Category: Places to Visit

This article is another in Power Tasting’s series on great wine bars of the world.  The most recent additions to this list were Vinauberge in Languedoc and Petits Creux et Grand Crus in Québec City.

 We have written about the Bounty Hunter before, in the context of things to do in the town of Napa while you are on a wine tasting trip.  It deserves to be taken on its own merits, as a place to sample some pretty good wine in a, shall we say, distinctive setting. Located on the corner of 1st and Main Streets, the Bounty Hunter (http://www.bountyhunterwinebar.com/) attempts to bring the ambiance of Western movie set saloon to the modern-day tourist mecca that is Napa Valley.  And, to our point of view, it succeeds.

Photo courtesy of timeout.com.

In the old Western films, a bounty hunter was not a nice person, but rather reminiscent of Inspector Javert in Les Miserables.  Fear not; we can attest that the people at the Bounty Hunter are all very pleasant and helpful in selecting wines to drink.  And help is often needed, as you have a choice of 40 wines to order by the glass and 400 by the bottle.

You may already know about the Bounty Hunter even if you’ve never been there.  If you’re a wine lover (and why would you be reading Power Tasting if you’re not?) you’re probably on a buyers’ list so you may have received their catalog in the mail.  It’s notable in the way that they highlight individual producers, mostly but not exclusively from California, and it makes good reading even if you’re not buying.  The wines in the catalog, for the most part, are the same wines you can order at the saloon.

The layout of the Bounty Hunter places the bar at the rear (unless you enter from the parking lot, in which case it’s the front) and restaurant tables at the street entrance.  The restaurant specializes in what the proprietors aptly describe as “Smokin’ BBQ”.  Although some of their wines do go with barbecue – Zinfandel always works for us – they have many high quality, rather delicate wines to choose from.  We think their idea is for you to drink a rough, tough wine with dinner and then take a bottle of Burgundy home with you.

The interior of the Bounty Hunter.  Photo courtesy of oenomad.com.

We must note the décor, which is notable for old Wild West posters, the heads of dead animals and a florid nude over the bar.  All that’s missing is a piano player.  You can easily imagine Black Bart walking through the front door to have it out with the sheriff.

It would all be very kitsch, except for that wine list.  The by-the-glass offerings change frequently.  You can look up the choices on their web site, but why bother.  As of this writing, they offer quite a few wines we know well (e.g., Veuve Cliquot, Frog’s Leap, Renwood, Chappelet) and then many more with which we are unacquainted such as Poetic Justice, Jigar or Ken Wright.  A sign of a good wine bar is that if you are comfortable with the wines you do know, you can have the confidence to experiment with the ones you don’t.  The Bounty Hunter also offers eleven flights of wines to help guide your experiments (including one to go with barbecue).

We don’t go to Napa Town without stopping for a glass or a meal at the Bounty Hunter.  We recommend that you do the same.

 

 

 

 

On the eastern edge of the Minervois appellation in the southwest of France, there is a small village – a hamlet really – named Le Somail.  There are no vineyards immediately surrounding it, the nearest ones being only a few kilometers away.  When you are visiting wineries in the general area, leave yourself some time to visit this charming spot.

It has a certain Brigadoon quality, as though time had slowed down, if not stopped, in the 17^th century.  That’s because Somail exists solely because it was at a convenient point between Toulouse and the Mediterranean Sea on the Canal du Midi.  It provided a stopping-off point for the boatmen and a harbor for their ships.

And so there were inns built, a bridge over the canal, a chapel, a few cafés.  They are all there today, some of them updated for the 21^st century of course, with the enhancements done with a dash of French élan.  There are many boats, called péniches along the canal, and vacationers with rentals continue to steer their way (a bit shakily in some cases) under the ancient bridge.

The bridge is festooned with pots of flowers and offers a view of the hamlet and its boats.  One near to the bridge is quite a sight.  It’s a floating grocery store, good for a few provisions for the boaters and croissants for the locals in the morning.  It, too, hearkens back to another era.

The Epicerie Flottante, or the Floating Grocery Store

A good idea is to save your visit to Le Somail for lunchtime.  There is a row of outdoor cafés stretched along the southern bank of the canal, several of which have quite a reputation in the region.  Steve had one of the specialties, frog legs in a garlic cream sauce.  It was particularly delicious and would surely have been enough for two, except that Lucie doesn’t eat the little hopper sand could not even look at him eating them.

The southern bank also has all the requisite craft shops and galleries that seem to pop up wherever tourists gather.  They’re fine, but really no better than all the other sun dappled villages in the south of France.

