Napa Day Two Continued: Frank Family Vineyards

Frank Family Vineyards (first constructed as Larkmead Winery in 1884) was not really on my planned list of wineries, but they happen to make one of my favorite wines (2010 Napa Valley Chardonnay). During our tasting at Duckhorn, we found out that we were minutes away from Frank Family--and we had some extra time before heading back to dinner at Hurley's--so we decided to stop in.

Once we were ushered into one of their tasting rooms, I saw this really cool tapestry on the wall of all the area appellations. I wish I had one in my house!

We chose the premium wine tasting for $30, and it began with a 2010 Carneros Napa Valley Chardonnay ($32.50/btl) This is hands down one of my favorite wines. It’s a perfect balance of fruit and oak. It’s my old standby on a menu if I want to just go with something I really like.

Here's my BF and our host, Rick. He was very knowledgeable and guided us through the tasting. Also on our list was a 2009 Carneros Reserve Pinot Noir, a 2009 Napa Valley Zinfandel, and a 2008 Rutherford Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon.

I am a huge fan of social media, and when I arrived at Frank Family I "checked in" on both Facebook and Foursquare. Then I got a message from one of my twitter friends, David Cole (who also happens to make great wine). He told me to ask our host if we could taste the Winston Hill (it was a wine for sale on our list but not for a regular tasting). The Winston Hill is a Cabernet blend of 89% Cabernet Sauvginon, 5% Cabernet Franc, 4% Merlot, and 2% Petit Verdot. Rick kindly allowed my request and brought out the bottle. It was a nice treat because a bottle of this wine is $150.00 (yes, per bottle, and you have to be a wine club member to get it).

The BF bought some wine at Frank Family as well and just last week we opened the second bottle of some Chardonnay he bought. We had it with some fish he made (excellent, by the way) and some rainbow chard sauté and roasted eggplant dip that I made. Most of the produce I used to prepare dinner came from my It's Organic Delivery box.

And I end this post where I began. With a taste of the Frank Family Chardonnay. Cheers!

You can find Frank Family on Facebook here and follow them on twitter here. For more information on the winery, you can call them at (707) 942-0859 or visit their website here.