Oregon Pinot Noir Tasting at Wine Watch

God made Cabernet Sauvignon, whereas the devil made Pinot Noir.
- Andre Tchelistcheff, Chief Winemaker at Beaulieu from 1938 – 1973

I remember my trip to Oregon in the summer of 1994 for the IPNC (International Pinot Noir Celebration) this is one of the best wine parties that I have ever attended. The festival is limited to 500 attendees as it is hosted by McMinnville College and that is all they can accommodate in their lecture facilities. I remember not only were the quality of the wines at the highest level but the people in attendance were some of the most passionate Pinot Noir lovers that I had ever come across. And although winemaking began in the 19th century in this state it is only recently that its potential has been recognized by the rest of the world.

It was in 1979 when serious wine producers started to look at the potential of this area as Eyrie Vineyards' 1975 South Block Pinot Noir placed in the top 10 of Burgundy-style wines at the Gault-Millau French Wine Olympiades, and was rated the top Pinot Noir. This send the news around the wine world and shortly after Robert Drouhin, head of Burgundy's legendary Maison Joseph Drouhin, was visiting America's west coast promoting the Drouhin Burgundies. The California wine industry was just starting to receive its first recognition back then, but there was little if anything going on in Oregon. Robert's first visit to the Northwest and its earliest vineyards left him with the impression that it quite possibly would be Oregon, not California, that would ultimately prove to be the best place to grow the great grape of Burgundy - Pinot noir.

Inspired by his trip to Oregon and the results of 1979 tasting that was held in Paris, where, for the first time, the best new Oregon Pinot noirs were tasted in competition with the finest Burgundies. Robert decided to hold his own blind tasting in 1980 at the Drouhin cellars in France, with several of the best Oregon Pinot noirs going up against the finest Drouhin Grand Crus. It was a Drouhin Grand Cru that took first place this time, but an Oregon wine (the now legendary 1975 Eyrie Vineyards South Block) placed 2nd by a very narrow margin with the French experts. News of this tasting brought the first widespread international attention to Oregon Pinot noir.

After a few years time Robert's daughter Véronique just graduated with an advanced degree in enology from the University of Dijon, and wanted to expand her experience by working in Oregon. Véronique interned with Adelsheim Vineyards, Bethel Heights, and Eyrie for the 1986 vintage. Later on, Robert mentioned to David Adelsheim that it might be interesting to buy a piece of land in Oregon, to see what it might produce. What started as a passing thought began its transformation into reality when Adelsheim phoned the Drouhins in Beaune not long thereafter to tell them of a property that was for sale that they might be interested in. The rest is history and with one of Burgundies foremost wine producing families moving to Oregon the writing was on the wall that this wine producing region would soon get its much deserved recognition as one of the world's premier Pinot Noir growing regions.

Today, the state of Oregon in the United States has established an international reputation for its production of wine. Oregon has several different growing regions within the state's borders which are well-suited to the cultivation of grapes; additional regions straddle the border between Oregon and the states of Washington and Idaho. Wine making dates back to pioneer times in the 1840s, with commercial production beginning in the 1960s.

American Viticultural Areas entirely within the state include the Willamette Valley, Southern Oregon, Umpqua Valley, and Rogue Valley AVAs. Parts of the Columbia Gorge, Walla Walla Valley, and Snake River Valley AVAs lie within Oregon. Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris are the top two grapes grown, with over 16,000 tons (14,515 metric tons) harvested in 2005. As of 2005, Oregon wine makers produced over 1.5 million cases combined.

Currently there are over 300 wineries in Oregon and a bustling tourism industry has developed around wine tasting. Much of the tourism focuses on the wineries and tasting rooms in and around the Yamhill Valley southwest of Portland.
You don’t have to travel to Oregon to see some of the top wines being made here as we have brought the wines to you. Tonight we will taste over 30 of this state’s top wines and Wine Watch Catering's Toni Lampasone is making a few tasty treats to accompany the tasting wines and the fee for this event is $35 + tax, for reservations call 954-523-9463.

Oregon Pinot Noir Tasting at Wine Watch
Friday, April 19, 2013
7:00 PM

Tasting Wines

Alloro Pinot Noir Riservata 2010
Price $49.50        Sale $43.56          Case $505

Intense cherries and blackcherries, rose petal, cracked black pepper, and Italian spice, with notes of mint, smoke, and sarsaparilla root.  This is a very full-body wine, with structured acidity, and broad, silky tannin with great persistence.  This wine has a very long finish with a melange of black cherries, clove, cinnamon, cola, and smoke, with floral undertones.  Like the 2010 Pinot Noir, this wine was crafted to capture all the same elements that express our estate, but was blended to build additional body, weight, and texture, as well as add even more complexity through the use of more new oak.  300 Cases Produced.

Eminent Pinot Noir Domaine 2010
Price $45.00        Sale $39.60          Case $495

Bright ruby. Spicy, racy, bold aromas of dark cherry. Warm vintage Burgundian red fruit core, with plenty of weight and pent-up muscle. Rich and energetic with the excellent persistence.

