WineInk: Greg Brewer pours at Free Range

Over the last three decades, Steve Humble has set the gold standard when it comes to providing our community with the best in wine experiences.

From tasting events at the Roaring Fork Club back in the day to summer gatherings on the Fryingpan River, to not-to-be-missed wine-focused dinners at the cozy, comfortable Free Range Kitchen & Wine Bar that he runs with his wife Robin in Basalt, Steve has brought many of the best winemakers from around the world to our valley.

Now Free Range kicks off 2025 with another outstanding winemaker’s dinner.

On Tuesday, Jan. 7, Free Range Kitchen & Wine Bar is hosting Greg Brewer, a California winemaking legend. Brewer will be pouring a pair of wines, the current releases from the eponymous Brewer-Clifton winery, along with offerings from his other labels, Diatom, which makes extraordinary lean and austere Chardonnay, and Ex Post Facto, a cool climate Syrah project. 

This dinner is beyond business — it’s personal, as Humble and Brewer go way back.

“I first met Greg Brewer and Steve Clifton at a tasting in Vail,” said Humble. “They were coming to Aspen, and I asked if they would consider stopping by The Roaring Fork Club, and surprisingly, they did. This was twenty years ago, and Greg and I have been friends ever since.”

The two bonded on a mutual interest in wines that reflect a sense of the place and a style focused on minimalist manipulation and intervention. Wines that are more a product of the earth than the machinations of a winemaker.

Brewer’s wines have shown the signature of the DNA of the Sta. Rita Hills appellation before the appellation was even founded. A Los Angeles native, he attended UC Santa Barbara in the early 1990s and found a gig in the tasting room at Santa Barbara Winery that put him on a career path in wine. He and Steve Clifton founded their winery in 1996 and started to produce pinot noir and chardonnay in the hills of a cool climate Valley that would become known as the Sta. Rita Hills in 2021. The focus of Brewer-Clifton was always on the terroir of these mountains between Buellton and Lompoc in the greater Santa Ynez Valley just north of Santa Barbara.

“The thing that really motivates us is the ocean. The Pacific is our muse, it’s our voice,” Brewer said in a recent interview with “Drinking Wine at Nine” for Denver’s Argonaut Liquor YouTube channel.

The terroir that defines the region, the sand, wind, fog, and unique Diatomaceous earth and soils, just “pulses through the wines,” Brewer said. While the Sta Rita Hills now hosts a plethora of great producers there is a feeling of fidelity between him and the place where he makes his wines.

“I’ve only worked there for 33 years now. I’ve never touched a grape outside of Santa Barbara,” he said.

And what a ride it has been. A little more than half a decade after Brewer-Clifton was  launched, influential wine writer Robert Parker Jr. wrote in his Wine Advocate, “The wines of Brewer-Clifton were the single greatest revelation of all of (his) 2001 tastings.”

The comment brought interest and adulation to not just Brewer-Clifton but to the wines of the greater Santa Barbara region, as well.

Fifteen years later, an opportunity came to the fore when Jackson Family Wines came calling and purchased Brewer-Clifton.

“The Jackson family maintains a commitment to world-class wines, a respect for nature, and a vision for uncompromising quality that’s very much aligned with our philosophy. I’m confident our collective strengths will further propel the Sta. Rita Hills on the global stage of fine wines,” Brewer wrote about the relationship.

That was proven to be insightful in 2020 as he, once again, achieved international acclaim when Wine Enthusiast magazine named him their winemaker of the year.

For his part, Humble is excited about hosting his friend for the special dinner.

“The eye opener for me about these wines, and I’ve had the opportunity to drink some of the older vintages from Greg’s cellar, is just how well they age,” he enthused. “And it is amazing how well they have held the prices.”

Indeed, the 2022 Brewer-Clifton Sta. Rita Hills Pinot Noir bottling, which is comprised of pinot noir grown in four vineyards within the appellation, retails for just $50, a steal for the quality of the wine.

In addition to the wines, the real pleasure of the dinner will be the opportunity for guests to interact with Greg Brewer the man. With a shiny bald pate, a broad smile, and a semi-shy, always Zen demeanor, he is passionate and expressive about both his wines and the Sta. Rita Hills.

It will be a warm gathering on a cold January night. What could be sweeter?

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