Beringer: reserve wines and special educational seminars are worth it.
The Napa Valley is known for a mix of both large and small wineries, and typically Jamie and I stay away from large wineries as they are busier, more touristed, and the wines we’ve tasted are usually mediocre. Not that we don’t like large wineries. To the contrary- we love their educational tours and seminars as they provide the best service to guests who are visiting the Napa Valley for the first time. We had heard a lot about Beringer and Dean Busquaert’s educational session on wine and dominant tastes in food. Guests would return from his session raving about how much they had learned. We finally met Dean and he agreed to come to The Inn On First one night and provide a slimmed down version of his seminar for our guests. Over the course of one hour he paired up different wines with various tastes in food (sweet, salty, sour, savory), and he explained why some flavors worked well with wine and others didn’t. When he had us experiment for ourselves the lessons became more obvious and suddenly we all felt like wine and food pairing experts. Granted, we are all far from that, but let’s not spoil the delusion for the moment….by the end of that hour we were more educated and ready to try and pair up wines with dominant food tastes as we eat around the Valley. Now, he also brought some of Beringer’s reserve wines, and what a difference that made. As I stated at the beginning of this paragraph, I usually steer away from tasting wines at large wineries as they will offer their lower end wines for tasting; and my experience is that these wines are mediocre. The exception- and there is always an exception to the rule- is that these larger wineries have “reserve” wines that are far better in flavor and complexity. Even at small wineries, when there is an option to taste reserve wines, I will always take that option knowing this is a better selection of wines. Beringer was no exception. All of us were impressed with their reserve wines and Dean was more than happy to take orders to fill for guests before he left. Although we probably won’t see him for the rest of the season- especially now that he was written up in Conde Naste as a “not to be missed” experience in Napa- we really encourage guests early on to seriously consider taking his session. He is funny, engaging, and hugely educational. That hour moved so quickly and we regretted we didn’t get more time with him. If you think you are going to want this “not to be missed” experience, be sure to sign up early. More information is available on the Beringer website (http://www.beringer.com).