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Sonoma Trip Breakdown - Day 1

We hit B. R. Cohn for a tasting. My first visit to this very cool vineyard. Apparently B.R. Cohn was the road crew manager for the Doobie Brothers forever, so lots of fun memorabilia on the walls. They have a very friendly tasting room, and Phil showed us some great wines.


Since I've committed to making this the el-cheapo wine tour, I'm trying to make sure that all my wines come in (mostly) under $25 a bottle, and I'm bringing back only a case. I picked up two bottles at B. R. Cohn:

* B. R. Cohn - Boater's Barbera, 06

* B. R. Cohn - Syrcab, 07
(77% Syrah, 23% Cabernet Sauvignon)

I also picked up a balsamic vinegar and a jar of the kalamata tapenade.

After that, we hit the CIA for lunch in Napa. We sat right next to the Demo Kitchen and watched them prep everyone's food.



Lunch was a terrific hangar steak, amongst various other samplings. We made a quick visit to the gift shop, but resisted coming home with any new cooking implements.
After lunch, we headed back to base camp for a much needed nap, and got prepped for dinner at Zazu.


When I arrived, I declared to our hosts that there was only 3 mandatory activities for this trip 1) a stop at Teldeschi to pick up some Zin, 2) that I could make everyone dinner one night, and 3) that we would hit Zazu. Zazu is a small restaurant and farm in Sonoma that's been featured in countless wine magazines. The owner and chef, Duskie Estes, was on the Food Network Challenge a while back. My last trip to California, we had dinner here, and it was fantastic. One of my fellow travellers declared that it was the "best duck I've ever had", and the kale that was the side to my dinner is the reason that I grow kale in the garden at home. Dinner this time was no less exceptional. We dug into the black pig salumi plate and a bottle of Seghesio Zin.

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