Day 4

Back to the old pattern, I didn’t want to wake up. But, Kari didn’t either, so we got started an hour later than we wanted to. The wonderful thing about this vacation is that even though we were behind our self imposed schedule, it won’t effect our day at all!

We started the day with breakfast at the International House of Pancakes. They had good food as always. I was surprised to see one, as I thought that they had all shut down. I guess that is only true of the restaurants in Minnesota.

Back to Napa, and this time we stopped at the Robert Mondavi Winery.

We had an excellent tour guide, or at least I thought so, Kari said that the guide she had last time was better. We got to see the new white oak fermenting tanks where they make their red wines. They also showed us their bottling line, which was actually running, this was the first thing that we have seen actually work at any of the winery’s. The tour ended with a tasting, just as they all do, but this one was the best. The guide gave us a great deal of information about the wines that we were tasting. This also happens to be the place that made a great wine that Kari and I drank, but could not find locally, Muscato d’oro. As it turns out, our guide informed us that they started making it on sort of a whim, and it just happened to catch on. It is, as he put it “expensive fermented grape juice”, but it is good! We didn’t buy any.

Next, it was off to the Culinary Institute of America. They don’t really have tours there, but they have some cooking demonstrations, and a gift shop that Kari wanted to shop at. We also came to have lunch at the Greystone restaurant. What a great lunch! We started with a sort of appetizer sampler that consisted of many different things. Then, it was on to our two course lunch. I started with a sauteed foie gras, (I don’t know how to spell it, but it is basically a goose liver pate), and Kari had a gnoochi dish with grilled vegetables. For the main course, I had what was basically a pork chop, with a mint/plum relish, and Kari had salmon with asparagus. My descriptions don’t do justice to just how good the food was! For desert, I ordered a chocolate crunch cake thing with a banana fosters sauce, and we both had a glass of Mondavi Muscato Blanc. Lunch was outstanding, and if you are ever in the Napa area, do stop in and have lunch or dinner!

After lunch, we headed next door to the Berringer winery.

We took the tour, which brought us into the caves that they carved out of the volcanic rock. They also had some antique wine making equipment on display. They had a new wine that Kari and I have never tasted, it’s a limited vineyard selection that is a blend of 80% White Zinfandel and 20% Chardonnay. It was very good, much to both of our surprise, so we bought some.

Tomorrow, we are off to Calistagoa, and to the spa for a massage and mud bath’s.

Here is the picture of the day!