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Why this matters more in Napa
A Napa day is three tastings and roughly six ounces of wine before two in the afternoon. Somewhere in there you need lunch, and leaving the valley floor to find it costs you an hour and a booking.
These wineries feed you on site. It is the single easiest way to make a Napa day survivable, and it is worth building the itinerary around rather than treating as a bonus.
02
The cheap one first
Brasswood sits just north of St. Helena in a renovated space and starts at five dollars, which is not a typo. Beaulieu Vineyard has been shaping the valley since 1900 and opens at twenty.
Ackerman Family Vineyards farms sixteen organic acres in Coombsville and starts at forty. Ashes and Diamonds is forty five, mid-century modern with a zig-zag roof, and the most photographed room on this list.
03
When lunch is the event
Antinori Napa Valley runs twelve hundred acres under a family whose winemaking goes back to 1385, from a hundred and twenty five dollars. Blankiet is a Yountville hillside estate from a hundred and seventy five.
Bravante works Howell Mountain Bordeaux from seventy five. Burgess has been a valley institution since 1972. Altamura pours Cabernet and Sangiovese from Wooden Valley and Frank often pours it himself.
04
The rest
Black Stallion sits on a former horseman's centre in Oak Knoll and took Wine Enthusiast's American Winery of the Year in 2023. Azur has a wine cave in Coombsville. Barrett and Barrett is Bo and Heidi Barrett, thirty years each making Napa wine separately before their first joint project.
Put the kitchen in the middle of the day and the other two tastings get better.
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