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It has been more than four and a half years since I conducted the first interview for the Eat, Drink, Savor series, a sit-down with Calera winemaker Mike Waller overlooking the Cienega Valley, with half a dozen open bottles of wine he had shepherded into being. He leaned across the picnic table and sternly said, “Do you like wine? The last person they sent didn’t like wine. She liked beer.”
I must have passed the audition because, after sampling those wines, Waller went back to the tasting room and brought out a bottle of the first wine that he oversaw at Calera, a 2007 Mt. Harlan Selleck Vineyard Pinot Noir, which influential wine critic Robert Parker gave an impressive 98 points.
The series began with a simple idea from BenitoLink executive director Leslie David: asking me to look into the Cienega Valley wineries, and in particular, the claim that the Eden Rift and DeRose vineyards are the oldest in California.
I dug into what little historical record there was on the vineyard founder, Théophile Vaché, and managed to turn up a few things by going through the archives at the Monterey County Historical Society. The most significant was Vaché’s signature in the County Assessor’s book, placing his wine depot in San Juan Bautista in 1851.
Case closed, and the first article, “The spectacular 170-year-old lineage of Cienega Valley Wine,” was published on April 18, 2021. It incorporated information from the second and third interviews I conducted with Christian Pillsbury of Eden Rift Winery and Al DeRose of De Rose Winery, both curators of the properties that comprise the original Vaché vineyard and their histories.
With that first article, “Eat, Drink, Savor” became a weekly series and now accounts for a quarter of my production for BenitoLink. I’ve written 222 so far, with Jenny Mendolla Arbizu filling in for me once with an article on Pasture Chick Ranch.
Though I grew up and lived in Concord, with wineries in Martinez, Napa, Sonoma, and the Carneros Valley a short drive away, the time spent with San Benito County winemakers was an incredible educational experience.
Among the more interesting to me was a two-part interview with Waller, detailing Calera’s six Pinot Noir vineyards on Mt. Harlan, a pre-blending barrel tasting of Eden Rift pinots with his brother, winemaker Corey Waller, a chat with Pillsbury on how climate impacts Eden Rift, and having DeRose detail how different barrels can impact the character of certain grapes.
There was also an extraordinary morning tasting, side-by-side, with winemaker Alessio Carli, as he blended a dozen permutations of mourvèdre for the Biltmore Estate in North Carolina out of his lab in Hollister. It was fascinating to see how the slightest changes in blending decisions could have a huge impact on a wine’s profile.
There are only so many wineries, so we quickly had to come up with a broader strategy: to include the best of San Benito County’s cuisine, no matter what it was, from the offerings of the most upscale restaurants in town to the more humble brunch locations and the chefs and bakers working out of home kitchens.
The first non-wine/beer article was about La Michoacana Paleteria y Neveria, which was quite an adventure. With the other articles, I was used to sampling just a few wines, four or five at most. It is about the limit for what I can taste and still discern the individual qualities without begging the winemaker for clues.
(I once asked Mike Waller for such a hint. “I only have eight words to describe wine,” he said, “and this does not fit any of them.”)
My interview with owner Ana Ramos-Aguilera began with my asking about flavors I wasn’t familiar with. She chose five, including guanabana, mamey, and zapote, which we tried. Then we went on to her five favorites, including corn, tequila, and cotija. Then she offered the five most popular, including the milk-strawberry and fresh-squeezed limes.
After a sharp note from one of the editors, Paul Hersh, telling me to curb the number of entries—he’s lucky we didn’t go through all 40 flavors the shop carries—I learned to be a bit more discerning and to draw a line.
Over the years, a certain routine has emerged for selecting the places I write about. First and foremost, they have to be based in or connected to San Benito County in some way, either by having a physical presence here or sourcing from the county.
This has been a sticking point at times. There are quite a few vendors at the Hollister Farmers Market that I would love to profile, but being based outside the county, in Watsonville, for example, eliminates them.
I had crossed Ivan’s Baked Potatoes off the list for years for that very reason, until I found out that the owner and founder, Laura Cosio, actually works at the Hollister Lucky’s. Connection made and that resulted in one of my favorite stories from last year.
It allows me to include wineries outside the county, many of which have been suggested by Mike Kohne at Crave Wine Co., like Birichino, Ser and Kobza Wineries, which are a virtual encyclopedia of the best old-vine wines from San Benito County vineyards like Siletto, Wirz and Enz.
Birichino co-owner John Locke is so enthralled by the local grapes that he told me, “If somebody approached us saying, ‘We’ve got this 103-year-old…,” we say, ‘Whatever it is doesn’t matter. We’ll take it.’”
It is a source of pride for me that we have been able to highlight the incredible importance of San Benito grapes to people who might not yet know of their widespread reputation for the highest quality.
Another point of focus is any restaurant or beverage maker using local, fresh ingredients or products, such as San Juan Oaks using Swank Farms, Farmhouse Cafe using Phil Foster Farms, and Johnny’s Bar using buns from Heavenly Bakery.
Reader recommendations tend to go to the top of the list, as well as any newly opened restaurants. And, not surprisingly, given the close connections among all the owners and managers, a good number of articles have come from someone I just interviewed, asking, “Have you tried this place?”
These are not food and beverage reviews in the classic sense. I always focus on the story behind the places: what experience the creatives have, what motivates them to offer what they do, and how they connect with the community.
I am not there to sternly judge what they produce; we go over the wine list or the menu item by item, looking for the best of the best—and the best stories about what they offer. It is not to say I am uncritical; if there is something I don’t like, I mark it down to my personal taste, and it gets no mention. Like anything made with broccoli—count me out.
There are a couple of common threads in every interview. The passion of all for what they create is palpable, as is the love they have for what they are doing. Invariably, when asked what they like about the work, every single one says it is being able to create something that satisfies their customers and makes them smile.
The second thread is how challenging it can be to maintain the profitability of these businesses in the face of the rising costs of labor, post-COVID-19 supply shortages, the challenges of tariffs, prices being inflated across the board, and shrinking customer bases.
As Grillin & Chillin owner Chuck Frowein said about adapting to shrinking cost margins on a hamburger: “If you use lesser quality meat, the customer will notice. If you make the patty smaller, the customer will notice. If you raise the price, the customer will notice. You can’t control the other costs. So what do you do?”
It was the hope of this series, born just four months after the COVID-19 restrictions on bars, restaurants and wineries were lifted, that it would perhaps raise the visibility of these local treasures and entice people into trying a few places they may never have heard of before. Though we can take no credit, it is encouraging that most of the places we have featured are still open.
Thanks to Hollister Super and Windmill Market, which have underwritten this series for almost four years, we will continue to showcase the food and drink that make this county such a great foodie destination. And we hope our readers will support all these remarkable businesses in the years to come.
Recommendations for future Eat, Drink, Savor articles can be emailed to roberteliason@benitolink.com.
BenitoLink thanks our underwriters, Hollister Super and Windmill Market, for helping expand the Eat, Drink, Savor series and for giving our readers the stories that interest them. Hollister Super (two stores in Hollister) and Windmill Market (in San Juan Bautista) support reporting on the inspired and creative people behind the many delicious food and drink products made in San Benito County. All editorial decisions are made by BenitoLink.
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