Since most visitors to Napa Valley come for the great food and wine, why not learn how Napa Valley cooks and take the knowledge home for a lifetime?  Here are a couple of ideas to to round out your food and wine adventure.
Dinners
Susie Pope, co-proprietor of Cedar Gables Inn, used to run a culinary school in Los Gatos, where her husband worked in high tech.  It was natural that when they renovated the kitchen, that they make a spacious, professional kitchen that guests would feel welcome in.  They offer cooking …

There are few opportunities for the home chef to learn the culinary art of smoking, curing and salting meats, a craft practiced around the world for centuries to preserve, flavor and economically utilize all parts of an animal. Taylor Boetticher of Fatted Calf Charcuterie teaches enthusiasts what the various charcuterie are including salami, sausages and pate, and how to make them from butchering, preparing and cooking the dishes. Classes also include butchery and roasting of flavorful cuts of meat, such as porchetta.
Boetticher introduced these classes this past summer, offering courses from …

Wine tourism is important in developing brand awareness for a wine region and its producers’ wines.  It also generates a lot of revenue.  Napa Valley drew about 3.5 million tourists in 2006 who spent a little over $700 million on hotels, restaurants and other leisure- and wine- related activities.  In many wine regions around the world, wineries open up their doors to hospitality including tours and various seminars on blending, wine tasting and food/cheese and wine pairing.  Bordeaux – not so much.  However, this is rapidly changing as Bordeaux competes with the New World.
In …