Farmstead Cheeses and Wines: Jeff’s Blog

Every year Fran Kysela, the mind behind Kysela Père et Fils, throws two huge tastings of his entire portfolio in his Winchester VA warehouse. He calls the tasting Mondovino, after the documentary I guess, but unlike that amateurish film, Mondovino is a fun, educational and eye-popping afternoon of over 200 well made wines.
I carry a lot of Fran’s wines at Farmstead- sometimes as much as 25% of my stock. His wines are always well-balanced, well-selected and well priced. In fact, seeing the “Kysela Père et Fils” logo on the back of a wine bottle should be an assurance for you to buy it.

This is the third time I have made the cross country trek for Mondovino, and the second time I have added a day onto the trip for sightseeing.

The area is rife with Revolutionary and Civil war sights, 19th century architecture, roadside kitsch, and lovely “horse farms” – huge weekend homes for the Washington rich. Winchester’s rpoximity to Washington has made it into somewhat of a commuter town – it’s only 90 minutes on a bad day from the beltway.

I reserved a night flight on Virgin America, a great newish no-frills airline that provides great service, comfy seats and an innovative seat back entertainment system. I arrived through BART, and I love how we finally have a mass transit system that connects seamlessly to the airport. BART drops you off at the entrance to the fabulous International Terminal, whose ceiling never fails to impress and inspire me

SFO International Terminal

I checked in, got comfy in my seat and attempted to sleep for the four and a half hour journey. Great intentions are just that, and I ended up getting only about an hour of Zzzs,landing at Dulles at 5:00 a.m. quite groggy. I rented a car and drove into Washington. Today was a free day and I had some sightseeing to do!

Washington DC is as confusing and confounding a city to drive in as San Francisco – streets meet at angles, and there’s the maddening NW, SW appendage on street signs. Add to that the lack of detail on a rental car map, darkness and lack of sleep, and you can imagine what my first hour was like trying to find a place to read the paper and have breakfast was like!!

After an hour of driving around frustrated, I decided to park at a downtown hotel, where they had a very nice breakfast bar, free newspapers, and a concierge who happily provided me with a nicer map that directed me to the mall.

Seeing as it was now only 7 a.m and none of the museums open until 10, I decided to walk the Mall and have a visit with Mr Lincoln.

The weather was beautiful at 7:00 a.m. – crisp, about 60 degrees. A far cry from the below freezing temps they’d been having a few days ago, and the Mall had its share of early morning joggers taking advantage of the warm spell.

The walk from the National Gallery (where I had parked) to the Lincoln Memorial is about three miles – three miles of truly inspiring neo-Classical architecture.

It’s always exciting to be in Washington, and being on the Mall when it was practically empty was a rare treat. I spent some time with Mr Lincoln, taking photographs, stood on the site where MLK delivered his I Have A Dream Speech, and admired the view of the Mall.

I then walked back to the Mall, some young men asked me to take their photograph (I guess they were impressed by my camera or something)

and stopped by the Museum of American history to visit the Hall of the Presidents. They have this funny exhibit where you are digitally inserted into a famous speech by Kennedy (“ask not…”), Roosevelt (“nothing to fear but fear”) or Reagan (“Mr. Gorbachev, take down this wall”). I chose Kennedy and then Roosevelt. It was a bit surreal and reminded me a bit too much of an old Firesign Theater album, it was fun to see me inserted into the “no fear but fear itself’ speech.

I tooled down the Mall to the National Gallery, deciding this time to stick to the European collection, focusing on the El Greco and Northern Renaissance rooms.

I then met an old colleague for lunch at a Spanish restaurant downtown, and we walked back to the Gallery to see the Robert Frank retrospective. He’s always been one of my favorite photographers, and it was great to see all of the photos from his landmark project “The Americans” on a gallery wall!

I said goodbye to my friend, strolled though the Gallery’s sculpture garden, found the car and, after an hour of wrong turns, found route 50 West, and got to Winchester and my hotel room.

I changed clothes and called Fran, whose office was next door to the hotel, and then followed his car to his amazing restored fishing lodge on a lake about 20 minutes outside of Winchester for a great evening of fine food and camaraderie with some of Fran’s international suppliers.

The food was amazing – fresh foie gras brought in by his Bordeaux producer, red fish caught by Fran and his wife Lisa on a recent trip to Louisiana, Paella made by Fran’s Spanish import agent, etc etc etc.

Fran and Lisa's Boston Terrier

Oh yeah, and I’m gonna kidnap their dog.

It was a full day – I’d been up for what seemed like forever with little sleep, so I made my way back to the hotel for a lovely dream filled night.