Casa de Fruta is a tourist trap, but...
Written: Sep 14 '09 (Updated Sep 14 '09)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Outstanding plum wine, good fruit dessert wines.
Cons: Lackluster grape wines, tourist trap atmosphere.
The Bottom Line: If you're due for a stop while driving, Casa de Fruta is not a bad choice. The grape wines are mediocre but the fruit wines--especially the plum wine--are worth trying.
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| bkalafut's Full Review: Casa de Fruta Winery |
Casa de Fruta, located along the Pacheco Pass Highway between Gilroy, CA and the I-5, is an old-fashioned tourist trap, not unlike something from Wisconsin Dells, or a less interesting Wall Drug. Children's rides, overpriced junk, at least ten varieties of fudge, self-importance, and an unashamed quirkiness one could generously call "charm" sum it up--although if one wants to read more it is listed separately in the Epinions catalog as a "destination"--and aside from the dried Santa Rosa plums, which are difficult to find anywhere else, the fruit is much better--more local, cheaper, fresher--at the ramshackle farmstands closer to Gilroy.
The tourist trap that tries to have a bit of everything must have wine, at least in California, and Casa de Fruta contains a winery called "Casa de Wine". Tourist wineries are usually bad, making bland, sweet wines to please people who don't ordinarily drink wine. Casa de Fruta offers plenty of tourist wine, but also a few that are worth trying.
Of its grape wines, the gewürztraminer, the merlot, and the sparkling muscat are probably the best. The sparkling muscat is flavorful but less sweet than Mondoro and other grocery-store Asti spumante; aside from the merlot having more residual sugar than I'd like, the other two are unremarkable but of the quality we can expect these days of twelve-dollar wines.
The standouts here are the fruit wines. Casa de Fruta offers dessert wines made of local blackberries, raspberries, apricots and pomegranates. The blackberry and raspberry wines are less flabby than the usual but far too strongly flavored for my taste, although I could see drinking them like liqueur or drizzling them over ice cream. The apricot wine, on the other hand, is superb--rich yet not overwhelming, with enough acid to be worthy of more than a single sip despite its cloying sweetness, easily a stand-in for sweet muscat or late harvest riesling alongside cheesecake or pastries. The pomegranate wine is even better thanks to the fruit's intrinsic tartness. Not mouth-coating like fresh pomegranate juice, but lush just the same, it drinks rather like ruby port.
Pomegranate can also be made into a very versatile semidry table wine. Proshyan, from Armenia, is a dependable example. It's somewhat disappointing, then, to see Casa de Fruta only offering pomegranate desert wine, but sweet sells. Casa de Fruta does offer one semidry table fruit wine, and it is the best of their selection. Made of local Santa Rosa plums--the only really worthwhile item in the dried fruit section, as they've very different from conventional prunes--it's far superior to the candylike stuff (think Kinsen) one usually thinks of when one thinks "plum wine". Asian "plum wine" is made by steeping plums in grape wine or rice liquor; Casa de Fruta plum wine is a fruit wine made from plums. The result has the structure of an off-dry Riesling and very intense plum flavor, and would go very well with spicy food and East Asian cuisine.
Tasting at Casa de Fruta, done at a wine bar-like counter in a gift shop, is free and limited to four samples. I use the dump bucket more than others but couldn't convince the pourer to let me try more; this review is based on two visits. Most of the really obnoxious stuff at Casa de Fruta is in other buildings; the tasting area is reasonably uncrowded and relaxed. Even though the "fruit stand" itself is overpriced and the place is a tourist trap, it's worth the stop if you like fruit wines.
Recommended:
Yes
Winery Name: Casa de Fruta
Country: USA
State or Region: California
County or Appellation: Pacheco Pass
Date Visited: 2009
Tours Offered: No
Guidelines for rating scale: If you''re in the area anyway
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Epinions.com ID:
bkalafut
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 in Restaurants & Gourmet |
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Member: Bennett Kalafut
Location: Tucson, AZ, USA
Reviews written: 259
Trusted by: 43 members
About Me:
Stretching single molecules for fun and profit.
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