On the other side of the bridge from the restaurants are several small hotel/guest houses and restaurants that offer fancier fare than the previously mentioned cafés.  The old chapel is worth a glance as well.  And there is a truly unique attraction: the Librairie Ancienne (the Old Bookstore) which claims to have 50,000 books, surely an undercount.  Of course, most of them are in French but there are plenty in all languages.  There are marvelous picture books to thumb, rare books to stare at under glass, comics, kids’ books, lithographs, engravings, antique maps and more.  If you are a bibliophile, you could get lost in there forever.

A partial view of the interior of the Librairie Ancienne

You can see all there is to see in Le Somail in an afternoon, lunch included, or you can stay for the night and really get the feel of the place.  It does come down to a choice, wine tasting or soaking up the atmosphere.  We chose the former, but not without a little twinge of regret as we pulled away.

This is another entry in Power Tasting’s catalog of great wine bars around the world, places to visit whenever you are in the area.  In previous issues, we have highlighted wine bars in Quebec City, London, Paris and other cities.  In this case, the destination is not in a city at all, but in a tiny village in the Languedoc.

If you are in the southwest of France, whether in a boat on the Canal du Midi or just wine tasting in the Languedoc, make a stop in the village of Poilhes.  No matter how that’s spelled, it’s pronounced POOH-ya.  The hamlet is surrounded on all sides by grape vines, as far as the eye  can see.  And in the middle of it is Vinauberge (http://www.vinauberge.com).

It is many things: a boutique hotel, a restaurant, a meeting hall and certainly not least a wine bar.  It is situated in a long-defunct wine cooperative, the location in a French grape growing region where viticulturists (that’s fancy Latin for grape farmers) take their crops to be pressed and made into wine.  An international group of investors bought the disused building and renovated and repurposed it.

For many American wine lovers, Languedoc’s wines are a bit of a mystery.  Maybe you’ve heard of Languedoc-Rousillion, Corbières, Minervois, St, Chinian, Faugères or Pic St. Loup.  Maybe not, and if you have you probably don’t know much about them.  If you tasted any of them years ago, you probably found them rough and highly acidic.  Today, there are many fine wines to be had in the Languedoc region, but trying them all requires time, travel and a resilient liver, plus some ability to speak French.  That’s where Vinauberge comes in.

Vinaubege on the banks for the Canal du Midi.

You may have seen those dispensers that for a dollar or two pours you a taste of a specific wine.  Your local wine shop may have one with half a dozen wines on offer.  Vinauberge has them too, with forty wines to sample.  Of course, facing forty unknown wines presents its own dilemma.  You certainly don’t want to try forty wines at a sitting.

Romuald (“Romu”) Barreau and his friendly colleagues are there to help you.  He first asked us what we wanted to taste and we replied we’d like to get to know the red wines.  Then he asked what our tastes in reds are. Steve prefers bold wines and Lucie goes for more elegant ones, so that called for more than one glass.  “Well, if you like this Faugères,” Romu said, “compare it with this St. Chinian.  Oh, and try this rosé”.  And, and, and.  Before we knew it, we had six glasses in front of us and we’d sipped who-knows-how-many different wines from around the Languedoc.

Romuald Barreau introducing us to Languedoc wines.

Aside from his generosity, Romu told us tales of the wine makers, their families, the history of the winery and other lore that only a local son of the vineyards would know.  We learned a great deal about Languedoc wines from Romu.  Of course, we bought several bottles when we left and we returned often.

One particular event is worth mentioning.  We happened to be in Poilhes the night of the annual harvest celebration, held at Vinauberge.  We shared dinner with more than a hundred vignerons and their families.  There’s something very special about being among the good, honest folk who work so hard so that we might open bottles of what they produce and get the enjoyment of a full-bodied glass of wine.

The vignerons and their families gather at Vinauberge for the harvest festival.

[Oh, by the way, it’s pronounced VIN-oh-berzh.]

Back in 1666, when Louis XIV was 28 years old and not yet the Sun King, he and his ministers decided to actualize a long-held dream: to connect Toulouse to the Mediterranean Sea via a canal running through the Midi, a familiar name for the Southwest of France.  The engineering work fell to Pierre-Paul Riquet, who is still celebrated in that region, and it was completed by 1681.  All of which is mildly interesting history, except for the fact that you can boat, live and walk or bike along the Canal du Midi today.  If you are visiting Languedoc for wine tasting, leave yourself some time to enjoy the canal as well.

