John Christopher Cellars

Our second and final stop in Livermore. This isn’t a winery. It’s a storefront in a plaza where you can do wine tasting and purchase wines.
Tasting fee is $ 5 per person. Fee is waived with a wine purchase. There were five tastes offered.
2011 livermore valley chardonnay
Courtyard red — 5^th release
2012 livermore valley zinfandel
2010 livermore valley syrah
2009 madden ranch cabernet sauvignon
My favorite was the Madden ranch cab. I love my full bodied wines. This would have been great with a steak.
You don’t get a winery feel here, but they have a brew house next door and I believe a place where you can get charcuterie and cheese while enjoying some wine and beer outside. Nice if you have someone that’s not a wine drinker in your group. Honestly, this would have been a great first stop since you can get food in the area. Then you’re off to do more wine tasting at the vineyards!

Love these guys and if you catch them before 6pm at Blacksmith Square there’s live music from 2 – 9, cheers!

I really enjoyed this wine cellar! We got to talk to the owner who rents out spaces at local wineries to run his business. He was very friendly and so was the lady behind the counter pouring the wine. The cellar itself is very comfortable with some tables and the bar area. What is really nice, is that there is outdoor seating on the patio where you can take your wine out and enjoy sitting outdoors.
The wine itself was a a good price, so you pay for the quality you are liking for! We did a 5 $ wine tasting for 5 flights! Can’t beat that deal! We all really liked their new release of the red blend! All the wines were good to me and my friends really enjoyed the
On Sundays they have a band that performs in the little patio plaza. The plaza has other wineries and breweries! The best of bit worlds :)

I was born and raised in Livermore, but I have been living n SoCal for 14 years. I cannot believe how many awesome places have popped up in my tiny town. It’s booming now!
I visited John Christopher Cellars yesterday and had a great time. I remember the owners from my high school days and was happy to support them. Tasting was just $ 5 and we tasted 6 wines. Great deal!
The tasting room is very small, but they have a wide selection of wines. The ladies who poured (can’t remember their names) were great! I was with my BFF who I don’t see often, so she let us chat away as we often do when we’re together.
The wine wasn’t my favorite, but I really enjoyed the environment and the location was great.
There is a huge free parking lot located behind the tasting room and there are several restaurants (casual and higher end) in walking distance.
I highly recommend John Christopher Cellars.
PS…it’s dog-​friendly, but space is limited, so it’s better for the little critters.

Everyone come behold Christopher Tracy’s parade, hey
The show will proceed, ‘less it should rain strawberry lemonade
Hopefully, that will not occur, the man above has been paid
Give what you can, all you can stand, and all of your life will be made
– Prince & John L. Nelson, «Christopher Tracy’s Parade» (From the very underrated album Parade)
Sidney Does the East Bay Wineries Part XV — The Suburban Portion
Getting close to finishing this winery section.
This is how you do Livermore Wine Country. Start at all the charming wineries out in the Vineyards first because they all close between 4:30 and 5:00pm. Then you go back to Downtown Livermore because there are a few there that stay open later like John Christopher Cellars which is open till 6:00pm on Weekends (at least during summer).
Per their website: «John Christopher Cellars is a family owned boutique winery located in the Livermore Valley producing around 1500 cases of heart and hand crafted wine each year». Awww, heart crafted wines :)
The tasting room is located in a charming boutique shopping center called Blacksmith Square. In the Courtyard was cover singer playing and his renditions of the singer-​songwriter catalog like The Eagles and James Taylor were quite good. This was a chill place to visit when I was there with a bunch of regulars and two tall and beautiful blonde servers behind the counter (sisters or mother and daughter I could not tell which I mean by a compliment). Sorry guys I believe they were both married but they were fun and down to earth to taste with.
Previous reviewer Naomi mentioned she received a taste from an off bottle and one of my wines was definitely corked (bacteria on cork causing a wet cardboard type smell and robbing the wine of any flavor). The staff could not taste what I tasted but in reading Naomi’s review maybe she received a corked wine too. It could be bacteria in the cellar (happened to BV and Montelena) or a bad batch of corks.
However, that was the only wine (Courtyard Red) that disappointed. The rest of them, the two chardonnays, the two cabernets, the Petite Sirah and the two Syrahs (I received some extra tastings of wines that were open) I sampled were all excellent. I bought the Chardonnay and the 2007 Syrah.
If you read any of my winery reviews you know I like unpretentious places that remember that wine is a beverage first and have fun with it. This is one of those places and I highly recommend a visit especially on weekends when the music is playing. Ample parking in the lot next door.
Echoing Naomi again that port should be served with a dark chocolate, not a generic piece of supermarket candy but otherwise they do the tastings here right.

I will give 2 stars for their Chardonnay but, no more due to the rudeness of the staff. We were here in Livermore for the taste of down town. And have been having an amazing time, when this was our final stop with about 12 friends. Well, In order to taste you need to buy the passport with wristband and a glass the festival provides we were in there tasting when a gentleman walked in with a glass that wasn’t labeled right, he had his wristband and wine passport. Well the server gave him total attitude because of the glass, so I nicely said, you know, I notice they were running low on glasses earlier, and he has the other stuff to go with it so why not just serve him? Well… I must have struck a nerve. Because he snapped at me with «why are you involved?» I responded that I just think your being a bit rude to your customer. Again I got «and why are you involved?» So I took my money that I planned on buying 4 cases of Chardonnay for an upcoming event in was doing and left. Guess I will have to find a new wine to buy. Because I will not be coming here again, at all. And neither will any of my friends and family who were with us as well. Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything but there was no reason for him to be so rude to a customer. You never know what I may be there to buy.

Unfortunately after spending a weekend wine tasting in Napa I found the wines here to be very poor quality. I agree that a $ 5 flight is a deal but if you can’t swallow the stuff it’s $ 5 wasted.
One wine in particular tasted so off the sommelier poured the remaining of the bottle out.
The port was decent but when served with a wrapped Hershey’s chocolate (the worst generic chocolate!) the appeal is somewhat lost…

Try their dessert wine, it’s like port.

Great location, friendly staff and good tasting wines!

My first venture in wine tasting brought us here with some friends. He was a member so he already knew it would be the good stuff. I like the 2 guys behind the counter. I pretty much liked all the wine-​no need to dump any of it as it was all tasty but what you get for the $ 5 tasting was plenty for me. I’m not a seasoned wino yet so that was good for now. We’re not actually dog people but I liked this dog. Friendly and cute not hyper or anything.

JC has a rather vast selection of wines for tasting. $ 5 got us about six or seven tastes. My friends liked their chardonnay the best. My preference was the syrah. The guys behind the counter are really friendly and fun to speak with.
If you use the Unilocal check-​in app, you get 20 percent off a case of wine.
Their dog is cute and friendly, but she farts a lot and that kinda kills the tasting experience.

Simply the best. John Christopher Cellars is the best tasting room in Livermore and the wine is some of the best you’ll taste if like bold reds (but start with the Chardonnay which is good too!) This should be your first stop when wine tasting in Livermore. Music on the weekends in the summer and the friendly staff make this the anchor of Blacksmith Square.

John Christopher Cellars is amazing. This is such a great tasting room. The people who work there always have a great smile on their face, great personalities and AMAZING wine. They are in a cute courtyard that is full of entertainment so you always want to keep up on their mailing list or check their website but if you don’t know where to go and want fun, great wine and visit with amazing people this is a great place to go.