Rob D.
Yelp
Ah, Biddle Ranch, home to a tasting room straight from the pages of "Fixer Upper". As a fan of everything "modern farmhouse" my wife and I were instantly excited by their style. But...lest you think that I would let this impede our judgement on the wine, you are....unfortunately, perhaps correct.
Subjectivity aside, the wine is great -- there is not a wine on the list (white or red) that we didn't enjoy. The chardonnay we tried was stored in 3 separate barreling processes; oak, stainless, and cement. From the oak, their was a nice butter flavor. Stainless seemed to preserve a crisp and fruit-forward element. Not sure what cement does, but it was fun to think about "road flavors" in the profile.
Pinots are their jam. Like any good jam session (such as one by Phish, String Cheese Incident, or Widespread Panic), my toes tapped to the beat of each wine. There is a Pinot sourced from a vineyard close to Pismo called the Spanish Springs Vineyard. This one was a bit earthy, definitely some vegetable flavors, but overall quite an enjoyable ride.
The next taste was a Sangiovese, super polite, but with hidden personality. I found some hints of sausage in this one -- but I had just bought sausage for tomorrow's breakfast, so this flavor may have recency bias.
Last taste was of a blend I cannot remember. I bought a bottle but I'm a little too lazy to go to our garage to determine what it was called. I believe it was part Syrah, part Cabernet, part "undetermined excellent wine". I believe the spelling began with the letter "A".
All in all, we love this place and recommend it to all our friends visiting the area (also we recommend to "non friends"). If I had one criticism, I bought 3 bottles of wine, which should have waived 2 tasting fees. Living in wine region, our family motto is to "enjoy wine, but buy enough to not pay for tastings". In our most recent experience my beloved wife ordered a glass instead of a tasting as she doesn't enjoy reds. However, instead of waiving the cost of the glass of wine (which is like 1/2 the price of a tasting), they added the glass of wine to my bill. Given we're here on a semi regular basis and spent $150 + dollars + tip, I felt this was a bit tacky as a more expensive tasting fee would have been waived.
The $10 glass isn't really a deal breaker, and we will continue to visit and recommend Biddle Ranch. But...if there was anything to note, we would have really loved feeling the "scratch my back, we'll scratch yours" by comping the glass!