Apr 13, 2008

Peachy Canyon (the Winery, not the road)

Peachy Canyon Winery isn't quite old enough to be a pioneer in the Paso Robles industry but the Beckett family has definitely been around long enough to be more towards the old school producers of the area. The Becketts got their start in 1988 selling Zinfandel made from fruit purchased from the Benito Dusi vineyard, which is among the oldest vineyards on the central coast. Since then Peachy Canyon has maintained their focus on Zinfandel but today when you go to Peachy Canyon to taste there are 15 or 20 wines to choose from that range from Viognier to Syrah to 6 or 7 different Zin options.

The tasting room itself is a reasonably cute building but it didn't blow me away with history or personality. It's also not the building that's on their powder-blue label...word on the street is that the property on Peachy Canyon Road that is now home to Minassian-Young Vineyard is actually the house that's still pictured on the Peachy Canyon Winery label. (As an aside I can't believe they ever sold the Peachy Canyon Road property...it is incredibly beautiful and peaceful out there.)

The woman that poured for me at the Peachy Canyon tasting room was very nice but I didn't leave the tasting room feeling like I had a sense of the Peachy Canyon approach to winemaking. I also found the epic tasting menu overwhelming but I'm always partial to smaller, more focused tasting menus so feel free to ignore that comment...it's easy to taste a big variation in wines at one location--it's just not really my favorite approach in a tasting room. This is also a great tasting room to do some tchotchke shopping. If you're in the market for any Zinfandel-related-pun this is the place. "Forgive me for I have zinned"...that kind of thing. Overall, I think Peachy Canyon Winery is worthwhile if you want to taste zins. This might be a good spot to start a day of tasting because it's just a couple miles down 46 West from 101 so all the other 46 West tasting rooms are accesible. If you're in Paso for a relaxing and casual wine-tasting weekend Peachy Canyon is a great stop. This probably isn't where the die-hard wine-geeks hang out but I enjoyed myself overall.

**All pictures came from the Peachy Canyon Website (www.peachycanyon.com) except for the label, which came from the Peachy Canyon profile page on the Paso Robles Wine Country Alliance website (www.pasowine.com)**

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