Introducing Wine Culture and Business in Napa Valley (CA) to Juilliard Graduate Florence Paget with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget
One of my family’s favorite places to go during summer when my daughter Florence was young was Napa Valley outside San Francisco.
Little Florence was not going
drink wine, but I wanted her to know about wine culture, since it is important
to California’s economy.
We had three destinations on
our usual Napa itinerary – Sattui Winery, the Robert Mondavi Winery, and Trader
Joe’s to buy wine.
Sattui Winery has been a San
Francisco secret for decades, because they have a market with items such as
terrines, pâtés, baguettes, French cheese,
salami, mesclun salads, and made-to-order sandwiches in addition to Italian
soda, French soda, and wine.
You can eat on the premises
at picnic tables or benches. Sometimes
bands play. Children can always play
here, making this a nice outing for children.
You used to be able to do
wine tastings for free, but now that their wines have won several awards, and
the winery is a stop on the Napa wine train, you have to pay for tastings.
There are some things to do
after eating. We would always walk
around the vineyard with Florence.
“These stone buildings look
like the ones you can see in Tuscany, Italy or Languedoc, France. Daddy and I saw wineries like this one when
we were on our honeymoon in Italy, France, and Spain,” I said.
We walked by the edges of the
vineyards where I told Florence, “Never pick the grapes in a vineyard to
eat. That’s a huge no-no.”
Laurent laughed and said,
“The vineyard owners might come after you with hunting dogs for eating grapes
in the vineyard.”
“That’s not funny,” Florence
said.
“It’s vineyard etiquette,” I
said. “You might get yelled at in French
and chased with a pitchfork, if they don’t have the dogs out,” I said,
continuing my vineyard etiquette lesson.
After inspecting the
vineyards, we would cross the street and go to the Dean & Deluca
brick-and-mortar store to get some Le Perroquet brown sugar cubes for tea.
We would always inspect the
cheese section. Barcelona and the
Catalan region of Spain surrounding Barcelona were very fashionable when
Florence was growing up, so we would get a Catalan cheese like Garrotxa to eat.
When I bought that, Florence
called it, “The gross cheese.”
We have started eating at
Tarla’s in downtown Napa now that Florence is older, but Sattui’s is still a
nice place to go with younger children.
The next stop on our Napa
wine tour was usually the Robert Mondavi Winery. The winery is white and towering with lots of
arches – perfect for fashion photos.
The tasting bar is full of
San Francisco’s upwardly mobile professionals, who describe the wine they taste
as “dancing on the tongue” and “having a luscious bouquet.”
Mondavi was a genius at
marketing; all Napa wines are excellent, but he created cachet. I just liked to see how he placed wine
glasses, wine buckets, corkscrews, and towels together with wine carriers for
al fresco dining. I asked Florence what
she liked on the table in the era of marketing to children.
“The glasses with the
picture,” she said, referring to an etched glass with the Mondavi logo. I knew from my work in marketing research
that children like logos and being associated with prestige brands. Florence’s remark just confirmed every kid’s
love for designer anything I thought.
I looked at some of the
winery’s more high-end merchandising, which featured a flowing Hermes-like
scarf surrounded with bracelets and earrings.
“A lot of people get dressed
up to drink wine,” I said to Florence.
“When are some of the times
people get dressed up to drink wine?” I asked Florence.
“Weddings, baptisms,
Christmas, Easter, birthday parties, and Sunday lunch,” Florence responded.
“It’s better for your liver
to limit wine to those occasions,” I said to Florence.
On the way home, we would
stop at Trader Joe’s to go wine shopping.
They had wines from all around the world on sale, but I would head to the
Italian wine section.
I always bought some Barolos
from the Piedmont region, which is considered Italy’s best red wine. I would also get some Amarone wines from the
Veneto region outside Venice.
We would also scout the
shelves for some bottles of Grgich, one of the winners in the 1976 Paris
Tasting that pitted Napa wines against French ones. When Napa wines won, the Napa region became
world famous.
By the time we bought the
wine, we were sun-burnt and ready to go home with our Napa Valley booty.
By Ruth Paget, Author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
Click here for: Ruth Paget's Amazon Books
 |
| Ruth Paget Selfie |
