Library Wine Tasting at Au Bon Climat
When one of your favorite rituals in Santa Barbara County is wine tasting, the holidays are a perfect time for a reserved library wine tasting as a special gift to yourself or your friends. A library wine is selected by a winery for cellaring and collecting. It has potential for aging and developing more nuanced flavors. It can be a special bottling for a notable event or a unique blend. It’s saved for a reason — to be enjoyed later.
Au Bon Climat (everyone calls it ABC) offers its library wine tasting at their tasting room in historic El Paseo in downtown Santa Barbara. Already popular for their longstanding and well-respected family-run vineyards in Santa Barbara County, the tasting room runs events like pickup parties for wine club members or After Hours events on the last Friday of every month. When you’re ready to dive deeper into the cellars of ABC, the tasting lineup pulled from the wine library becomes intimate and special.
ABC is so deeply intertwined with Santa Barbara wine culture, thanks to the enthusiasm and endearing nature of its founder, the late Jim Clendenen. We lost an important and influential man when he passed in 2021. His children, Isabelle and Knox, have taken up the reins and now rally a passionate team that keeps the ABC legacy going — actively trying new things and refining the existing ones.
An intimate wine tasting, charcuterie board included. Photo: Rob Bilson 
Reserved for you. Photo: R. Brown 
Just one of many from the ABC family. Photo: R. Brown
Sitting down for a tasting, you learn so much about the background of the Clendenens in the wine industry and their genuine love for growing the grapes and producing their wine. When the table is set for you and the charcuterie board laid out, you are a special guest who’s privy to their history, stored in the bottles and revealed in each pour. Like ABC’s 2011 Pinot Noir “Isabelle” or the 2011 Nebbiolo “Punta Exclamitiva” from the Clendenen Family Vineyards label, just two of the extensive lineup of eight bottles or more. Questions are encouraged, requests are accommodated for a custom experience, and at the end of the tasting — give yourself about two hours to thoroughly savor it all — you’ll see why the ABC family thrives.
