Koi Zen Cellars

​Koi Zen Cellars is the first urban winery I’ve visited, and it is quite urban.  It is located in an industrial park near Home Depot in the Carmel Mountain region of San Diego.  Not a very nice outside, but the interior is well done, as shown below.  This particular urban winery does not have an affiliated vineyard – they buy all of their grapes from vineyards all over California, but not necessarily the same vineyards from year to year.

​The entire operation sits, as noted above, in an industrial park.  Their 800 or so sq. ft. facility was pretty packed when we visited as they had the barrel room filled with fermentation vats.  These were very large plastic boxes with just a plastic sheet over them to keep bugs out of the mix, as shown below.  Their wine maker pulled away one of the sheets so we could see the must (crushed grapes – seeds and skins included).  First time for me.

​The facility is broken down into essentially three lounges, two with bars.  Very nice interior setting.  The server we had is a Sommelier (level 2, I believe) and at least one other person in the operation is a level 3 Sommelier.

​Wine tasting is $10 for 5 tastes.  As shown below, most of their wines are made from French varietals, with grapes mostly from California.  One very unique wine is a Chardonnay with oak chips in the bottle.  The one outstanding wine in the listing is their Syrah.  We bought a bottle.  Unfortunately, I did not get a picture of the bottle before it was consumed, so I have posted a picture of their award-winning Pinot Noir which, unfortunately, was not available for tasting.

​They have a wine club, two bottles every other month with substitutions allowed.  Discount is only 10%, and members are limited to two free tastings per month.  Like many wineries, they hold wine pick up parties with food and music.