Chateau St. Jean

If you were to build your own personal chateau in the Sonoma Valley you couldn’t pick a much better location than this. A long driveway through the vineyards leads up to the white, turreted mansion at the foot of the mountains. The walk from the parking lot to the tasting rooms leads through a manicured, formal garden, and on the other side of the reserve tasting room is a patio area and expanse of lawn overlooking the valley vineyards.

The winery itself was once a private residence surrounded by walnut groves, built as a palatial summer home by a family of Michigan mining barons in the 1920s. The only signs now of its Michigan roots are the two fishponds shaped like the Great Lakes Michigan and Huron.

The chateau was almost bought by Bruce Cohn, founder of B. R. Cohn Winery, in the 1970s but ended up being acquired by a group of investors and who opened it as a winery in 1975 with Richard Arrowood as the winemaker. He went on to establish his own Arrowood Vineyards & Winery just down the road, and St. Jean is now owned by the multinational Fosters Wine Estates.
The winery pioneered the production of vineyard-designate wines in Sonoma in the 1970s and now has four in its portfolio—two chardonnays, a pinot blanc, and a fumé blanc. Grapes for all the wines are sourced from vineyards all over Sonoma County, but 80 acres of estate vineyards around the chateau are planted principally with chardonnay.

Although St. Jean is best known for its white wines (which include multiple chardonnays, viognier, gewürztraminer, pinot blanc, riesling, and fumé blanc), it also has its share of big reds, including Cinq Cepages, a bordeaux-style red blend of five grapes that is always rated highly by critics. Other red wines are Sonoma County cabernet sauvignon, merlot, and pinot noir, as well as reserve versions priced up to $100. Tasting room staff love to boast that this is the only Californian winery that (as of 2005) that has had five wines in the Wine Spectator Top 100 in one year (which was 1996).

It’s worth spending a little extra for a reserve tasting ($10), especially in summer when the sun-drenched reserve tasting patio is open. For just $5 more than the reserve tasting you can also take a 45-minute tour of the winery and a short course on wine tasting at 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. It is one of several appointment-only educational courses and tours offered (8555 Sonoma Hwy., Kenwood, 707/833-4134, www.chateaustjean.com, open 10 a.m.–5 p.m. daily, tasting fee $5).