For the most part, the canal wends its way through shady glades and lovely little villages.  Life does not go very fast along the Canal du Midi.  It is 240 km. long but only 10 meters wide, just enough for two rather narrow boats to pass by.  You couldn’t go fast if you wanted to, unless you wanted to smash your boat against one that is anchored on the side, drown in a lock or take your head off passing under a low stone bridge.  So you are forced to slow down your inner clock, take it easy and enjoy the scenery.

Sometimes the best part of that scenery is the willows and reeds along the banks.  On others, it’s the pretty small villages along the canal and also the glimpse of castles and cathedrals off in the distance.  And if you’re walking or biking along the banks rather than boating, there are pleasant pathways that give way to breathtaking vistas especially, so we have found, as sunset approaches.  Both the boaters and the walkers seem to enjoy a friendly wave as they pass one another.

Our personal experience has been to take a tour from just outside Toulouse to a turning point half way to Carcassonne.  It’s only 30 or so kilometers and can be driven in a half an hour, but it took us all day.  There are other, similar tours all up and down the canal.  Make sure you find one that goes further than just around the sections that are in urban areas.  Nothing against cities, but the joy of the canal is the French countryside as you glide by. We have also spent time in a house along the canal, which was wonderful.

Another idea is to make the Canal du Midi the vacation itself.  We haven’t done it ourselves, but we know that you can rent a boat (called a péniche) and pilot yourself along the canal.  There are dinky little boats available as well as large cruisers that sleep up to 10 people, although we mostly have seen parties of six or fewer.  From what we can see from the banks, the most popular rental agency is the unimaginatively named company, Le Boat (www.leboat.com).

There are numerous places along the canal where you can pull up and spend the night or a few days.  If you are next to a village, you can pick up groceries or have your meals in cafés or serious French restaurants that line the shores.  It’s the best fun you’ll ever have in the 17^th century.

Here’s a place to visit that you can’t visit anymore, and thank goodness for it.  But there is  some kind of nostalgia involved anyway.

In many US states and Canadian provinces, sales of alcoholic beverages are restricted to the government.  That’s all right because these stores are indistinguishable from the private wine and liquor stores in other states.  You walk down aisles with shelves stocked with wines, locally made and from around the world.  Just because it’s an SAQ store (Société des Alcools du Québec) or one run by the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board makes no difference.  Do you really care if the profits go to the government instead of a private owner?

But it wasn’t always this.  Just because Prohibition ended in the United States in 1933 and in 1920 in Canada (a wartime provision) didn’t mean that drinking alcoholic beverages was universally accepted.  In fact, in many places it was considered to be a sin.  Therefore, various jurisdictions reached the rather contradictory conclusion that if the state or province was opposed to sin it should nonetheless profit from the sinners.  But they needed to be well aware that they were sinning.  Hence, the state stores were born.

Photo courtesy of virginiaplaces.org

There were no aisles to wander.  There were no gaily decorated bottles to see.  There was no one to ask for a recommendation of what to serve with dinner that night.  What there was was a counter, some civil servants and racks of bottles behind the counter, “unauthorized entry prohibited”.  There was a price list of the products for sale in a plastic folder on the counter and you asked one of the civil servants to get you a bottle of whatever you intended to buy.  These individuals were there to serve you, but it definitely wasn’t service with a smile.

It became a rite of passage for a teenage boy to enter a state store with a driver’s license clenched in his fist and ask for…what?  Something.  Anything.  Just to prove that he could do it.  Drinking from that bottle was almost an afterthought and it was surely not going to be a fine wine from the vineyards of Bordeaux (he probably couldn’t pronounce it, much less spell it).  More likely he said, in a tremulous voice, “I’ll have a bottle of Gallo Hearty Burgundy, please”. Thus were the wages of sin paid.

Note that we refer to teenage boys.  Legally speaking, girls were allowed but that just wasn’t done in those times.  In fact, it was a brave grown woman who entered a state store.  Moms looked askance if Dads even took their little children into a state store with them.  Lucie’s Dad took her and she still remembers her Mom’s comments when they got home.

The whole point was that you were supposed to feel guilty.  Guilt was the cement that bound the drinker with society, and it was guilt that washed the sin away from the state or provincial coffers.  The underlying schizophrenia of such a system had to become unsupportable over time.  Eventually, the governments came to realize that they could make more money from sin if they made it seem attractive rather than reprehensible.  And so the stores became as they were and still are in their less restrictive neighboring states.

