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California is known for its amazing wines and its innovative, offbeat ways of growing, producing and marketing them. We think that should also apply to how they’re served in the tasting room.

So in our offbeat and innovative way, we’re trying out a new type of tasting, mixing plenty of great wine with good gab by California Groundbreakers who turn grapes into liquid bliss.

Our panelists are:

* Andrew Willsen, who has been a manager and sommelier at Mulvaney’s B&L, the Waterboy, Hawks and Taylor’s Kitchen, to create a fun wine social focused on great summer wines made here in the Sacramento region.

* Craig Haarmeyer, designated a “winemaker to watch” by the San Francisco Chronicle, believes in the power of Sacramento terroir, and the out-of-the-ordinary wines he makes are getting lots of national buzz (he just came back from a pouring trip in NYC, where jaded Manhattanites got weak in the knees after drinking his Chenin Blancs). And Craig is hosting us at his Haarmeyer Wine Cellars in West Sacramento.

* Chris Walsh, an Amador County native who earned his chops in New York City as a sommelier, then decided to come home a few years ago and throw himself into winemaking full throttle. He just planted grapes on his family’s land, and currently makes wine under the End of Nowhere label, which showcases grapes grown by other small farmers in the Sierra Foothills. His goal: to approach well-known varietals in a different way and make them as “natural wines” (native yeast fermentations, organic grapes, unfined, unfiltered and not modified).

Join us as we talk with Andrew, Craig and Chris about California and Sacramento-specific wines in our first of hopefully what will be regular wine socials.