Urban Wineries- Part 3
Periscope and Urbano Cellars
You may have noted from previous posts that we are fans
of East Bay wineries. Our favorites (noted
previously) have been Rosenblum and Rockwall in Alameda, and Stage Left, Urban
Legend, Dashe and JC Cellars in Oakland.
There are a few more that we have visited and been only mildly impressed
and not worthy yet of a review. There
are two more that we are impressed with that we will talk about today.
Periscope is a winery that has been around for several
years. It has been up until recently
located in Emeryville in what was formerly a submarine repair facility. We made many visits to the cramped and
somewhat dark facility up until about a year ago when the tasting room was
closed. Periscope is owned and operated
by Bendan Eliason. Brendan is a product
of the Cal Poly SLO wine program and gained much of his hands on wine
experience working with David Coffaro Winery in the Dry Creek area. He also ran the wine program for a bit at Va
di Vi, a very popular wine bar in Walnut Creek.
One of the things we enjoyed on our visits to Periscope at its former
location was that the events were very Berkeley like with interesting
(sometimes weird) art showings, light shows and sometimes loud music. He definitely had a following.
The tasting room was closed with plans to move to a new
facility in Oakland (Jack London area) but that has not happened. Brendan also had some bottling issues and
other challenges but we are hoping he is back on track. Periscope has recently opened a new tasting
bar/room in the Swan’s Market in the
downtown Historic Oakland district.
Swan’s is trying to develop into a sort of Ferry Plaza type
establishment with different merchants and restaurants. The buildings in the neighborhood are very historic
and distinctive and there is a new vibe to the area. Currently at Swan’s there is a butcher, a
fish vendor, a great casual Mexican restaurant and several other vendors. There are plans for four additional
restaurants. Periscope is currently
pouring wine on Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings.
What is unique to Periscope it that they are really
moving towards ‘tap’ wine. All the wines
he poured on our recent visit were straight out of the tap. The goal is to provide wine in refillable
flip-top bottles of 500ml or about 2/3rd of a standard bottle. Unlike other refillable programs in the area
you will be able to select different varietals instead of the basic Red or
White blend. The authorities have very
specific labeling requirements and the label needs to say what is in the
bottle. Brendan believes he will be able
to mark the bottles Red Wine, White Wine or Pink Wine to satisfy the
requirements. And the 500ml idea is not
bad. Many of us are just looking for a
glass of wine and not a whole bottle (if we are splitting it with someone) and
the 500ml provides you two healthy glasses of wine.
Our second Urban Winery actually got its start inside the
Periscope facility several years ago.
Today Urbano Cellars is in Berkeley in that district near the waterfront
and close to Ashby Avenue. Occasionally
when Periscope had an event, Urbano would be pouring their wines also. The owners of Urbano come from more of a
Garage Wine background than having big time experience in a known winery. Bob Rawson who we have met a couple of times
comes with an accounting/finance background.
Fred Dick, the other partner comes from the advertising/marketing
world. They made wine in their garages,
volunteered at other wineries and took some UC Davis enology classes.
Bob or Fred are always in the tasting room that is just
open weekends now and are friendly, down to earth guys. On the day or our recent visit there were
several wines open for tasting. Urbano
sources from different areas including Solano County (Green Valley) which parts
are within a couple of miles from Napa, and the Lodi area. Urbano’s wines tend to be a nicely priced
with the least expensive being a Vin Rose for $12.00 and topping out with the
Sangiovese (Dry Creek) at $24.00. We
tasted a Vin Rose, Barbera, Sangiovese, Grenache and a Zin Blend. Urbano also offers a Red Wine 1 Liter
refillable which is currently made up of Syrah, Grenache and Mouvedre. We had brought our bottle in this day for
refilling (which was consumed 2 days later for Christmas Eve). It is a very
casual tasting experience. There is a
fee, I believe $5.00, which is comped with a wine purchase.
One of the things we like about tasting in the East Bay
is that it is not just about wine. There
are always interesting things in the neighborhoods around the wineries. A couple of blocks from Urbano for instance
is the Berkeley Bowl, a great store known for its produce but it also has one
of the best beer selections around as well as a great wine selection. Within a couple of blocks of Swan’s Market
are many restaurants/bars including the Pacific Coast Brewing, Trappist
(Belgian Beer), District, and the place we went for dinner, Borgo Italia, just
kitty corner from the Market and where I
had the best thin crust pizza I have ever had.
What we liked- For those of us living in the East Bay it
is a real easy trip to these wineries and if you go with an open mind you
always find something interesting to do in addition to the wine tasting.
What we bought- A Petite Verdot which we took across the
street for dinner from Periscope and from Urbano we refilled our refillable
(growler) and also took home a bottle of Zinfandel.
Vitals-
Periscope at Swan’s Market
930 Clay Street
Oakland, CA 94607
(510) 655-7827
Urbano Cellars
2323 4th Street, #B
Berkeley, CA 94710
(510) 647-8393
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