Linne Calodo — Attraction in Templeton

I have never visited the actually winery so I can't comment on the wine tasting experience on site but I have drank their wines on many occasions as I have friends who are California wine enthusiasts. They are card carrying members and often preach to me how great the wines of Linne Calodo are.

I have always contended that the wines are extremely overpriced, over ripe, and somewhat one dimensional compared to a village cru quality Cotes du Rhône (for example, wines from Gigondas, Vacqueyras, or Chateauneuf du Pape etc).

My friends disagreed until I challenged them to a blind tasting putting 3 Rhône valley reds of my choosing against 3 Linne Calodos of their choosing.

The results: even the 2 lowly $10 dollar non village cru generic Cotes du Rhônes smoked the Linne Calodos. And the $40 Gigondas just trashed the competition. Yikes, it wasn't even necessary to pull out a big gun from Chateauneuf.

Needless to say my friends were stunned by the results. I don't mean to pick on Linne Calodo as there are many other California wineries that are flogging overpriced mediocre juice. To be fair California makes some absolutely fantastic wines but you can also spend $100+ a bottle and get something that's basically uninspiring....

On a recent girls weekend in Paso, we had a reservation for a seated tasting at Linne Calodo Cellars. I wish I had taken more exterior/interior pics of their tasting room which is nestled in a live oak forest surrounded by vines. The architecture is so fitting for its location, with dramatic lines, high ceilings, and soaring windows.

Our server Christina, who grew up in our town of Temecula, walked us through our tasting. It was fun hearing the stories behind some of their creatively named estate grown wines - Contrarian, Level Headed (my fav), Martian...and some others that I would buy just to gift for fun to the appropriately-named people - Problem Child, Overthinker, Perfectionist, Nemesis, Sticks & Stones.

One thing I didn't care for was the idea of pre-poured flights - all the wines were poured and at table when we sat down. I believe I read somewhere afterwards that we could have opted for individual pours from one glass, which is what I would recommend. It was harder to keep track of what we were all drinking with the...

We like to visit small wineries rather than visit famous wineries. Their wines look quite unique and interesting so it made us to visit there.

The quality of wine is outstanding and we end up got membership there. Also it seems like their wines are not always available and very limited. Since they didn’t have wines what we wanted try, we got membership to get them later.

The cellar is beautiful but it doesn’t have views like others have. We also wish to get more information. However I’m still glad to find this winery and want to visit...