{"id":698,"date":"2017-08-30T22:06:31","date_gmt":"2017-08-30T22:06:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=698"},"modified":"2017-08-30T22:06:31","modified_gmt":"2017-08-30T22:06:31","slug":"frank-family-vineyards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=698","title":{"rendered":"Frank Family Vineyards"},"content":{"rendered":"

There is a certain type of winery in Napa Valley (and elsewhere, too) that sets our teeth on edge.\u00a0 Someone is a great success at something other than wine making, buys a property in Wine Country and vows to make wine that\u2019s not only great in itself but reflects the values of his (always his<\/em>) family and their tradition.\u00a0 After all, this is the description of Joseph Phelps and many other great, great wine makers whose products have enriched our lives and those of many other wine lovers, so we cannot be doctrinaire.<\/p>\n

To that select group we must add Rich and Leslie Frank, whose Frank Family Vineyards are located in Calistoga, at the northern end of Napa Valley.\u00a0 They were big shots in television before opening their winery.\u00a0 It is not our purpose at Power Tasting to review wines, but it is fair to say that we enjoy their wines very much.\u00a0 Our objective is to pass along our views on the experience of wine tasting at wineries we have visited, and Frank Family gets high marks there, as well.<\/p>\n

The site itself is historic.\u00a0 There is a rather spare stone building, which was once the building of Hanns Kornell\u2019s winery, where methode champenoise<\/em> winemaking was introduced to America on a commercial basis.\u00a0 The Franks bought the vineyards and the winery that Mr. Kornell had built.\u00a0 As you drive up, you\u2019ll find a spacious picnic area under the trees.\u00a0 Evidently, Frank Family was grandfathered in; Napa County doesn\u2019t give permits for picnicking to newer wineries.<\/p>\n

The building hosting the tasting room has the feeling of an old home, with lots of wood and rooms leading from one to one another.\u00a0 Cleverly, Frank Family has set up bars in several of the rooms, so it never feels very crowded.\u00a0 You can also have a seated tasting, which we found worthwhile as you get to really savor their reserve wines.\u00a0 This being Napa Valley, the top wines are Cabernet Sauvignons, especially the Patriarch, which is 100% Cab and quite expensive as well.<\/p>\n

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One of the bars at Frank Family<\/em><\/p>\n

We found the servers to be quite knowledgeable about their wines and wine in general.\u00a0 This may be because they knew we were from Power Tasting<\/em>, so we hope that it is representative of the entire staff.\u00a0 If you do take a reserve tasting, you\u2019ll find it valuable to have several glasses so that you can compare different wines and, if you\u2019re lucky and they have them open, different vintages of the same wine.\u00a0 Our experience at Frank Family is that if you exhibit real interest in their wines, they go out of their way to provide you with an interesting experience with a lot of variety and interesting insights into their wines.<\/p>\n

Many visitors to Napa Valley drive up from San Francisco and go wine tasting only in the southern end of the valley.\u00a0 Now, we love the wines there too, but sometimes it pays to just keep driving north.\u00a0 Calistoga itself has its own charms, being a bit more of an old-fashioned feel than some of the other towns in Napa Valley. There are very nice cafes and restaurants where you can enjoy your lunch.\u00a0 \u00a0And it has mud baths (ugh!). \u00a0It\u2019s worth making the drive and if you do come up that way, make sure that Frank Family is on your itinerary.<\/p>\n

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There is a certain type of winery in Napa Valley (and elsewhere, too) that sets our teeth on edge.\u00a0 Someone is a great success at something other than wine making, buys a property in Wine Country and vows to make wine that\u2019s not only great in itself but reflects the values of his (always his) … Continue reading Frank Family Vineyards<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=698"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":700,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698\/revisions\/700"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=698"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=698"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=698"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}