Valentine's Day Weekend Wine Tasting

Valentine's Day weekend has turned into somewhat of a big tasting weekend among Oregon wineries - not as big as Memorial Day or Thanksgiving, but many wineries open their doors to the public or hold special events. On Saturday, Rachel was officiating at a high school district swim meet (Tim was swimming), so I headed out on my own. It's less fun going wine tasting by yourself, but a lot better than not going at all.

My first stop was a port and chocolate tasting at a new restaurant in Dundee - Farm to Fork. We've not yet eaten there, but certainly plan to soon. The menu features fresh local ingredients and an extensive wine list. Today however, a representative from Kopke was there to sample Port. Each port was paired with chocolate made by Cocoa Velvet, a Portland-based chocolate maker. The Ports ranged from a ruby and a tawny, to a 10 year vintage-style port to an amazing "Century Port" made using a solera system over 100 years old. It was very good, but very expensive.

I then headed back north into Carlton to Scott Paul Wines where Scott Wright was pouring Burgundy from cult wine superstar Lucien Le Moine. It's rare to even find this wine available for sale, much less open for a tasting, so I wasn't going to miss it. All the wines were from the 2007 vintage. We started out with a (white) Puligny-Montrachet Les Folatières 1er Cru which was sharp, crisp and very minerally. I really enjoy white Burgundy with it's often austere fruit and great acid. Next it was a Chambolle-Musigny les Charmes 1er Cru with darker fruit and earther, toasty tones. The Vosne-Romanée Beaux Monts 1er Cru was brighter and fresher with more light fruits, while the Pommard Grands Epinots 1er Cru was fruitier and riper. Finally, the Echézeaux Grand Cru was amazingly earthy and complex. Scott said it would be much better in a few years, but I thought it was drinking pretty well now. All the wines except 1 were over $100 a bottle, so while it was wonderful to taste them, I didn't get anything. Scott was also tasting through his own wine and a few Burgundies from his normal lineup, and I ended up going home with a couple bottles of the newly released 2007 vintage of his flagship Pinot Noir La Paulée. It's a great restrained and elegant Oregon Pinot. Interestingly, the Lucien Le Moine wines were sold out before I left, so anyone who came later in the day missed out on the tasting.

Next it was off to Penner-Ash for a vertical tasting of their Willamette Valley Pinot Noir. Penner-Ash makes some very nice wines, and they also have some of the best events at their winery, usually paired with some really nice food. I started out with their 2008 Viognier which Rachel and I tried at Thanksgiving. It is an excellent example of a Viognier with good acidity and a spicy finish. Next it was on to the 3 vintage vertical - 2006, 2007, and 2008. The 2006 was of course the biggest and ripest of the bunch, while the 2007 was more restrained and elegant. The 2008 was a surprise since I had been expecting more fruit than the '07. It was also fairly light with bright strawberry and not quite the earthiness of the 2007. Of the 3, the '07 was my favorite. Finally, their 2006 Syrah. They source the fruit for this wine from the Rogue and Columbia valleys and it's a fine example of warm climate Syrah, although I much prefer the pepper and spice of cool climate Syrah myself.

My last stop of the day was Styring, a family-owned winery that Rachel and I had been to over Memorial Day weekend a couple of years ago. Our impression at the time was very nice people, pretty average wine, and today's visit reinforced that impression. The Styring family and their staff are all very nice people and made me feel very welcome. They were serving 5 wines, each paired with a snack. The first was their 2008 Pinot Gris paired with Prosciutto and melon (the fruit, not the varietal). The Gris was well made with pretty good acidity. Next was their 2006 "Signature" Pinot Noir with Italian Truffle cheese, and then the 2006 "WIT" Pinot Noir with black truffle oil and bread. This PN was pretty good, although a bit too big and fruity for my taste. They then poured their new 2007 Cab Sauv from the Columbia Valley and paired that with Champignon cheese and chocolates (always a nice pairing!). The wine was tannic and slightly bitter, but that may soften over time. Finally, they poured the 2004 "Afterglow" dessert wine - a wonderfully balanced sweet Riesling. This was paired with assorted tea cakes and was the best wine of the bunch.

On Sunday Rachel joined me after church as we headed out to some old friends and something new. We started with our own local winery, David Hill, which is literally about a 5 minute drive up the hill from our house. Every year they do a chocolate, Pinot and Port tasting featuring hand made chocolates by the tasting room manager Michele, and of course their great wines. This year they paired different chocolate offerings with one of their 2006 Reserve Pinot Noir, the wonderful 2006 Merlot, Jason's new Ruby port and the usual muscat port. All were excellent, although I thought that the muscat was slightly bitter by itself. However, it was an amazing pairing with Michele's chocolate with Grand Marnier.

