{"id":1911,"date":"2021-08-30T15:39:15","date_gmt":"2021-08-30T15:39:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=1911"},"modified":"2021-08-30T15:39:15","modified_gmt":"2021-08-30T15:39:15","slug":"foppiano-vineyards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=1911","title":{"rendered":"Foppiano Vineyards"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you\u2019d like to have a glimpse of what Sonoma County used to be while still tasting wines that might appeal to more modern tastes, Foppiano vineyards is a winery to add to your list.\u00a0 One reason it\u2019s like what Sonoma County once was is that Foppiano was there back then.\u00a0 It was founded in 1896 by Giovanni Foppiano, an Italian immigrant from Genoa.\u00a0 To the present day, there are many Sonoma Country wineries with Italian names; in this case, the Foppiano family still owns and runs it.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Foppiano\u2019s winery.\u00a0 Photo courtesy of Sonoma County Tourism.<\/em><\/p>\n

The winery is a little bit out of the way although it\u2019s easy enough to find if you start in downtown Healdsburg.\u00a0 Just head down the Old Redwood Highway and there it is.\u00a0 (It\u2019s tougher to find coming off Route 101.)\u00a0 It\u2019s hard to miss, with \u201cL. Foppiano Wine Co.\u201d written in big letters on the side of their production building.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The Foppiano orange tree, in full (sour) fruit.<\/em><\/p>\n

Foppiano is located in the northeast corner of the Russian River Valley, although it doesn\u2019t feel that typical of the region.\u00a0 The general image of Russian River is of winding lanes through the forest and alongside vineyards.\u00a0 Old Redwood Highway and the roads that feed into it are straight as an arrow and the landscape is open and flat.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Foppiano\u2019s tasting room.\u00a0 Photo courtesy of TripAdvisor.com.<\/em><\/p>\n

Foppiano\u2019s tasting room is housed in a little white clapboard house with a huge orange tree outside.\u00a0 (They\u2019re happy to let you take any oranges that fall, because they\u2019re terribly sour.)\u00a0 The building backs up to their factory, so the overall impression is \u201crustic industrial\u201d.\u00a0 The impression is softened by the vineyards that surround the buildings.\u00a0 The tasting room is a bit dark with a simple bar, lit by big windows that overlook the vineyards.<\/p>\n

As is often the case with smaller Sonoma County wineries, Foppiano produces an extremely wide range of wines.\u00a0 There are Sauvignon Blancs, Chardonnays, Pinot Noirs, Cabernets Sauvignons, a Cabernet Sauvignon, a Zin, a Ros\u00e9, some sparklers and even a Carignane.\u00a0 With that many varietals, it is unlikely that all of them will appeal to all tastes.<\/p>\n

However, there is one varietal for which Foppiano is best known: Petite Sirah.\u00a0 A hybrid of Syrah and Peloursin, this grape was developed in France but is now largely grown only in California.\u00a0 Many use it as a blending grape to provide color and depth; Foppiano began bottling it as a varietal in 1967.\u00a0 Their Petite Sirahs are dark, unctuous and deeply flavorful.\u00a0 Prepare for blue teeth if you try some.\u00a0 In our opinion, even though their wines are drinkable on release, they really need several years cellaring to knock of some of the rougher edges.<\/p>\n

With 125 years of history, Foppiano has certainly seen a lot of changes, both in their vineyards and in the life of Sonoma County.\u00a0 For most of those years, they produced jug wines and in tribute to those days, they still sell half-gallon growlers of Petite Sirah.\u00a0 We see Foppiano as a bit of a throwback to a slower, less frenzied time when the roads of the county were filled with tractors, not tourists.\u00a0 As the song says, these are the good old days, but it\u2019s pleasant to visit the good older days, too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you\u2019d like to have a glimpse of what Sonoma County used to be while still tasting wines that might appeal to more modern tastes, Foppiano vineyards is a winery to add to your list.\u00a0 One reason it\u2019s like what Sonoma County once was is that Foppiano was there back then.\u00a0 It was founded in … Continue reading Foppiano 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":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1911"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1911"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1911\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1915,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1911\/revisions\/1915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1911"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1911"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1911"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}