For those of us who enjoy tasting and drinking wine responsibly, it is hard to think back on these benighted times.  But it’s good to do so from time to time, if only to put our pleasant avocation in context of our times…and those gone by.

If you go wine tasting in Marsala (and you really should if you visit Sicily) less than two hours drive from Palermo, you will likely want to stop for lunch.  You can try to find a restaurant in the town of Marsala, but to be honest the town is rather dull.  The people in the wineries recommended a few places, but it seems they were only open for dinner.  But then the server at Cantine Pellegrino suggested we drive up the road a short way, “only 10 minutes away” to Mamma Caura’s.

Mamma Caura’s restaurant on the beach in Trapani

As is often the case when you get advice from the locals, they don’t have a true sense of distance on roads they know so well.  She then spoke the most dangerous words of advice: “You can’t miss it.”  As long as we hugged the coast and watched for signs for the ferry, we’d be fine.   And in fact, we were.

What she didn’t tell us is that the road itself was worth travelling.  It took us past the salt flats of the next town north, called Trapani, where they take salt from the sea.  (The most desirable salt in France is called fleur de sel and its Italian cousin is sale marino, which comes from Sicily’s western coast.)  Sea water is pumped out of the Mediterranean into shallow, squares  pools, or pans, set up on the shore where the water evaporates and leaves salt with mild flavor, moist texture, and tiny, irregular grain sizes.  The salt is harvested and piled up into small hills that remind us North Americans of snow after a blizzard.

Salt has been made here this way for many centuries, even before the Romans.   The pumps were driven by windmills (evidently a recurring theme in this issue of Power Tasting) and a few are still there, more for show than for practicality.  Motorized pumps do the work these days.

Which brings us back to Mamma Caura’s.  Yes, it was easy to find and it is on the beach near the ferry jetty that takes people to the nature preserve on San Pantaleo island.  The food is simple but enjoyable. Indeed, what’s not to like on a very hot day when you enjoy a fresh and crispy tuna salad with a bottle of white wine (Donnafugata Anthelia, from the winery where we had just visited).  And the view is wonderful!  In front of you are the salt pans, the mounds of salt, and a magnificent windmill.  A few boats round out the vista.

After lunch you can walk out to the windmill, learn more about the history and the process and buy some salt at the shop.  It comes in small or large packages and in a variety of colors.

One word of caution, though.  It can be very hot on the beach.  We were there in mid-September, not the middle of the summer and we broiled, even under Mamma Caura’s outdoor pavilion.  You should still go; just have a nice cold bottle of white wine with your lunch and enjoy.

This article is the latest in Power Tasting’s irregular series on interesting wine bars around the world.  Previous issues have taken readers to locations in Paris, London, Copenhagen and Lisbon.

There is a street in Québec City called rue Cartier that is only five blocks long, but is the commercial heart of a sector that is very much Québecois.  Not the Québec of monumental hotels and 18^th century architecture, but rather a reflection of the way the people of this French-speaking Canadian province live and think of themselves.  For example, there are five boulangeries, where you can buy the best baguettes in North America, and as many pastry shops that dazzle the eye as well as the palate.  There are trendy clothes shops, a French bookstore, two family-owned butchers, two pubs where you can watch all the hockey games and at least a dozen restaurants all spilling out into the street during the warm summer months.

And there is one wine bar, a “bar à vin”, called Petits Creux & Grands Crus (https://www.petitscreux.corsica), which translates roughly as “little snacks and great wines”.  While it is open year round, its indoor space is rather small.  PC&GC comes into its own after the last snows melt and before all the leaves fall, May through October.

Now, Québec City is a very French town as opposed to Montreal, which is more evenly split between francophones and English speakers.  In the not so distant past, no one knew about rue Cartier except the locals.  Québec City has always had plenty of tourists but they generally stayed in Vieux Québec, the Old Town, and were not seen in the residential and commercial areas.  Today, you will hear English, Chinese, Italian and Spanish as you walk along rue Cartier (which doesn’t please Lucie, who is from Québec).  The wait staff at PC&GC are adept at both French and English and we have heard conversations in other languages as well.

With Québec’s French heritage, you might expect this wine bar’s list to be heavy in Bordeaux, Burgundies and Rhônes and indeed there are plenty of those on its rather extensive list.  But Marie-Pierre Colonna, the owner, is Corsican-American.  So the spécialités de la maison are wines from Corsica, that island department of France floating in the Mediterranean.  Its wines reflect its geography, with the sun producing big, flavorful, fruity wines in both red and white.  The Corsican rosé served at PC&GC looks more like a light red than a slightly colored white, as found in Provence.

