​We now return to reviews of the great wineries dotting the landscape of our beloved San Diego County.  Our latest local winery that we had the pleasure of visiting is Sunrise Vineyards, located on Highland Valley Road in the “between” land, not quite in Ramona but not quite in the Highland Hills region.  Very nice facility with great views, as seen below, and one really interesting wine.  But we’ll get to it towards the end of this blog.

​The downside is that Sunrise Vineyards, like almost all of the boutique wineries, grows Cabernet Sauvignon grapes even though Southern California is generally too hot for Cabernet Sauvignon grapes.  Ah, but there is a difference….
One of the unique features of the wine country here in San Diego County is the terrain.  It is really rough, with valleys, canyons, mesas facing in all directions.  In addition, we have a very dry climate, resulting in significant differences in temperature between areas in the shade and areas in the sun.  Even on a small parcel one can have multiple terroirs with essentially different climates.  Enter Sunrise Vineyards.  Their grapes are planted on the eastern side of a hill (a bit northern as well), so they do not face the hot afternoon sun.  Ergo, they’ve been able to beat the heat, so to speak, allowing them to grow decent Cabernet Sauvignon grapes.  Adding Sangiovese, a warm climate vine, to the mix does not hurt at all.
In addition to Cabernet Sauvignon and Sangiovese grapes, they purchase grapes from their neighbors so offer other wines such as the white wine Grenache Blanc and Syrah.  In addition, they blend the Cabernet Sauvignon and Sangiovese grapes to make a wine much like the Italian Super Tuscans, but, of course, cannot call their wine a Super Tuscan.  This makes perfect sense since they are certainly not located in Tuscany.  What we tasted was worth the visit, even the Cabernet Sauvignon.  They grow some of these vines at the bottom of their east-facing hill, a cooler area than where they grow the rest.  The grapes from these vines have turned out better, and they’ve used them to make a reserve wine.  Not sure when it will be released, but one that should be quite good.

Of course, boutique winery owners like to try new things – comes with the territory.  So, they decided to use some of their Cabernet Sauvignon grapes to make a rosé, the really interesting wine I mentioned earlier.  Wow!  Maybe the best rosé in all of Southern California!!!  If you are a rosé lover, you’ll not want to miss this wine!
By the way, they have gotten the message, or at least I think so.  As shown in the photo below, they keep their red wines for tasting in a cooler.  Hopefully they stay with this so you can taste their reds the way they should be tasted, between 55-60 F.

​They have a wine club.  Members purchase twelve bottles per year (four every four months, winemaker’s choice, no substitutions).  20% discount on all wines and one free glass of wine per month.  Of course, wine club members get first choice on new releases.  Hopefully they won’t buy up all of the Cabernet Sauvignon rosé!

​Doc Ed has been to Sonoma a number of times, and after one of his trips he wrote the following :  “Benovia had a large selection of well-made wines, and they presented them in a beautiful tasting room with a great view of their property.  My favorite was the La Pommeraie ($65), a blend of clones 777 and 828, which was aged for a long 16 months in new French oak.  Wow, the flavors were wonderful!”  With this review on our minds, we made reservations to visit them on the third, and last, day of our expedition to Sonoma.  Benovia Winery is located in the Russian River region of Sonoma where Pinot Noir reigns supreme,  and, well, we spent quite a bit of time there.  It is, as Doc Ed noted, quite a beautiful place, as shown in the pictures below, and the wines are just superb.

​The wine list is shown below.  On the left are the wines for tasting that day.  Of course, after we ran through all of them we had to try La Pommeraie, and then the Russian River Pinot Noir, and some white wines, and….  All told we had a very pleasant afternoon.

​Of the Pinot Noir wines we tasted I found myself in full agreement with Doc Ed on La Pommeraie.  Just a wonderful wine, though it now runs $75 a bottle.

​And so, we came to the end of our Sonoma Expedition, with a case of Benovia wine added to our shipments from Orsi and Moshin, and enough time to stop for food on our way to the Sacramento Airport and our flight back to San Diego.  Alas, “The best-laid schemes o' mice an 'men Gang aft agley” (Robert Burns, “To a Mouse”).  You see, we were halfway or so on the drive from Sonoma to the Sacramento Airport when we all got texts saying our flights had been cancelled due to the government shutdown.  Fortunately, our heroes, shown below, drove us home to San Diego, arriving in the wee hours of the night.

​Our intrepid band of wine explorers were excited about our second day of our second Sonoma trip a as it took us back to Moshin Vineyards, a winery in the Russian River region that we visited during our barrel tasting expedition.  This time around we arranged for Rick Moshin to give us a tour of the facility.  As noted in my first post about this winery, it is on a hillside to allow Rick to gravity feed the wine rather than pump it.  Ergo, we had to start the tour at the top of the hill.  Unfortunately, our rental vehicle (shown below) could not make the trip so we had to walk up this very steep hill and, well, I’m not young.  Fortunately, we got around to the wine….

​I won’t go into much about how he makes his wine as I covered it in detail in my last post about Moshin Vineyards.  I did learn that he is doing some of his wine growing using biodynamic processes.  One in particular is worth mentioning.  If you bury nettles in the ground nothing happens – dig them up a year or so later and they are still nettles.  However, if you wrap them in sheep intestines then bury them when you dig them up you get a black goo that you can spray on your vines as an insect repellent!  Some pictures of his system follow below, with a picture of Rick as well, but, not sorry to say, no pictures of the goo:

​We sat out front this time, and, unfortunately, wound up partially in the sun.  Nonetheless, we stayed around to taste a wide variety of products and, much to my surprise, I purchased bottles of their Cabernet Sauvignon made from grapes grown in the Dry Creek area of Sonoma.  I did not purchase any Pinot Noir.  Why?  Well, he had this great deal last summer on Pinot Noir….  We wound up buying three cases of wine for shipment back to San Diego, though I should add that our intrepid group just ordered two more cases....