Recommendations for Sonoma?

liked arista, gary farrell and hop kiln right off the top....

have wines from arista and hop kiln in the cabinet still. both are highly recommend. if i can remember some of the others we visited i'll let you know. we stayed the week in bodega bay.
If you get up that way go to the terrapin creek. good shite... michelin star rated as well.
have some good places in headlesburg as well...

also, the restaurant at bodega bay lodge called the duck horn or something is legit as well....

edited for: Moshin,

Scopa for dinner

J, Stryker, Joseph Phelps freestone

Underwood for lunch

There are a few threads on this already with good information. I posted in a few before and after our trip out there. Check them out, they have some good info

Check out Tra Vigne in Saint Helena (they say it hel-en-na, not hel-leen-na). Great little restaurant for lunch or dinner. Bouchon in Yountville is a must for a coffee and pastry. Sunflower cafe in Sonoma was good for breakfast.

Silver oak and cakebread were awesome for larger scale wineries. The tours/tasting at each were great. The tour at inglenook was over priced. There was a winery co-op that I think was called the Napa wine company. They had rotating smaller wines available from vineyards who didn't have their own equipment. Robert Mondavi wasn't as good as we were led to believe. Went to Kenwood, which had surprisingly good wines at affordable prices. Imagery (mentioned above) had us taste one of their wines with fresh chocolate covered blueberries (amazing). Br Cohn was another good one, owned by the doobie brothers manager, so has a lot of memorabilia.

Most people say you get hammered while doing tastings, but that really wasn't the case for us. If you drink normally, you taste about a full glass of wine in an hour. You will spend a lot of time driving and looking around the different grounds, so you actually really never feel it (at least that was my experience).

If you are looking for lodging, check out airbnb. We stayed in one, and it was 1/4 the price of the hotels in the area. You also may want to stop in at a tourist info center. A lot of times you can pick up cards or flyers for free or reduced price tastings.

Thanks for making me want to plan another trip out there hah. We spent a few days in SF before heading to wine country as the wife had never been. Both of us agree that next time we will fly straight into Oakland and head to Napa. Next time we plan to hit up more smaller wineries and book more tours in advance for a longer stay.

Kunde winery....it is where they filmed Bottle Shock, they give free tour into their cave. Pretty good wine.

For someplace to eat, in the downtown area of Sonoma there is a little Italian place we went to called Della Santina's. Really good and has a nice patio area.

check out the square in Healdsburg. Williamson is a good place to start. Aside from downtown Healdsburg, I'd recommend Seghesio if you enjoy Zins, Michel Schlumberger is a nice estate winery, Silver Oak is worth a stop just to see their library, and Lancaster is a beautiful property with great reds and a sweet cave tour.

Forgot to add Palmaz in Napa to the list. It's well worth the money you pay for the private tour. You need to check to see if they have any reservations though. By far the best tour/tasting I went on.

If you're talking about Sonoma County in general:

Like HerbFest said...Arista and Gary Pharell. Both are great wineries. The guys at Arista are originally from TX and do an annual crawfish boil. Good folks with some great Pinots.

As for restaurants...I'm partial to Chalkboard in Healdsburg. I try and go there once a month since I live close. Awesome.

If you're talking about the town of Sonoma I really don't know much. Only went to Mary's Pizza Shack with my daughter's tennis team.

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Check out Tra Vigne in Saint Helena

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prolly out of season now, but i had the fire roasted dungeness crab there in December. Holy cow it was good.

3 great brewpubs in Sonoma Valley, Bear Republic, Russian River and Lagunitas.