Today I took a trip up to Napa not only to get out of the hustle and bustle of the City (and the less than stellar weather) but also to visit two fantastic wineries, ZD Winery and Robert Sinskey Winery. My first stop was at Cornerstone Place in Sonoma for a quick sandwich from Sage Fine Foods and then popped into the Roshambo tasting room to say hi and get in a quick game of Pac man. It was an overcast and slightly humid day but perfect weather to taste a little vino and make some new friends. I headed to the CA-29 and cut over the 128 to Silverado Trail (which I later found out was named for it being one of the original trails during the silver rush built from Napa to Calistoga as a major trade route). As I pulled into the ZD winery parking lot the sun just began to peek through the clouds. ZD Winery is located along the Silverado Trail a short drive from Lake Hennessy and neighbors to Mumm Napa Winery. It’s set on 6-acres of prime Rutherford real estate and from the back of their facilities they have a stunning view across the valley. I met with ZD’s regional sales manager, Kendra Gillette and she showed me around the facilities. She gave me the history and a quick peek into the “library” (a collection of bottles from each vintage and varietal produced at ZD starting from 1969) I then got to look at their bottling equipment and barrel taste some of their upcoming pinots and cabernets mmmmmm. ZD stands for the two gentlemen that started the winery, Norman deLeuze and Gino Zepponi. It also stands for “Zero Defects” a term used in aerospace engineering (a profession that both owners were in prior to becoming wine makers) also a practice that ZD applies to their wine making. ZD is also a certified organic winery that has been using sustainable organic practices since the 80’s but became certified by the California Certified Organic Farmers (CCOF) in 1999. On top of farming organically in the fall of 2007 ZD installed 712 solar panels to power its winery. Some interesting facts about the solar panels used by ZD: over the course of a year…
They could Power 22 homes for a year

Remove the equivalent CO2 that 32 acres of trees would process
Power 1,238 100 watt light bulbs a year

Remove the equivalent of 16 cars from the road a year
This blog is slowly beginning to turn into a short story and I haven’t even begun to talk about Robert Sinskey yet. I’ll have to save that winery for another post. I would like to mention one of ZD’s standout wines, 2007 Founders Reserve Pinot Noir. This wine was absolutely delicious cherry cola, raspberry, spice and beautiful hints of herbaceousness (made up word) most of these aromas followed through on the palate with the addition of structured tannins that give it a great backbone, an absolutely wonderful pinot that has won more than a few gold medals in wine competitions throughout the country.

Another post will follow with my dynamic time at the biodynamic winery of Robert Sinskey.