COPIA: a guest posting perspective

I've written about COPIA here in the past--here's a perspective, from none other than my mom and dad!

COPIA, the American Centre for Wine and Food, is Napa Valley's best-kept secret. Billed as a "cultural museum and education center dedicated to the discovery, understanding, and celebration of wine, food and the arts in American culture", COPIA is much more than a museum, encompassing a first-class restaurant (more on that in a moment), a bistro for less-expensive foods and a unique all-you-can-drink wine-tasting atrium where wines are dispensed from four-bottle machines using electronic cards.

COPIA also boasts 45-minute food and wine educational seminars at nominal cost, galleries and interactive displays that provide entertaining snippets of historical information about (what else?) food and wine.

Lunch at COPIA's main restaurant is an experience. Named Julia's Kitchen, after Julia Child, you'll love the delicious, though somewhat limited selection of foods. For lunch, we tried the gorgonzola-peach appetizer salad with juicy peaches grown on the premises. It was August 15—Child's birthday. The menu featured a pricey four-course lunch using Child's own, original recipes. The vegetarian risotto and tuna salad off the main menu were good choices. Although Julia's Kitchen was not full when we visited, reservations for dinner are recommended. Lunch for two, including appetizers came to $60 with excellent, friendly service.

Complimentary wine-tasting was provided by a COPIA volunteer the day we visited. You can also go to the service desk and request a free wine-tasting card for a local winery. But note that complimentary wine tasting are few and far between in Napa these days, unless you drive out to some of the more remote wineries.

On COPIA's spacious second floor, visitors can play with creative and amusing interactive displays, learning the origins of a variety of vegetables and other foods as well as popular manufactured foods including potato chips and Kool-Aid.

Care to know more? Visit http://www.copia.org.