Well as you know, I do love wine. I love learning about the winemakers, the production of it, and I love tasting and exploring different styles and grapes from around the world. So when there is an opportunity to explore a wine region that I am unfamiliar with, I always say YES!
This past August I had the chance to do just that by attending the Wine Bloggers Conference in Lodi, California. I not only explored Lodi, but I took part in the “pre-excursion” tour to Amador County (south-east of Sacramento). What a gem of a region! A wonderfully historic and beautiful area, offering boutique wineries producing amazing wine by some genuine lovely people!
So, here are some of the wineries I got to discover in Amador County and the wines I tasted:
Family Photo from World War II
Grown in the area: Persimmon, walnuts, olives, black beauty apples, pomegranate.
This is the best area for Barbera (they tell me), it does well in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada – much like the alps in Piedmont. There is no marine influence and no fog but here there is hot weather with a diurnal temperature swing (meaning hot days with cool nights) which Barbera likes. Watch for Primitivo and Sangiovese as the up and coming grapes in this area. Loved these wines!
Rusty the winemaker (seen above) loves working with Italian varieties. Their Sangiovese was rustic and delicious, definitely worth trying vs. a Sangiovese from Italy. Home run!
Winemaker Scott Harvey works with Zinfandel and Barbera, but would love to start working with Tempranillo! I can’t wait to check this out when they start producing it! Until then, their wines are dee-licious.
Paul the winemaker
They only made 600 cases of their Barbera. Which by the way was yummy, and with such a small amount produced means you need to make your way to their winery!
Michael Havill from Bella Grace is the winemaker with her husband Charlie
Charlie
A winemaker for 12 years, we all fell in love with Michael! She’s not just lovely but she makes a killer Vermentino! She is creative and her wines show it! I’ll be watching this family winery.
Their aim? To have personality in the wines they produce. So head to the winery, because it’s gorgeous and you can try their bold reds (like the Zinfandel I had in this picture) and fun whites.
A family winery where 30% of the proceeds go towards the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation. Much respect for what they have created!
Joe the winemaker shared the dirt on his vineyards and his wines. He makes some fantastic Barbera (no surprise as it does well in this region) along with Tempranillo to Zinfandel. Along with one of my favourite finds of the trip: Jubilance, a sparkling Rosé made from 100% Zinfandel. Delicious!
As I have a love for Rosé wines, I gathered my wine friends at the conference to do a spontaneous video review of the Jubilance:
I hope you enjoyed my short tour of Amador County Wineries & their wines. A definite MUST for your bucket list of wine regions to explore.
Donita
Wine and Travel Concierge 
Great job! You all were fabulous!
Great post! WBC16 was really eye opening for us as well. We live in Napa and generally have too many things on our visit list to go too far out of the local area (which might include Sonoma or Mendocino). But the conference really showed off Lodi well along with the other wine regions in the area. I can’t help but think in 20 years we’ll see a wine region starting in Lodi and extending up to Mendocino with the Sacramento and Solano wine regions all part of that.