Vega Vineyard Welcomes All Ages to Buellton

Ever since I first visited Vega Vineyard & Farm in the fall of 2022, the full-service spread became my quick go-to suggestion for the constant queries I get about where to go in wine country. 

It’s the easiest answer to give a varied audience, for depending on your desires, Vega can be enjoyed as a tasting room, restaurant, event space, picnic location, petting zoo, demonstration farm, or all of the above. Plus, it’s right off the 101, and the nearly 20 different wines made by Steve Clifton represent some of the best that this Santa Barbara legend — who founded Palmina in 1995 and then co-founded Brewer-Clifton the next year — has ever crafted. 

Less than two years since opening, the Vega vision of owners Jimmy and Karen Loizides is coming more fully into focus this summer. As the tasting room hums, live music strums, and the restaurant’s Chef Christopher Rossi pumps out excellent lunch seven days a week and dinners Thursday through Sunday, the barn — which is tucked in between the row crops and animals — is hitting its stride as a functional farmstand, gift shop, and casual eats purveyor. 

Meanwhile, six cabanas — called Pop’s Place — are now ready for friends and families to rent amid the vines and towering oak trees. And there’s a number of festivals on the calendar, including the Greek Night in the Vines on August 16; the Festa de Pomodoro on September 8, where Rossi and Chef Massimo Falsini of Caruso’s (which now sources from the Vega farm) will do their best tomato work; and the Santa Barbara Vintners Festival returns to the site on October 19. 

Clinton showed me all of this during a visit last month, but not before we talked about his malvasia bianca, vermentino, barbera, and red blends — among other bottlings — over too much lunch. From pinot grigio with halibut crudo and albariño with blue crab-deviled eggs to cacio e pepe with syrah, the dishes entertained both eyes and palate. While the lavender panna cotta and nutty cheesecake wowed — the latter made from a secret recipe by a server named Louise — the GLT, in which gyro meat replaces the bacon, proved to be a crave-inducing treat for me, the salty, spice meat slabs giving welcome heft and chew. I’ll be stopping in just for that one of these days. 

Clifton and Loizides were bullish about the potential for Vega when they described the project to me back in 2022, but they’ve been happily shocked by how much the community responded. They sold out of the first vintage of 2021s wines, which was 3,800 cases, in 10 months, then upped 2022’s production to 5,800 cases, which also sold out just as fast. They’re quickly moving through the 9,000 cases of 2023s right now, and the restaurant can pack in hundreds on busy weekends. 

“We have way more locals than I ever anticipated,” said Clifton, who estimates that the crowd is usually at least 50 percent Santa Barbara County residents. Visitors are really loving the breadth of wines, which cover expected grapes like pinot noir and syrah but then go deeper into Italian and Iberian varieties. 

“Aromatic whites on a sunny patio do well,” said Clifton, who’s recently planted more malvasia and pinot grigio. As for reds, his juicy barbera is the crowd pleaser. “It’s low in tannin, so it goes with everything,” theorized Clifton as to why this typically overlooked Italian grape is so popular. “I can’t quite figure it out.”

The cabanas, which cost about $200 for a full day reservation, only expand on their big tent philosophy. “There’s not a lot for families to go do,” said Clifton, himself a father of two. That was already evident when we talked two weeks before Pop’s Place was even ready to open. Said Clifton, “They’re already booked for the entire month of July.” 

See vegavineyardandfarm.com.