Paso Garagiste, The First Ever…Starring Doug Minnick

How many wine events can one person go to before they all start looking and feeling the same?? We’re not sure what the answer is to that, but we do know that we went to the first Paso Robles Garagiste Festival and for a first time event we were absolutely blown away.

The location, Windfall Farms on the east side of Paso Robles, is simply gorgeous. It’s a horse farm/ facility with beautiful rolling hills and the event was actually held in one of the horse “barns”. There were two or three wineries pouring in each horse stall which left the main walkway relatively free flowing. It felt very organized and clean, kudos to the organizers for doing such a great job.

The idea behind this event was to showcase very small producers…hundreds of cases to roughly two thousand cases, many of whom may not even have a tasting room. Small lots of high quality, handmade wines is what these producers are putting out there. In our opinion, this is what Paso Robles is all about, the little guys. While the big producers certainly have some great wine, and definitely bring people to our area, where do they go once they finish at Castoro Cellars or Tobin James; they go to these small wine producers. The little tag line we often say about this is that they may come initially for the big guys, but they keep coming back for the little guys.

This video is our interview with Doug Minnick, co-founder of the event. Hats off to them, we had a fabulous time and certainly hope there is a 2^nd annual Garagiste Festival here in Paso Robles. If you missed this event, well, you missed out on great small lot wines, great people, and a stunning location.

Thank you to Doug, Stewart and the rest of the people that worked on this event, job well done!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__AC5GhqreU[/youtube]