As I told you last week, I had the opportunity to walk through Wente Vineyards’ sustainability program with its fifth-generation winemaker, Karl Wente.

It’s an understatement to say Karl is pretty passionate about sustainability. From reusing the old tanks in the winery to make the floors of the winery restaurant to using the waste parts of fish (scales, fins, bones) as compost for the vineyards, Wente is on the cutting edge.

He’s also pretty passionate about the quality of Livermore Valley wines.

“Livermore is every bit as good as any region in the world,” Karl explained. Then he rattled off a list of the different kinds of grapes they grow on Wente’s 3,000+ acres.

Trust me, it’s a lot.

And then I had to admit to Karl a horrible secret: I don’t know much about Livermore wines.

There, I said it. Ignorant am I.

*weeping*

Karl laughed (with me, not at me, mind) and talked to me about the minerality, the range of fruit and showed me the many different flavors.

I have to say I was impressed.

And I’d bring two points back to  you, dear readers.

1. Wente makes great wines.
I’m just like you. I buy the wines I know I like. I may see a wine on the shelf but am not sure I want to try it. So try the Wente wines, I say, try them!

2. Get thee to a tasting room.
Want to try a new wine but don’t want to spend the cash yet? Pay a visit to a tasting room (most wineries in smaller wine areas, like Livermore or Amador, are free) and try out that wine that looked interesting but you were hesitant to splash the cash out on. (This is how I discovered the happy happy joy joy splurge of Renwood Grandpere. Happy happy yum yum.)