Many of the grapes in the Corsican wines are barely known this side of the Mediterranean.  There are reds like Neullucciu from the north of Corsica, Sciacarellu from the south and a white grape used there called Biancu Gentile. (Sometimes these grapes are spelled with an “o” instead of a “u” but M. Collona speaks in the Corsican dialect.)

The “little snacks” as advertised in the wine bar’s name aren’t really that small.  You can get boards with meats, cheeses, veggies or seafood but there is nothing much that you would call a nibble. They used to make their own potato chips that were served warm and very crusty but unfortunately they removed them from the menu.   There are also a few main courses, some of which echo the Corsican theme of the bar.

Despite the influx of tourists, rue Cartier is still a focal point for the people of the surrounding neighborhood.  One of the great pleasures of spending some time at Petits Creux & Grands Crus is watching the parade of the local people passing by.  Sure, in one way it’s the same mix of young and old, men and women you’ll see anywhere.  But these are the folks of Québec, with their distinctive history, beautiful language and joie de vivre.  So take a glass or two of wines that you’ve never heard of, much less tasted, and pretend for an hour or so that you’re a part of this wonderful Québecois culture.

 

 

For many years, Long Island was famous for certain agricultural products, specifically ducklings and potatoes.  Then, 45 years ago Alex and Louisa Hargrave thought that the soil and climate of the North Fork of eastern Long Island would provide the right terroir for wine grapes.  Today, there are 38 wineries in the North Fork AVA.  The fact that they exist is a testimonial to the Hargraves’ vision, but from the perspective of a wine tasting enthusiast, it is only recently worth the trip to try the wines.

We have been visiting the North Fork Wine Country for roughly 25 years and for most of that time, we would have had to say that wine tasting in this region amounted to a pleasant day in the country.  It was not an expedition for the purpose of serious wine tasting.  The wineries were ambitious and the wines showed promise but they were, in our opinion, mostly poorly made and overpriced.  Growers were and still are planting too many varietals, most of which are not supported by the terroir.  Based on some recent tastings, we are pleased to say that the quality has improved sufficiently that a visit to the North Fork can be rewarding in terms of the wines themselves, while still offering attractive surroundings and attractions other than wine alone.

  The tasting room at Bedell Cellars

While there are still too many varietals at almost every winery, a consensus seems to have been reached as to what the North Fork does well: Sauvignon Blanc in the whites and Cabernet Franc in the reds.  We guess that there is a market for Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, since they are still being produced, but they do not measure up to the quality we have sampled of the two varietals we mentioned.  It would seem that there has been more investment in wine making technology as well.

We certainly didn’t like everything we tasted, but we could say the same thing about Napa Valley, Bordeaux or Tuscany.  Not that Long Island’s wineries are at the level of those exalted regions, but it is fair to say that tastes differ and that the North Fork has established itself as an area with some well-made wines.  There are also charming villages that take advantage of Long Island’s agricultural and maritime traditions that can round out a visit, beyond wine tasting.

There are still some negatives that should be mentioned.  It is a long trip from Manhattan to the North Fork, at least two hours each way.  We have decided that in the future we will not go there for day trips but will stay over at a hotel or an inn.  That will give us the opportunity to try some of the restaurants that are open only in the evenings or for lunch only on weekends when this sector of Wine Country can be quite crowded.  Many wineries feature live music and picnicking in the summer, placing more emphasis on tourism than on the wines for their own sakes.

Is the North Fork AVA a destination for wine tasting adventurers?  We would say “yes”, especially if they have other reasons to be on the island, outside New York City.  (It takes an hour to leave the city.)  A degree of open-mindedness is still called for but a visit there can provide some rewarding new tastes.

 

Sonoma County has several rather distinct wine growing regions, each of which specializes in certain grapes that flourish in their respective terroirs.  There’s Russian River for Pinot Noir, Alexander Valley for Cabernet Sauvignon and Dry Creek for Zinfandel.  Every place grows Chardonnay.  For wine tasters, one of the problems with the broad spread of Sonoma County is that wherever you go to taste wine, you’re pretty far from a place to buy lunch.

Photo courtesy of The Press Democrat

In the Dry Creek sector, you really have only one choice: the Dry Creek General Store.  This emporium on Dry Creek Road comes complete with a lot of history.  It’s an attraction in itself, beyond the food.  It has been open since 1881, serving gold miners, bootleggers, travelers and locals for decades.  In its day, it has sold all sorts of provisions, as evidenced by an ancient photo on the store’s web site (http://www.drycreekgeneralstore1881.com) proudly stating that hardware and dry goods are for sale.

