Vindemia Vinyard and Winery

If you are a complete novice to wine tasting, and want to see it done right, my suggestion is that you visit Vindemia Vineyard and Winery in Temecula.  Vindemia is a bit hard to find.  You make a left turn off of Rancho California before the circle.  There’s a road going up a hill to the left just as you see a road sign saying “Pavement Ends”.  Take that road to the top of the hill and Vindemia is on your left.
​Vindemia is closer in nature to Ramona’s boutique wineries in that they do not have an elaborate facility.  Just a small patio and a pavilion bar for tasting (see pictures). 

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Now the reason to go there is that they do everything right.  As soon as you say you want to taste their wines they pour you a glass of water.  The wines for tasting – both red and white – are kept in a chiller (see picture).  They provide munchies (bread and olive oil) so you don’t drink too much on an empty stomach.  To make sure the remains on one wine do not affect the taste of the next wine you taste, they rinse your glass out with the wine you are about to taste.  That is the way it should be done!

As you can see in the tasting menu below, they provide six tastes for $16 week days, $20 weekends.  They specialize in red wines.  I should add that they do not follow the pattern of their expensive wines not being very good compared to their less expensive wines.  Oh, and their Cowbell is actually a Zinfandel.  Not sure why they don't say so on the tasting menu.
Their wine club is a five-shipment per year set-up, with either three or four bottles per shipment at a 20% discount.  Includes four tastings per visit to the winery and $15 off of hot air balloon rides – their other business.  Like most wineries, they have special events for wine club members and some members-only wines.  As with most boutique wineries, most of their wines are estate, meaning they make the wine from the grapes that they grow.