We weren't sure where we wanted to go next, so we headed south toward the Dundee Hills (there's always good wine there!). We had tried Winderlea wines a couple of years ago just after they'd bought the old Goldschmidt vineyard and built their tasting room. At the time, we weren't very impressed, but wanted to go back and try them again since we know that great wine can come from that vineyard. Today they were pairing gourmet cupcakes with the Pinot and the tasting room was quite crowded. We found a spot at the bar that turned out to be right next to some swim parents that Rachel knew from another swim club. They were out tasting also, and we had a nice chat with them while we tasted. We started out with a wonderful 2007 Chardonnay - lightly oaked with great fruit (apple and tropical fruit) and good acidity - yum! This was followed by 3 Pinot Noirs, all of which were really quite nice. Either our palates had changed since we last tasted their wines, or the wine has improved. The 2007 Ana vineyard PN was earthy with red fruit, the 2007 Winderlea Estate PN was fairly light with subtle fruit, and the 2008 Dundee Hills PN had a hint of earthiness and bright red fruits. We discovered that their winemaker is Robert Brittan, whose own label PN we had tasted and liked at the Carlton Winemaker's Studio in January (oops, I forgot to write a blog entry about that!). All in all, a very pleasant surprise. By the way, we saved the cupcakes for the boys.

Just down Worden Hill Road from Winderlea is Crumbled Rock Winery, a relatively new kid on the block. The Juliard Vineyard has been producing great Pinot grapes for years and had been under contract to Dick Erath, but in 2007, the owners decided to build a small winery and start making wine commercially. 2007 was their first vintage under their own label, and it was pretty good. We also got to barrel taste the 2008, and I think it's going to be excellent. We'll be back once they've released it. Because they only had the one wine, they invited 2 other vineyard owners to come taste with them - Deux Vert and Cleo's Hill. We've been drinking wine made from Deux Vert grapes for years (Elemental Cellars and Roots to name a couple) and it was fun to meet the vineyard owners Mike and Patty Green. Mike was tasting a Melon de Bourgogne made by Macindoe Family Cellars, and was looking for the usual confusion on our faces when he mentioned the grape variety. Instead, we looked pleased, and said "OK, great." "You are familiar with Melon??" he said incredulously. We explained that we very much enjoyed Melon, and had tried various wines from Elemental Cellars, De Ponte, Panther Creek, and Roots. He was floored and took an instant liking to us. He meets one person every few months who has ever even heard of the grape, much less fans. Anyway, the wine was fantastic - crisp and acidic with nice clean fruit. His wife was also making Tempranillo from grapes on their property (another of our favorite varietals) and we tried both the 2007 and 2008. Both were great, but the 2008 was a standout with spice and pepper. We'll definitely make it a point to attend any upcoming events at their vineyard (they promised tapas in the vineyard this summer - how cool would that be!). The other vineyard making their own wine was Cleo's Hill. I could swear we've tasted them before, maybe at 12th and Maple, or somewhere else, but I couldn't remember. The vineyard owner said that we looked familiar to her, but she couldn't remember where either. They had a couple of very nice Pinot Noirs also. It's always so much fun to talk to the grape growers themselves, and we had a fantastic time here.

Our last stop of the day was Vista Hills - one of the most beautiful tasting rooms in the Willamette Valley. We've has their wine a couple of times, and it was good, but not great. They have their wine made by several different winemakers including Laurent Montalieu, Michael Stevenson of Panther Creek, and Isabelle Dutartre of De Ponte. Most of their Pinot Noirs that we've tasted made by Laurent have an incredible nose, nice mid-palate, and almost no finish (where did it go?), although today they had a bit longer finish. Michael's wines were all very good, but the surprise of the day was the last wine that wasn't even on the tasting list. We can usually build a pretty good rapport with the pourer if he or she knows anything about wine, and we had a great talk with the guy here. He told us he had one more wine that wasn't on the list that he'd be happy to let us try. It was their 2007 Saga Hills Pinot Noir, and it was wonderful - big and fruity for an '07, but very structured and well balanced with a long finish. We figured it was another of Michael's wines, but it turned out to have been made by Isabelle from De Ponte. This was surprising because we just haven't been all that impressed by De Ponte wines in the past, so we may need to go back and taste again sometime. With a trunk full of wine and smiles on our faces, we headed home.

