Cali Zona, Food & Wine, Marcus Samuelsson, Spoonful of Flavor & VinDulge.