By TED LUX
You don’t need to get behind the wheel this summer and drive the I-5 north out of Los Angeles, weaving some 400 miles just to visit Napa or Sonoma valleys. You don’t need to fly out of Burbank or LAX to Oakland or San Francisco, then rent a car, pay for hotel rooms and meals, and spend a bunch of your hard-earned dollars for wine-tasting. All Angelenos need to do is to simply follow the Pacific Coast Highway to Malibu to tour, sample and buy L.A.’s own fine wines.
Wine has become increasingly popular in Southern California over the last few decades. According to WineInsitute.org, California wine shipments to all markets increased to 258 million cases last year. That’s nearly a 42 percent increase over the last 15 years. Wineries on the Malibu coast have likewise multiplied.
Mark Englander, chief financial officer of Aldabella Custom Crush Winery & Storage in neighboring Westlake Village, said, “The Malibu coast region has recently been designated an American viticultural area – internationally on par with the Napa and Sonoma regions for fine wines.
“Santa Barbara County’s wines don’t have that distinction yet.”
Over summer weekends, you can merely get in your car or SUV with your significant other and take a leisurely ride on a sunny, cloudless day to the Malibu wineries. Visit the sampling rooms at Cornell Winery and Tasting Room, Malibu Wines and Rosenthal Wine Tasting – all of which are open for customer tours and sampling in lavishly furnished rooms. Taste the reds and whites, and have a romantic afternoon with your cherished loved one. Spend a few bucks in the area and help locals out.
If you’re moneywise and pressed for time – you should stay put in Los Angeles County and not travel north to those “other” valleys. There’s really no need this summer to spend more than $4 a gallon filling up your gas tank several times and driving more than 800 miles roundtrip to sample delicious California wines. Taste those berries, flowers and honeys locally in and around Malibu.
Today, many grape growers in Malibu are small and can’t afford the infrastructure and costs of fermenting and maintaining a winery or simply don’t want to bother. Just across the Malibu Hills is Aldabella. It makes wines for a dozen or so vineyard owners who don’t have the inclination or economic ability to go it alone. Aldabella, for a fee, will take Malibu-grown grapes and ferment them, then bottle, label and even warehouse finished reds and whites for customers.
Aldabella also has a lavish open-to-the-public tasting room to put on your wine-touring radar screen. Inside at the dark brown wooden bar, you can sample some of its own labels as well as others from the Malibu region.
Today, think twice before heading 400 miles north to Napa or Sonoma to sample fine wines. Keep the local Malibu vineyards and merchants in mind over the upcoming summer months and beyond. You’ll be pleasantly surprised by the varieties and tastes that whet your palate.
Ted Lux has been involved in real estate lending in the L.A. area for more than 25 years. He is author of investment book “Exposing the Wheel Spin on Wall Street.” He is a wine lover but has no interest, financial or otherwise, in wineries.
