Although California maintains a vital role in the foodie world, one of the most important food contributions California, primarily Napa Valley, makes is wine.  Considered one of the premier wine regions in California, Napa Valley is an American Viticultural Area located just north of the San Francisco Bay region.  With its wine history dating back to the nineteenth century, Napa Valley has the ideal Mediterranean climate, geography, and geology that is conducive to growing high quality wine grapes.  Currently, Napa Valley is a top tourist destination in California, second only to Disneyland.  The wine region attracts about 4.7 million visitors each year.

In 1858, John Patchett was the first man to establish a commercial vineyard.  In 1861, the first commercial winery in St. Helena was established by Charles Krug.  Although Napa Valley’s wine industry suffered greatly from a vine disease, phylloxera, outbreak in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, as well as the effects of Prohibition and the Great Depression, the Paris Wine Tasting of 1976 played an important role in restoring Napa Valley to its former glory as a excellent wine region capable of producing world-class wine.

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