Day three, Sideways Vacation & Wine Reviews

Fun factoid:
According to our waitress, the record at Andersen's Pea Soup in Buellton, California is 17 bowls of soup consumed by one person in one meal. I had two bowls and felt like a stuffed pig. How can anybody consume 17 bowls? That is about two gallons of soup.

Wine
We had another great day of wineing and dining. We went to Sanford [Link], Melville [Link], Buttonwood [Link] and Rideau [Link]. The last two were from a sudden lack of imagination (we found coupons for free tasting.) They were very commercial. But, both seemed to have good value wines. Rideau has a premium line, but that was not included in the tasting. We liked a few of their wines and bought their 2003 Solvang Tempranillo. Their facilities are nicer, much nicer than Buttonwood. The Buttonwood wines were good for the price, but their tasting room was loud and blared music that made it more suitable for the college crowd.

Our friend Tyler recommended Melville, and that was a real treat. The pourer there was great. I liked their Chardonnays, which have lower malolactic fermentation (MLF) and are crisp and more like the European style of white burgundy. These were very yummy. Their Santa Rita Hills Pinot was quite good, but we already have a lot of Sanford Pinot. They make a Syrah that is very different, inky and spicy. Susie and I liked it but not as much as Tyler, whom we picked up a bottle for. We got the Chardonnay.

Susie and I are members of Sanford and had a very enjoyable drinking experience there. We have quite an inventory of their wines already, but Susie really like their Sauvignon Blanc, and so we bought that. Their Chardonnays were good, their 2003 Chardonnay: Santa Barbara County is great with partial MLF and similar to the Melville and the 2003 Chardonnay: La Rinconada Vineyard is a buttery 100% MLF powerhouse. We have some of each already, so we bought neither. To me Pinot is king at Sanford and we tasted the 2002 Pinot Noir, Santa Rita Hills, the 2002 Pinot Noir, La Rinconada Vineyard, Santa Rita Hills and the 2002 Pinot Noir, Sanford & Benedict, Santa Rita Hills. The latter two were knock your socks off good and we bought the Sanford & Benedict as we did not have that.

We really took our sweet time at Sanford and Melville. These were real treats! Thank you Tyler for the suggestion.

Food
Elaine Whitebook [Pic Link] recommended the Solvang Restaurant [Link] to us and it was a winner! Thanks to Elaine we had Aebleskivers for breakfast. They were really yummy. I had not had them for years and I got to introduce Susie to them. That was too much fun! Then we went walking around the Danish-like town of Solvang before we went wine tasting. We later had lunch in Lompoc and saw the bowling alley that was in Sideways. Ohhh-Ahhhh...

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