Today was a day of pleasant surprises. We had expected David Hill to be good, and it was, but the other wineries all turned out better than expected. Winderlea and Vista Hills were places that we had visited in the past and had come away with our socks still on our feet, but today both exceeded expectations, and we'll no doubt be back again. Crumbled Rock, however, was easily the high point of the day - friendly people who are passionate about what they do, and some really nice wine. It was such a pleasure to talk with the Greens from Deux Vert, and we're really looking forward to Crumbled Rock's 2008 PN.

Pre-thanksgiving wine tasting trip

We usually go camping over Thanksgiving weekend every year, but that means we miss out on one of the biggest wine tasting weekends of the year. Fortunately, many wineries also open their doors to club members and past customers on the weekend before Thanksgiving, and Rachel and I ventured out to pick up the futures that we'd bought earlier in the year and to taste through some wines.

We took along a recording GPS unit, and I ran it through my "Automatic Memories" software which extracts details of where you stopped and creates a skeletal blog to help you remember where you went. Because I'm actually writing this about 3 months after the fact, I'm relying on the auto-blog to remember where we went. I'll fill in few details as I remember them.

11/21/2009 9:38:02 AM
We left home heading toward Ribbon Ridge.

11/21/2009 10:03:17 AM
We arrived at Patricia Green Cellars. We had purchased several bottles of Pinot Noir futures from her, and came to pick them up. We also had some marvelous Sauvignon Blanc. It was funny because Tim was on his way to a swim meet with a friend, and apparently they drove by the winery. Just because it was a winery, Tim said, "Hey, maybe my parents are there" not having any idea where we actually went. But, sure enough, they looked up the hill to the parking lot and saw my car!

11/21/2009 10:55:32 AM
We started driving.

11/21/2009 11:02:02 AM
We arrived at Penner-Ash Wine Cellars. They always put on quite a spread that usually includes barrel tasting and good snacks, and today was no exception. We tasted through several of their blends and single vineyard Pinot Noirs, and got barrel samples of both some 08's and 09's.

11/21/2009 11:49:47 AM
We started driving.


11/21/2009 11:59:02 AM
We arrived at Shea Vineyard. We have long been fans of the wines made from Shea Vineyard fruit, and we also enjoy several of the wines that they produce themselves, especially with their new winemaker Drew Voit (previously an assistant winemaker at Domaine Serene). We had purchased futures of their 2008 Homer Pinot Noir and were here to pick it up. They were offering tastes while we were there, and it was just as good, if not better that we remembered it. Those bottles are going to disappear into the cellar for a few years! By the way, I recently learned that the Homer name refers to it being their best effort to hit it out of the park - a homer. Hmm, not mythical at all.

11/21/2009 12:34:22 PM
We started driving. As you can see by the GPS-generated time stamp, it was lunch time and we were getting hungry. We dropped down into Lafayette and...

11/21/2009 12:46:27 PM
We arrived at American Cafe. This is a little roadside cafe, and from the name and copious US flags decorating the sign and windows, we should have figured out what we were in for. The food was pretty standard diner fare (I had a patty melt), but the decor was right out of a right-wing propaganda commercial. Lots of pictures of eagles, flags, fighter jets, soldiers, etc. with "my country right or wrong" slogans all over the place. I half expected to see Rush sitting at the next table (fortunately, he wasn't there). Nice enough people, I'm sure, but ya think they might have a blind spot (wink, wink)?

11/21/2009 1:27:27 PM
We started driving.

11/21/2009 1:49:52 PM
We arrived at Dukes Family Vineyard. This is a fairly new winery that is run by a very nice family who recently moved here from California to make wine. They have recently re-built an old barn on their property as a winery. They're not quite ready to make wine there, but should be in a year or two. They were previewing their 2007 Pinot Noir (very dark, smoky and earthy) along with their second label Syrah. They had invited their neighbors, Iota Wines, to pour also, and they were very nice people with a good Pinot Noir. The funny thing is that they put out an incredible food spread with tri-tip steak, mushroom soup, and a bunch of breads and cheeses. If we'd known that, we'd have skipped the American Cafe and come right here.

11/21/2009 2:34:07 PM
We started driving.

11/21/2009 3:12:27 PM
We arrived at Lachini Vineyards. This is a vineyard on Calkins Lane that we have liked very much. They make a number of different estate grown Pinot Noirs, along with some big reds using Washington fruit. They also put out great food. Sadly, the wine was a little bit disappointing this time. It wasn't bad, but it just wasn't as special as we had remembered it in the past. Perhaps our palates were tired, or something, but it just didn't have that zing to it like usual. We'll have to check in again.