Anne Amie Cuvee A pinot noir 2011
Price $24.75        Sale $21.78          Case $253

A vineyard is made up of many microclimates that produce wines with different characteristics and our blends reflect that diversity.  Each vineyard block is carefully matched to a suited barrel.  Our Cuvée A Pinot Noir is a selection of our most forward and charming barrels of Pinot noir, blended in a style meant to capture their bright, fresh flavors and aromas.

Winery notes:  red cherry, strawberry, cedar, forest floor, sandalwood, leather.  juicy, red cherry, red plum, rose petal, forest floor, great acidity, with a long, smooth, silky tannins

Brittan Vineyard 2010 pinot "basalt"
Price $48.75        Sale $42.90          Case $498

The Basalt block comes from the parts of the vineyard that have the heaviest concentration of broken sub-marine basalts, resulting in low yielding vines that produce intense flavors and layers of complexity. The 2010 vintage in the Willamette Valley was a cool and late ripening vintage that produced wines with vibrant flavors of raspberries, boysenberries and exotic spice notes of anise and cardamom, with undertones of minerality, gunpowder and gravel dust.  The clarity of the fruit is immediate on the palette, with bright acid leading into a supple but deeply structured mid-palate.  The acid-driven core rounded by soft tannins carry through purposefully yet lithely, giving way to a lengthy and elegant finish of dark raspberry and plum.

The Pinot Noir for the Basalt Block consists predominantly of the Pommard selection, blended with clonal selections 667, 777 and 115.  The vines are planted on Riparia Gloire, 3309 and 101-14 rootstocks.  The fruit for the 2010 vintage was picked in late October and allowed to cold soak for five days before fermentation began.  After fermentation, the wine was aged in French Oak barrels, approximately 25% new.  The wine went through malo-lactic fermentation in barrel and was aged for 9 months prior to bottling.

Raptor Ridge Pinot Noir Reserve 2010
Price $33.00        Sale $29.04          Case $337

Winery Notes:  In the glass, this wine is a deep garnet with slight purple hue. Aromas of black cherries, unctuous plums, and figs juxtapose neatly against brooding scents of mushroom, smoke, cola, and cumin. On the attack, these aromas combine with brown spices to unearth memories of baking a cobbler in Dutch oven over a campfire. This wine has a rich mouth feel, and is worthy of aging, or enjoying now, with or without camping equipment.

Florida Wine Company

2010 Bergstrom Pinot Noir Cumberland Reserve
Price $47.50        Sale $41.80          Case $485

"The 2010 Cumberland Reserve is our tenth vintage of this flagship blend from Bergstrom Wines and is comprised mostly of the de Lancellotti, Shea and Bergstrom Vineyards. The wine has a vibrant and youthful ruby red color and has a very expressive nose of dark chocolate, black cherry and dark raspberry fruits, sweet violet flowers and a toasty oak driven vanilla spice. The wine is energetic with pure flavors of dark cherry and raspberry which echo on the richly textured palate and are framed in by pie spices, dried rose petal and earth flavors and nuances. The finish on this wine is long and promising with persistence and mouthwatering food-friendliness now but the structure to age and drink well for another 10+ years. Drink now-2022+."

2011 Bergstrom Pinot Noir Shea Vineyard
Price $57.00        Sale $50.16          Case $582

This is a wine for the ages that will drink well for twenty years if aged properly. The perfumed sweetness of the diverse and complex aromas is intoxicatingly delicious and although this wine is lacking the meat and smokehouse aromas that are hallmark of this great site in past vintages, I believe that they will develop with time in the bottle as this wine is currently very youthful and taught. The incense and perfume in the nose appear again on the palate and flavors of wild cane berries and strawberry, rhubarb pie. The finish is textural and layered with the classic Willakenzie soil gravelly tannic backbone and juicy ripe acids which will ensure a great longevity for this wine.

2011 OVERVIEW 2011 was the latest, coolest, and most prolonged vintage in Oregon's 45 year history of winemaking. The vintage and the wines are reminiscent of 2008, 2007, 1999 and 1993, although it is truly unlike any other vintage we have ever seen. The wines will prove to be some of Oregon's greatest and most age worthy wines ever crafted.

This vintage was one that put all Oregon farmers and winemakers to the ultimate test. Although, if the work was done well in the field and the winery and the yields were low, the wines will prove that Oregon's Willamette Valley is truly the most authentic, unique and successful cool climate wine region in the new world, ideal for growing and producing world-class Chardonnay and Pinot Noir.

2011 Bergstrom Pinot Noir Gregory ranch
Price $62.50        Sale $55.00          Case $638

Like its predecessor, our second release from this amazing estate vineyard site in the Yamhill-Carlton AVA shows enormous potential (our first release in 2010 earned the highest score from Robert Parker for a 2010 Oregon Pinot Noir!). Very dark black ruby with a violet hue, this wine has a high-pitched floral bouquet that lies somewhere between a meadow full of spring flowers and Christmas potpourri. Bright and energetic aromas of red currant and tart cherry mingle effortlessly with darker flavors of blackberry pie, cola, graham and incense-like spices. There is a great dichotomy within this Pinot Noir between coexisting high-toned and bass-toned elements that give it an irresistable intrigue. Laced with fine and ripe tannins and framed by a delicate but mouthwatering acidity, this wine holds great promise for ageing over the coming years.  DRINK NOW 2013-2023+

2011 Haden Fig Willamette Valley Pinot Noir
Price: $28.50       Sale $25.08          Case $291

his years Willamette Valley blend is roughly 50% Cancilla Vineyard, 25% Bjornson Vineyard and 25% Johan Vineyard. Aged in French oak for 11 months (10% new) and bottled unfined and unfiltered it displays delicate cherry and raspberry aromas and a subtle forest floor note. It's showing beautifully now and should improve nicely for the next 2-3 years.

