J. Bookwalter Wines is a family-owned winery in the heart of Richland. The wines of J. Bookwalter are approachable and expressive, and have all the characteristics you want in a well-crafted Washington wine.

Five Vines Wine Bar isn’t your average wine bar. This local San Juan Capistrano spot was rated one of the 25 best wine bars in the country by Travel + Leisure Magazine in 2018, and their winemaker dinners, like the one we attended with Arietta Wines, was so great that it could serve as a blueprint for how other venues conduct their wine events.

We attended a private wine tasting and food pairing the other night and the tasting included eight, yes, eight Grgich Hills Estate wines. And as you would expect from Miljenko “Mike” Grgich, the man who brought us the 1973 Chateau Montelena Chardonnay, which won the 1976 Judgment in Paris, there was not a bad bottle in the lot.

If you aren’t familiar with the Michael David Winery, it is based in Lodi, CA, and is named after the two brothers who own, Michael and David Phillips.

We were fortunate to have Steve Brutocao, the CEO and grandson of the Founder of Brutocao, Irv Bliss, give the presentation. Steve dropped by every table and answered questions, and was a gracious host. You could feel his passion for the wines as he spoke about each one in great detail.