Today’s Dry Creek General Store is a combination delicatessen and gift shop.  The deli side of the store makes sandwiches from a wide variety of meats and cheeses  on artisanal breads, together with salads.  The other sells  cutesy things that nobody needs but that are pretty little gifts.  But it wasn’t always this way.  In recent memory, the meats were ham and roast beef, the breads commercial white and whole wheat.  The rest of the store wasn’t a gift shop.  They sold nails and pots and towels and, and, and – the stuff of a true rural general store.  Yuppie sandwiches and merchandise make the store more accessible to many travelers, at the expense of authenticity.

And then there’s the bar adjacent to the store.  As of this writing, it’s closed, because some patrons thought it was okay to take their drinks away with them, a violation of local licensing laws.  The owners are fighting to get their permit back and so the bar will surely be open soon.  Then you will be able to see a crazy collection of general store memorabilia hanging from the ceiling and you can down your beer while sitting on a horse saddle.  And you’ll be able to share that beer with a few locals who look like they stepped out of a time warp or from central casting.

Photo courtesy of Dry Creek General Store

If you’re lucky, you’ll arrive on a day when there’s a barbeque going in front of the store.  Depending on the day, you’ll be able to buy brisket or sausages or even crabs.  While there’s no documented evidence of such cookouts in the old days, it feels like a throwback to a communal past that may never have existed, but ought to have.

And that’s the reason to make sure you visit the Dry Creek General Store in your wine tasting travels.  It’s a real part of the past, now adapted to the needs of the present day.  The people of the area don’t need a general store when there’s a Walmart just down the highway.  In our times, there’s money to be made in wine tourism, so the store serves this generation of customers.  Come and feel a part of the past as you munch on a sandwich out on the porch.

The Oxbow Public Market’s (http://oxbowpublicmarket.com/) name comes from the shape of the Napa River.  The course of a river may encounter an obstruction, causing the river to bend in a U-shape around it.  This creates a widening of the river, effectively a lake.  This is called an oxbow, because it resembles the U-shaped yolk placed around the necks of oxen.  Such an oxbow occurs in the Napa River, at the town of Napa and this is where they have erected the Oxbow Public Market.

It is various things for different people: a place to buy food and wine, a tourist attraction and a site for casual and slightly more formal dining.  It is a truth universally acknowledged that a person who loves good wine loves good food as well, so the Oxbow Public market has become quite a magnet for those who take a little time away from wineries to venture into town.  As the weekends can be awfully crowded on Route 29 and the Silverado Trail, Napa Valley visitors might find it a good idea to visit Napa instead, making the market quite an attractive stop.

For one thing, the views over the oxbow are quite beautiful.  As you cross the First Street bridge approaching the market, you see the broadening of the river, and the buildings alongside it.  It is a  particularly attractive view at sunset.

The Napa River oxbow.  Photo courtesy of the Iron Pig.

 The interior of the market is a mix of kiosks and booths hosting purveyors of fruits, vegetables, sausages, wines, books, ground coffee, bread and spices.  Local people actually do shop there, but a great number of the people you’ll find in the Oxbow Public Market are tourists.  Of course, the same can be said of New York’s Chelsea Market, Seattle’s Pike Street Market or Victor Hugo Market in Toulouse, France, Barcelona’s La Boqueria, or other urban markets around the world.   For the visitors, ice cream, hamburgers, chocolates, cupcakes and pizza are available.

The interior of the Oxbow Public Market. Photo courtesy of Madison Marquette.

Then again, if you’re a real foodie (and most wine lovers are, so we’ve observed) you like looking at the food available in any city you’re visiting, even if you don’t have a kitchen nearby to cook it in.  It is certainly something we do in our travels.  If nothing else, seeing all the culinary bounty fires up the appetite.  When that occurs, there are restaurants in the market as well.

Of course, there are many restaurants in Napa outside the market, some of them quite good.  The point is, you don’t have to eat at the market but you can.  Much like going wine tasting, it’s as much about the experience as the food itself.  And in this case, the Oxbow Public Market is symbolic of the revival of Napa, which had been left behind as Yountville and St. Helena, up the highway a bit, became meccas for food lovers on a wine tasting vacation.  Those are indeed great destinations, but the town of Napa should be included in your Napa Valley wine trips.  And the Oxbow Public market is fine place to see when you’re in town.