Day 3 San Francisco July 2010

Day 3 Napa Valley

Day 3:

It was a good 2 hours drive to the Napa Valley.

We started our day with wine tasting at the Artesa Winery. A very modern and beautiful winery with nice mountain top view of the Napa Valley. How romantic!

We ate brunch at Ad Hoc Restaurant owned by the same owner as the famouns The French Laundry. The brunch menu was simple: chef's special. We like that when we don't need to spend hours deciding what we want to try and eat :) It was really good :) Highly suggested!

We bought macarons and bouchon at Bouchon bakery. Yum yum! And as we open the door to leave Bouchon, we saw Thomas Keller walking in the bakery! I guess he also owns this bakery :)
So next time you guys are in the area, make sure you try at least one of his restaurants: http://www.tkrg.org/index.php

We then visited few wineries: Chandoney, Opus One, St-Supery, V. Sattui Winery, Merryvale, Castello di Amorosa... there are actually soooooo many of them. It's relaxing, it's romantic, and you get to try all these wine. We were never wine expert and will probably never be. But, tasting wine one after another, we really got to try different tastes and we started to notice the different textures and aromas... we'll learn and we'll get there one day! I think next time we come, we'll stay a few days here :)

We liked the V. Sattui for the price, cuz the wine tasting menu starts at $5 to try 5 wines, that's a $1 each!!! But we loved the Castello di Amorosa for the medieval ambiance. You all know me and my love for medieval things :) One thing I regretted was not to buy their pasta! It was a bit expensive, but they make the prettiest pasta I've ever seen! Hope we'll get to see some in Florence in August!

We also visited the CIA - Culinary Institute of America :) where chefs are trained and cooking classes are offered to public.

We bought few stuffs at Dean & Deluca. Cute little shop with all the fancy food produce.

Finally, we had supper at Zuzu, a Spanish fusion Tapas restaurant. Portions are small, but perfect for Napa Valley with all the cheese and wine tasting :)