After spending a lazy mid-morning at Foppiano Vineyards, walking the self-guided vineyard tour and tasting Foppiano wine we headed down the road to J Vineyards. What an amazing contrast in wineries. Foppiano represents much of the past in wineries with its modest tasting room and winemaking facilities. J Vineyards on the other hand is far removed from the traditional, with a lush tasting room, state of the art winemaking equipment, beautiful grounds, and more expensive wines.
The tasting room is exquisite and so is the tasting experience. There is a choice of tasting menus and we chose the basic tasting of four wines for $10. The pace was very leisurely; we probably spent about 45 minutes tasting the four wines. Our server was very informative and not overbearing with his knowledge of the J wines. Everything is done in a classy style. With each pour of wine comes a new wine glass.
Too often in this type of environment the staff tries too hard and goes a bit over the top.
Not so here, it was a generally a fun and enjoyable experience. The wines were all very good, well balanced, and structured. The wines however because of their quality and style are priced well above the Foppiano Wines.
Foppiano and J Vineyards represent a contrast in time in the wine world and both are fun to visit in succession. You get a little of the old and a little of the new, in wine world.
