Santa Barbara County’s Wine Reputation Finally Starts Taking Root

As the vinous spotlight in California shines on Napa and Sonoma, Santa Barbara County stands quietly to one side, waiting for recognition.

Without much fanfare, the image of Santa Barbara is creeping forward. In particular, the area is staking a claim as a region quite hospitable to two Burgundian grape varieties, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. But this image hasn’t advanced so far or fast as to keep out the wine pioneers. Santa Barbara still holds hope for aspiring wine makers on a budget.

For one thing, vineyard land is far less expensive than in the northern reaches of the state (where a planted acre of vines commands $25,000). Also, the land is workable; little of it is rugged forestland. Mostly, you get gently rolling hills.

Moreover, it’s tested: More than three dozen wineries exist in the county, and famed wineries in Napa (with reputations as exalted as Chateau Chevalier, Chateau Montelena and ZD) long ago discovered that the area had a lot to offer. So much so that they bought grapes from Santa Barbara County for their award-winning Chardonnays.

Napa Valley Buyers

When Napa Valley-based Beringer Vineyards recently bought 3,000 acres of vineyard land here, it verified the fact that even the big boys know good value when they see it.

Still, no matter where in the world of wine a young entrepreneur sinks roots, the wine business is a costly enterprise, both in terms of money and in the time and emotion spent on getting it up and running. Yet, Bill Wathan and Dick Dore feel they couldn’t have gotten into the wine business in any other region.

Wathan and Dore believe they can cope with the expense, money and emotion because they have found the only spot left that’s not only affordable but affords them a climate and soil that will allow for the production of truly classical wine from the Burgundian grape varieties.

The name of this tiny venture is Foxen and it is a prototype start-up winery, reminiscent of many that got going in Santa Barbara wine country, a two-hour drive north of Los Angeles in which wine has become a way of life.

On a per-capita basis, Santa Barbara County may be the most wine-savvy county in California.

For one thing, the city of Santa Barbara, with a population of 79,000, boasts a half-dozen superior wine shops, far more than are found in any other city of that size in California. And a huge percentage of the county’s restaurants feature local wines, by the glass and by the bottle.

Also, winery owners speak of a county government that understands its needs and doesn’t throw up unnecessary roadblocks to vineyard and winery plans.

Moreover, unlike the vintner-grower squabbles that exist in many other areas of the wine world, folks here seem to work together. (A couple of years ago at the Central Coast wine competition in Santa Maria, the award for wine man of the year was presented to Santa Maria grower Dale Hampton. When it was announced, the first ones on their feet in standing ovation were winery owners.)

The county’s modern viticultural history started about 20 years ago, with huge blocks of vineyard land owned by insurance companies and other conglomerates who sold their grapes to established wineries. One vineyard that rolled over 2,000 acres, Tepusquet, became the source for some of the state’s top Chardonnays and Rieslings.

Gains Recognition

Hampton began to gain recognition for a number of his properties about eight years ago. One of them in particular, the Sierra Madre Vineyard, began to grab headlines for its wine quality, notably Pinot Noir. In 1984, a ton of Sierra Madre Pinot Noir cost $450. Today, a ton is $1,000. Another vineyard with a growing reputation for quality is Bien Nacido.

Wineries existed here before 1974, the year Brooks and Kate Firestone founded their winery on a knoll above Zaca Station Road. However, it was significant that Brooks was heir to the Firestone tire fortune and probably could have bought into the Napa Valley. Choosing Santa Barbara County meant a lot to the region’s image.

Almost immediately, Firestone (with Andre Tchelistcheff, the state’s greatest wine maker, as consultant) began to release a series of wines showing promise. There was an erratic nature to the line, however, partly because weather conditions change subtlely here and new wineries often need a few vintages to sort through the variations in the grapes.

One wine maker who saw through the problems was Ken Brown, who kicked off a dramatic career as wine maker with Zaca Mesa, located at the base of a hill far back from Firestone off Foxen Canyon Road. Founded in 1978, the winery began to produce a string of top-flight wines including some stylish and deeply flavored Chardonnays and Pinot Noirs. It was further verification that Santa Barbara had the stuff to do it.

Excellent Wines

After a few years of inconsistency, now under wine maker Gale Sysock, Zaca Mesa has come back with a number of excellent wines, notably Pinot Noir.

Earlier, indications that Pinot Noir was potentially a star here came from Sanford and Benedict, a tiny winery west of here. A 1977 Pinot Noir from partners Mike Benedict and Richard Sanford, though not a perfect wine, showed traces of Burgundian qualities, and it found favor among many who felt Santa Barbara could be the place they’d been looking for to produce the great Burgundian wines.

That same year, Firestone too produced a great Pinot Noir, adding to the luster of the region. But years passed before greater evidence pointed to the county as a true haven for these wines.

It was verified when Zaca Mesa and Sanford, then off on his own venture, began making Pinot Noir of grand quality. And periodically, others would make a fine Pinot Noir. Vega, Los Vineros, Au Bon Climat and Austin have done well with the variety.