11/21/2009 3:45:32 PM
We started driving.

11/21/2009 3:49:02 PM
We arrived at Arborbrook Vineyards. Our last stop of the day, we were here to pick up some futures of their 2008 777 Estate Pinot Noir. We still like their wine very much, but they too have suffered a bit in our memory. Their 2007 777 estate Pinot Noir is just not as intense and interesting as it was in earlier vintages. Maybe it's just an example of a sub-par 2007 Oregon Pinot. The 2008 futures that we picked up seem to be much better, so maybe they just had an off year. However, their 2007 Vintner's Select Pinot turned out quite well and had that dark earthiness to it that we tasted in their 2006 estate. Maybe the siphoning off of the better barrels into the select is diluting the estate? Fascinating to think about. We'll keep an eye on them.

11/21/2009 4:15:52 PM
We started driving.

11/21/2009 4:45:27 PM
We arrived home. A long day, but for the most part, excellent wines.

Pre-Memorial Day Wine Tasting

Memorial Day weekend is the big event in the Oregon wine lover's calendar. Nearly every winery in the state opens its doors and hosts an open house - many offering live music, barrel tasting, cave tours, tasty food, or other special perks. It's a great opportunity to visit many wineries that are not normally open to the public, but unfortunately things can get pretty crowded. However, for many years, the weekend before memorial day has been the time that those in the know have traveled out to visit those special wineries, getting to taste newly released wines or barrel samples without having to brave the crowds. More and more people are figuring this out, but it's still less crowded than Memorial weekend itself. Rachel and I ventured out this past weekend while the boys were at a swim meet in Washington, and had a whole series of wonderful winery visits.

Unfortunately, I forgot to take any pictures, but try to envision the perfect day in wine country - clear skies, temperatures in the mid-70's, bud break on the vines, and rolling hills of red clover. It really doesn't get much better than this. We kept gloating to ourselves, "We actually live here!"

We started out on Saturday around 11am and drove to Penner-Ash winery. We have tasted there once before, but aren't terribly familiar with their wines. As we drove up the dirt road to the winery, I was somewhat concerned that we might be the only people there, it being before noon and all. Not to worry - their parking lot was full and cars were parked all along the road. Fortunately a car was pulling out of the parking lot just as we got there, and we got a great spot. Because we are on their mailing list and had RSVP'd for the event, we were told "you can just bypass the pay station." I like that! They really put on quite an event. Upstairs they were tasting their 2007 Riesling (off dry and crisp), 2008 Viognier (yeasty and interesting) and the 2008 Roséo rosé (fairly interesting). Downstairs in the winery itself they were serving a variety of their released reds along with a bunch of barrel samples. Most of the released Pinot Noirs were 2007s, and while there are some really nice '07's out there, most are more toward the subtle and restrained side rather than in your face like warmer vintages. We're told that this is a more typical Oregon vintage, and I appreciate it for what it is, but in general I tend to prefer the warmer vintages. Our favorites were the Carabella Vineyard (bright fruit, rose) and the Shea vineyard (darker and earthier, but certainly more subtle than some years). They also had a barrel selection called Pas de Nom which was very elegant, refined, and smooth, but perhaps not worth the $90 they wanted as a pre-order. The 2008 barrel samples were fun in that they were tasting the individual clones before blending. We thought that the Pommard clones were all fruit up front without much on the finish, the 114 clones added "zing" but not much else, and the 777 clones gave big fruit and some smokiness to the wine. The 115 clone from Bela Vida vineyard was really wonderful, and seemed to combine good fruit up front with a longer finish. Finally, they tasted a 2006 Syrah from southern Oregon that was very smooth for a Syrah, almost like a Pinot. In addition to the wine, the snacks were incredible - great cheeses, a carmelized onion tart, and a strange cheesy french toast among others. This was a very well done event, and the price (free) made it perfect. We brought home a bottle of the 2007 Shea vineyard Pinot Noir.

Next, we headed over to Calkins Ln. Faithful readers will recall that I attended the Calkins Ln event last month to pre-taste some of the wines. Our first stop was Arborbrook. Again, because we are on their mailing list, we had received a complementary invitation. In addition to the wines I tasted in April, they had just released their 2007 Vintner's select Pinot Noir and were barrel tasting the 2008 Estate Pinot Noir. The '07 Pinot Noirs that had been released so far had been good, but not as intense as I had been hoping. The Vintner's Select (a selection of the 4 best barrels) was everything I thought had been missing from the other 2007s: much more intense flavor and more smokiness/earthiness. For the 2008 barrel tasting, Dave had 2 samples: one that had been harvested in early October and one that had been harvested in late October. The earlier harvest showed more structure and layers, while the later harvest was fuller and rounder - almost sweeter although both were fully dry. Then he blended the 2 together for a really nice wine. We bought futures for the 2008 estate (the first time we've ever bought wine futures) and look forward to a really nice wine.

