January 28, 2022 – It’s been a very long time coming, but The Tasting House in Los Gatos is officially open. It’s a unique place to discover the joys of well curated wine paired with carefully crafted food, along with a massively impressive retail wine shop that also carries an almost overwhelming selection of gourmet cheeses and accessories, bean-to-bar chocolates, caviar, crackers, jams, Acme baguettes, books and gifts galore.
Initially opened last week, the new enterprise had to suddenly shutter its dining and wine service due to an outbreak of Covid in the kitchen. This certainly isn’t news these days, but it has proven a setback after some very successful and busy opening days. Owner Denise Thornberry tells us they plan to resume kitchen service on February 1, with a menu that offers everything from cheese plates to extensive wine pairing experiences. The menu reads like a short story in culinary indulgence.
The place rests on one fundamental concept: pairing delectable foods with equally desirable wines to create an explosion of delight with each bite. It helps that the wine director here, Ryan Fillhardt, a Los Gatos native, is also the executive chef and a sommelier.
The retail wine, cheese and chocolate shop remains open for business and boasts 120 domestic and international cheeses, plus more than 100 different bean-to-bar and artisanal chocolates, along with gourmet pantry items and accessories. Choose from a mouthwatering selection of cheeses from your backyard or someone in Italy’s.
Tasting Boxes and charcuterie boards for parties, retreats, wine tasting excursions, business lunches and family picnics are also available. Cheeses and wines can be shipped nationwide.
You’ll recognize some local talent from the Santa Cruz side of the hill here at this gleaming new French bistro style establishment.
Among them is executive fromager and certified sommelier Cesar Olivares, who had a long career with Staff of Life in Santa Cruz. His extensive experience in artisanal wine and cheese shops, restaurants and wine bars makes him an ideal fit for this unique kind of place where he can put his worldwide knowledge of wheels, curds and whey to the test. Edible Monterey Bay readers will know he has been named one of the top ten cheesemongers in the United States three times and twice was invited to participate in the Mondial du Fromage in France.
Serving up his extensive knowledge of local wine from his days as liquor manager at The Summit Store is Curtis Cooke, who has a deep love of our region’s winemakers and their unique stories. The Summit area is poorer for his absence at the store, which he and former Summit Store cheesemonger and wine consultant Tabitha Stroup helped turn into a gourmet paradise for mountain dwellers. But The Tasting House is richer for his easy going charm and ability to pair the right wine with a customer’s personality. Cooke also worked at Poetic Cellars and Love Apple Farms.
The Tasting House is located at 368 Village Lane, where Cin-Cin used to be and just down the block from Manresa restaurant. It has been completely remodeled, using a silver, black and red palate, including black and white honeycomb tile on the floor. Handsome black and white striped awnings proudly announce the concept, and outside many bistro tables for two await. A parklet with heaters and planter boxes is in the works, and hopefully will be completed within the next two weeks. Doubtless, it will be the most artfully decorated in town.
The entire team put together the retail shop’s cool collection of gifty food-geeky stuff, guided expertly by Thornberry’s former retail housewares merchandising background.
The wines, many of them local, including Wrath, Bottle Jack, Fogarty, Vidovich, Big Basin Vineyards, Kings Mountain and Kathryn Kennedy, have been assembled with the assistance of advisor Jeffrey Perisho of Plumed Horse and the whole Tasting House team, all of whom are keenly interested in the fruit of the vine. The place boasts 50 wines by the glass from around the world, so you’ll always have something new to tickle your tastebuds. Wines are available in 3-ounce and 6-ounce pours, as well as by the bottle, and in flights.
If you love cheese, you might want to check out their monthly cheese club as well as their monthly wine club. The January Cheese Club is $49 and includes 1655 Gruyere, Camembert de Normandy made from raw cow’s milk and James Montgomery English Cheddar. Stories and tasting notes about the cheeses are fascinating. Suggested pairings would be the January wine club wines, which are all Pinot Noirs from a variety of locations: Willamette Valley of Oregon (Big Table Farm), Burgundy (Maison Champy Pernand-Vergelesses) and New Zealand (Mount Riley). Oh, and there’s a monthly chocolate club, too. January’s selection is a 24-piece box of chocolate pralines from Neuhaus, the Belgian chocolatier that invented the Belgian praline and ballotin.
All the club shipments can be delivered or picked up in person. Reservations at The Tasting House can be made using Open Table or by calling 408.348.1807. Current hours are Tuesday through Sunday, 10am until 10pm. Closed Mondays. More at: tastinghouse.com
About the author
Laura Ness is a longtime wine journalist, columnist and judge who contributes regularly to Edible Monterey Bay, Spirited, WineOh.Tv, Los Gatos Magazine and Wine Industry Network, and a variety of consumer publications. Her passion is telling stories about the intriguing characters who inhabit the fascinating world of wine and food.
