Now that’s a 19th hole: The Players Championship, TPC Sawgrass, March 13-16, 2025
Our mission at SwigCoach is combining great golf and wine, so it’s an enormous vindication when we find a host venue with both. Such is certainly the case at Pebble Beach, but we were gratified to find a strong list at Nineteen, the main restaurant at TPC Sawgrass. While the best golfers in the world are gulping for air on the tee box at 17, one can happily gulp from an excellent, geographically broad list that specializes in California and Bordeaux, supplemented with appealing options in Burgundy, Italy and Spain. There are verticals from a variety of top producers including a 10-vintage collection of Dominus, some Comte de Vogue Musigny and Harlan. We found at least one world class wine at less than retail. This place is a 19th hole worthy of the name. Unfortunately Nineteen appears to have removed their list from the website, but a version can be found on the Wine Spectator’s Award pages.
Restaurant Medure takes a distant second. The list is plenty big enough and with patience you can wade into it and find something worth drinking, although over the past year they eliminated any prices on the online list so sticker shock is a distinct possibility. Still, there’s good variety particularly in California and a decent nod to geographic diversity.
While it’s a 38-minute drive (no traffic) from TPC Sawgrass, Restaurant Orsay in Jacksonville has a fantastic list that is especially strong in California. There’s a playful spirit underlying the list’s organization, which TBH may require some help since it tends to dump big European collections into a single category, like all Italian reds in one section. Still, I’m always willing to endorse a list that proudly proclaims and backs up “Awesome Wines $60 & Under.” Wines are listed in ascending order of price, which makes scanning for your budget a breeze, and although they may be a bit steep on the high end, it’s plenty fair overall. This is very well done.
No-see-ums
We found no retail stores in the area with noteworthy online inventory. Royal Palm Village Wines & Tapas has a dine in/takeout approach with generous corkage policies. They say they have 1200 bottles on premise.
