Cougars Invade Amador County!

Rombauer Winery of Napa Valley is famous for their buttery Chardonnay. People are obsessed with this wine; a wine marketing-type once called it "liquid crack." The reputation is also that women of a certain group known as, um, cougars love is so much that Rombauer Chardonnay is sometimes called Cougar Juice. Now the unthinkable has happened.

The Purchase
Rombauer bought the Renwood Winery in the little wine country of Amador County in the Sierra Foothills. Though this region's wine presence has grown over the decades it's still tiny time compared to the likes of Napa Valley. The wineries are mostly small, family-owned, and with a $5 tasting fee. Amador County is Napa Valley in the early 1980s. Rombauer's first step was to fire everybody from Renwood because they had a plan starting with a complete redo of the existing property. They weren't trying to fit in; they were bringing Napa to Shenandoah Valley in Amador County.

A Fish Out of Water
It's a pleasant tasting area with indoor and outdoor seating. It's appointment-only. The only time anything is appt-only around here is because it's a one-person operation and you want to be sure someone is home. I dropped in on a Saturday for a look around out of curiosity as the tasting room had just opened and was the talk of the town. A very pleasant young lady who had transferred from the Napa winery to Amador (remember, they fired all the existing staff) said we could wait awhile for a tasting slot to open. When I declined she did offer us one taste so we sat outside and absorbed the Napa-ness of it all.

The Wine
Rombauer didn't come here to get into Amador wines, they just transferred their Napa wines to Amador right along with the $25 tasting fees. Yes, they are selling hundred dollar Napa Cabs. The funny part is the $45 Napa Zinfandels in the heart of Zin country as Amador County made its name off old vine Zinfandel. Seeing the Napa Zins in the land of Amador Zins at half the price made me laugh. Heck, their cougar juice, I mean Chardonnay, was priced higher than just about anything you'll find at another winery around here (although I did find one other new winery selling a hundred dollar Barbera)!

The tasting room

The Visitors
The place was quite busy with mostly nicely dressed mostly middle-aged visitors. You know, the people with the money to buy these wines. As we sat outside I noticed one 50-ish woman coming from the building with an opened bottle of Chardonnay for her group. In profile I also noticed her front end was a little too perky for someone of her age and I thought, "Wow, a real cougar. Rombauer got their audience to visit them way up here!" Another cougar-type asked me if I was Capt. Sully (the famous airline pilot). That was funny and I couldn't give her a straight answer. Then my wife got excited thinking about sleeping with Tom Hanks (he played Sully in the movie). What can I say, it was spring and the cougars were in full bloom.

The Future
So will Rombauer become super-popular, will they survive, will other big money come in and change Amador? I definitely do not hope for the latter. A few years ago a Napa-type restaurant moved in (a local called in Napa-type, I didn't) with fancy, high-priced food in the land of family Italian restaurants and BBQ joints. They are still there and doing well. I noticed no other similar restaurants on this trip so we'll see. We might start seeing #resistnapa bumper stickers on the locals' pickup trucks.