Olken Charles E. - The new connoisseurs guidebook to California wine and wineries

USING THIS BOOK AND ITS WINE RATINGS

PART ONE
A CALIFORNIA WINE PRIMER

Grape and Wine Types

PART TWO
CALIFORNIA WINE REGIONS AND WINERIES

Alameda County 288

Alexander Valley 88

Alta Mesa 382

Amador County 368

Anderson Valley 64

Apple Hill 368

Arroyo Grande Valley 329

Arroyo Seco 314

Atlas Peak 166

Ben Lomond Mountain 290

Benmore Valley 70

Bennett Valley 89

Borden Ranch 382

Calaveras County 370

Calistoga 166

Capay Valley 384

Carmel Valley 314

Carneros (Los Carneros) 90, 168

Central Coast 290, 318

Central Valley 382

Chalk Hill 90

Chalone 314

Chiles Valley 168

Cienega Valley 317

Clarksburg 384

Clear Lake 70

Clements Hills 384

Cole Ranch 66

Contra Costa County 291

Cosumnes River 385

Covelo 66

Cucamonga Valley 394

Cuyama Valley 346

Diablo Grande 385

Diamond Mountain District 169

Dos RIOS 66

Dry Creek Valley 90

Dunnigan Hills 385

Edna Valley 330

El Dorado 370

El Dorado County 370

Fair Play 371

Fiddletown 371

Green Valley of Russian River Valley 91

Guenoc Valley 70

Hames Valley 315

Happy Canyon 346

High Valley 71

Howell Mountain 169

Jahant 385

Knights Valley 92

Lake County 68

Leona Valley 394

Lime Kiln 317

Livermore Valley 291

Lodi 386

Madera 387

Malibu-Newton Canyon 396

Mariposa County 371

McDowell Valley 67

Mendocino 67

Mendocino County 63

Mendocino Ridge 67

Merritt Island 388

Mokelumne River 388

Monterey 315

Monterey County 311

Mount Harlan 317

Mount Veeder 169

Napa Valley 170

Nevada County 371

North Coast 71

North Yuba 372

Northern Sonoma 93

Oak Knoll District of Napa Valley 171

Oakville 172

Pacheco Pass 318

Paicines 318

Paso Robles 330

Petaluma Gap 93

Placer County 371

Potter Valley 67

Ramona Valley 396

Red Hills Lake County 71

Redwood Valley 68

River Junction 388

Rockpile 94

Russian River Valley 94

Rutherford 172

Saddle Rock-Malibu 396

Salado Creek 389

San Antonio Valley 315

San Benito 318

San Benito County 311

San Bernabe 315

San Francisco Bay 288

San Francisco County 292

San Lucas 316

San Luis Obispo County 329

San Mateo County 292

San Pasqual Valley 396

San Ysidro District 293

Santa Barbara County 345

Santa Clara County 292

Santa Clara Valley 293

Santa Cruz Mountains 293

Santa Lucia Highlands 316

Santa Maria Valley 348

Santa Ynez Valley 348

Seiad Valley 389

Shenandoah Valley of California 372

Sierra Foothills 367

Sloughouse 389

Solano County 294

Solano County Green Valley 294

Sonoma Coast 96

Sonoma Mountain 96

Sonoma Valley 96

South Coast 396

Spring Mountain District 173

St. Helena 174

Sta. Rita Hills/Santa Rita Hills 348

Stags Leap District 173

Suisun Valley 294

Temecula Valley 397

Tracy Hills 389

Trinity Lakes 389

Tuolumne County 371

Ventura County 349

Wild Horse Valley 175

Willow Creek 390

York Mountain 332

Yorkville Highlands 68

Yountville 175

IT IS NOW THREE DECADES SINCE MY FIRST BOOK , The Connoisseurs Handbook of California Wines, appeared in print. In that era, it was easy to cover virtually every winery and to extend the book's reach to Oregon and Washington. There was nothing comprehensive in print covering West Coast wines, and those books that had earlier described the California wine scene had been made obsolete by the industrys rapid expansion in the early 1970s. At the same time, the extraordinary quality improvements being made by new and existing producers alike because of new understandings about winemaking and improving technology also altered the landscape. In short, California and the West Coast had changed, and the Handbook was able to capture those changes for a growing wine-buying world.

The Handbook held on gamely through four major revisions and many reprintings, and in one form or another, stayed in print for over twenty-five years. But, like all attempts to take a snapshot of a moving target, it became increasingly a captive of past scenes and could not adapt to the new reality of thousands of labels, greatly expanded growing areas, and the changes in information exchange brought about by the emergence of the Internet.

When my writing partners, Norman Roby and Earl Singer, and I finally put the Handbook to bed almost a decade ago, it had outlived its usefulness in its existing form. Today, one can get more information via the Internet than any basic reference book can provide. When it came time to produce another broadly written look at the California wine industry, it was clear that a new approach was needed, and this book, rather than trying to out-produce the Internet, takes full advantage of the extensive resources available at everyones fingertips by providing Web addresses for every winery and for many other valuable sources of information.

Virtually every winery Web site is more extensive than anything we or any other author could put into written form. In this book, then, the basic introductory matter for each winery sets the scene for the detailed background information that followsdata not generally available such as production level and vineyard acreage, examinations of house winemaking styles, and ratings for thousands of wines. This book has one other advantage, too: it combines in one place information on almost five hundred wineries, on some 130 or more places that grapes are grown, and about virtually every important grape and wine type made in California. No single Web site does all that as comprehensively as this book.