After Arborbrook, we drove up Calkins Ln and in less than a mile came to Lachini. In addition to the wonderful wines that I tasted during the Calkins Ln event last month, they were also tasting some of their older "library wines." The current releases were inside the tent that they usually set up adjacent to the barn, but they were pouring the library wines out under a portable gazebo on the grass surrounded by the vineyards. Not bad, not bad. They were pouring 2003-2005 Estate Pinot Noir as well as the 2005 Giselel's Cuveé. We have tasted the 2003 and love it (still have a couple bottles left), but had never tried the '04 or '05. The '04 was very spicy and interesting, while the 2005 was layered and more subtle. We tried to buy both the '04 and '05, but they were only selling the '04 in magnums, and we weren't prepared to do that. Near the lawn area, Lachini has a wonderful flagstone patio surrounding a huge oak tree. We grabbed a couple of lamb-kabobs and a lemongrass soda and settled in under the oak tree for a rest. It was so quiet and peaceful sitting there in the vineyard!

As we were turning onto hwy 240, we saw a sign that indicated that Shea Cellars was open. The Shea vineyard has some of the best Pinot Noir grapes in Oregon and they sell to many of the top producers. We first experienced wine from Shea grapes in the memorable Panther Creek 2003 Shea Pinot Noir, and we tend to collect Shea Pinots whenever we can. Shea also use some of their fruit to make their own wine under the Shea Wine Cellars label. They were tasting their 2007 Willamette Valley blend Pinot as well as a very nice Chardonnay. In addition, they had a number of barrel samples of the 2008 Pinot. The Chardonnay and the released '07 Pinot were very nice, but not spectacular. We again enjoyed tasting the clonal differences in the 2008 barrel samples, but were just blown away when we got to the 2008 Homer sample. Homer is their biggest, best Pinot blend, and I remember tasting the barrel sample of the '07 Homer last year and not being all that impressed. Well, the 2008 was amazing - big dark Shea fruit, with earth, smoke and minerals - really a wonderful wine. Given that we'd already primed the futures pump at Arborbrook, we also bought futures of the Homer. It's going to be really fun to open a bottle every year and see how it's evolving.

Moving on, we headed south toward Dundee and stopped at Maresh Red Barn. The Maresh vineyard is one of the oldest Pinot Noir vineyards in Oregon and they sell their fruit to some of the top wineries. In addition, they keep back some grapes and have it made (often by these same top wineries) into their own label wine. We had a delightful Pinot Gris that was light and crisp with lots of acid, and a couple of very nice Pinot Noirs.

Finally, we came into Dundee and stopped at Le Cadeau/Aubichon. This was the first time we'd tasted there, and had a nice chat with one of the four winemakers. Basically, they have a vineyard that they've divided amongst the four, and each takes his blocks and makes a Pinot Noir in the style they want. It was interesting to taste the different styles that the various winemakers produced from similar fruit.

That was enough tasting for the day, but we still had an appointment at the Scott Paul winery in Carlton for their Grand Cru Burgundy tasting class that evening. In preparation, we headed to the Golden Valley Brewery for dinner (no, I didn't have any beer). I had Tim's favorite burger there (the blackened bleu burger) and Rachel had a nice Cobb salad.

We arrived at Scott Paul a little before 6 and sat down at the long front table. Scott was pouring a nice Puligny Montrachet as a starter. Scott then talked about the various villages in Burgundy and their associated Grand Cru vineyards. Interestingly, it is the vineyard itself that has the Grand Cru designation, not the wine. Some of these vineyards are owned by many different producers, and each farms his rows and makes his wine the way he wants. The result is that just because a wine has "Grand Cru" on the label, doesn't mean it's going to be good. It just means that it comes from a vineyard that has the potential to make great wine. We tasted through 6 different wines, and all but the first were just wonderful. However, at the end of the day, perhaps my palate just isn't sophisticated enough to believe that the $125 to almost $300 a bottle is worth it. We really enjoyed trying the wines though, and it was obvious they were great wines, but we didn't buy anything.

All in all, a nearly perfect day. Good weather, great wine, fewer crowds, and a nice day out with Rachel. We're still looking forward to trying a lot of good wine over Memorial Day weekend, and this was a great warm-up!