In Chardonnay, Jim Clendenin and Adam Tolmach turned Au Bon Climat into a cult winery with deeply complex wines, and Brian Babcock likewise found a style that fit the region: rich and complex, but with high acidity.

The sleeper of the bunch is Santa Barbara Winery, which was founded in downtown Santa Barbara in 1962 and which once took pride in making fruit and berry wines. Located two blocks from the Pacific Ocean, this may be the closest winery to a sea in the Western Hemisphere.

The place was able to shed its image of making blackberry wine when Bruce McGuire joined up as wine maker for the 1982 harvest. His wines are essentially produced off 70 acres of vines planted to the north, between Buellton (the town Pea Soup Anderson made famous) and Lompoc (the town W.C. Fields made infamous), west of Highway 101.

In the last year, McGuire’s wines have won so many medals the winery should consider buying a safe. His first Pinot Noir (1986, $11) won a slew of medals; his 1988 Beaujour Zinfandel ($7) is a light red wine made like a Cru Beaujolais, and as good a warm-weather red as you can find; his 1988 White Zinfandel ($6) is perhaps the best I have ever tasted, and his 1988 Chenin Blanc ($7) is barrel-fermented and a dead ringer for Chardonnay.

Ken Brown left Zaca Mesa in 1984 to found his own property, Byron, and now that winery’s image has shot up with the release of 1985 and 1986 Pinot Noirs that have excited tasters around the world.

And Sanford, with his wine maker Bruno D’Alfonso working from a new winery, has developed a wide following for his stylish, rich Chardonnays and Pinot Noirs that seem to improve every year.

A winery that has gained little fame because of its marketing approach is Gainey. Wine maker Rick Longoria (formerly of J. Carey) has turned out some lovely Chardonnays, Cabernet Sauvignons and late-harvest Reislings. Most of the wines are sold out of an attractive Spanish-style winery building, or by mail (P.O. Box 910, Santa Ynez, Calif. 93460).

The Foxen story is one of pure dedication. At this point, little of the wine is available, though the wine shops of Santa Barbara and a few in Los Angeles are beginning to carry the Foxen wines.

Wathan was a fruit science major at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo who taught viticulture as a graduate student. Dore was a banker who finally decided it was more fun to make wine.

The problem was cash. Neither had a great deal of money to buy a winery or vineyards, and they had heard that you needed $500,000 to start a small winery.

“But we also knew we could do a lot of the work ourselves,” said Dore, a tall, energetic fellow who is tanned from the outdoor work he must do.

Starting with a home wine-making project, they began building toward their dream of a commercial winery. They have dug holes for fencing posts and stretched chain link to keep the deer away from the grapes. They have planted vines and tended them. They have built an irrigation system 800 feet up from the valley floor.

Start From Scratch

They have built a winery out of a falling-down shed. They have insulated and hauled barrels. They have weeded and moved rocks and paved and trimmed trees, cut swaths in the earth for their vehicles, and they have picked grapes and crushed them and have fermented them.

And now they are selling a 1987 Pinot Noir (70 cases) and 1988 Chardonnay (420 cases) that are stylish and complex little wines, evidence that these guys are on the right track. The Chardonnay ($18) is a deeply complex wine that will appeal to those who like a more full-bodied style. I like it, and I can see where the house style is headed.

The Chardonnay is sure to find a lot of fans.

The Foxen winery itself is small, but it is located on the 2,000-acre ranch of the Wickenden family, of which Dore is a member. He is the great-great-grandson of founder Benjamin Foxen, a sea captain who in 1838 won a Mexican land grant to this place.

Foxen, incidentally, is a name lost in history, but a historic marker down the road from the winery notes that Foxen (nicknamed the Pioneer) was the man who, in 1846, warned Lt. Col. John C. Fremont (the Pathfinder) of an impending Mexican ambush down the road at Gaviota Pass.

Foxen safely led Fremont and his men over San Marcos Pass, avoiding the ambush, and they captured Santa Barbara without bloodshed. Three weeks later, on Jan. 13, 1847, California was ceded to the United States.

There was no wine to speak of in the Foxen family. A bit of wine was made from the old Mission grape for the family’s use, but Wathan and Dore named their winery after the man, not any wine heritage.

To date, Wathan and Dore each have spent $50,000 out of pocket to acquire the expensive French oak barrels in which the wine is aged, and to pay for building materials, chemicals to do lab analysis, and mundane things like hoses and fermenting tanks.

They have 10 acres of vines growing on a hill south of the Santa Maria Valley.

To raise funds before the wine is released, they sell barrels to the public for their cost (about $400). After two years, the investor in the barrel gets his initial investment back plus a case of the wine that was aged in the barrel. Investors are also invited to a barrel-signing dinner party and a dinner when the wine is released.

This is the Santa Barbara experience. It’s still possible to work toward a dream in Santa Barbara.