2010 Evesham Wood Cuvee J Pinot Noir
Price: $47.00       Sale $41.36          Case $480

(92 points)  Constituting a marriage of six ostensibly superior barrels from the estate vineyard (two of them new but discreetly-integrated), the Evesham Wood 2010 Pinot Noir Cuvee J smells alluringly of rose petal, red licorice, smoky black tea, and dark berries, all of which reconvene on a tenderly-textured palate and lead to a finish of impressively juicy and subtly interactive length. I suspect this at once soothing, stimulating beauty will be well worth following for at least a dozen years. (8/ 2012) Robert Parker's Wine Advocate

King Estate

King Estate Pinot Noir Acrobat 2011
Price $18.00        Sale $15.84          Case $184

Acrobat is wine born to introduce even more people to the power and grace of Pinot Gris and Pinot Noir. Grown responsibly in the gorgeous hills and valleys of Western Oregon, these wines work wonderfully with food of all kinds and are equally satisfying on their own.

NOSE features pretty spices vanilla, cherry, strawberry, cranberry, chocolate aromas with plum, toasted oak, raspberry, coffee, cocoa.  The mouth features viscous, tannic, round acid and good length through the finish

King Estate Pinot Noir Signature 2011
Price $28.50        Sale $25.08          Case $291

One of the most well known bottlings of Pinot Noir in America. Organic pinot noir from our estate vineyard blended with grapes from sustainably farmed vineyards throughout Oregon, where grapes are grown to our strictly enforced standards.

Nose features toast, oak, black cherry, baking spice, leather, pomegranate and grapefruit with raspberry, eucalyptus, tobacco leaf, toast cherry, citrus.  The mouth features soft tannins, viscous mouth, lingering fruit, medium long finish

King Estate Pinot Noir Domaine 2009 
Price $64.50        Sale $56.75          Case $658

Our Domaine Pinot Noir is produced in highly limited quantities and exemplifies what Oregon Pinot Noir can be when quality is championed above all considerations.

Appearance: deep garnet red  Aroma: spice, strawberry, toast, rose petal, sweet raisin, plum,  brambleberry, mocha, light caramel, hazelnut  Flavor: cranberry, raspberry, cherry, orange citrus, dried  cranberry, currant  Mouthfeel: soft entry, medium body, long viscous finish

Pali Wine Company

Pali Pinot Noir Alphabits 2011
Price: $22.25       Sale $19.58          Case $227

The 2011 vintage in the Willamette Valley was very similar to 2010, which was a typical one for Oregon.  The long, cool growing season produced wines of great structure and balance as opposed to 2008 and 2009, where the wines were dominated by up front, ripe, almost candied fruit.  The 2011 "Alphabets" is deep garnet in color, with a nose of dried cherry, cranberry, cinnamon and a touch of smoke.  The palate shows Bing cherry, red raspberry and white pepper, with bright acidity, firm tannins and excellent structure.

Pali Pinot Noir Shea Vineyard 2010
Price: $57.00       Sale $50.16          Case $582

The light red color is no indication of the expressiveness and weight of this beautiful Shea Vineyard Oregon Pinot Noir. The wine shows aromas of bright fresh raspberry, white pepper, lightly toasted oak and red currants. Mouth-coating tannins hold on with full flavors of sweet cherry and spice.

Pali Pinot Noir Momtazi 2008
Price: $53.25       Sale $46.86          Case $544

This is a big, fruit-driven wine, brimming with vibrant aromas of black cherry, raspberry, pomegranate and dried cherries.  Super-concentrated, juicy Bing cherries, black currants, licorice, brown sugar and slate envelope on the palate.  This massively rich wine has plenty of acid to keep it in balance, and earthy undertones hint at its Oregonian roots.

Stacole

J. Christopher Chardonnay Willamette Valley 2011
Price: $22.00       Sale $19.36          Case $225

When Jay first produced this fresh, clean Chardonnay with no oak or malolactic fermentation, some called him a lunatic. But its local popularity proves that he wasn’t so crazy after all.

J. Christopher Sauvignon Blanc Willamette Valley 2011
Price: $22.00       Sale $19.36          Case $225

Sauvignon Blanc is a specialty at J. Christopher. Although not widely planted in Oregon’s Northern Willamette Valley, Sauvignon Blanc is ideal for the area’s climate, as this wine proves. Made in the clean, fresh style of France’s Loire Valley, this wine is fermented in stainless steel and does not go through malolactic fermentation. The result is a classic, highly aromatic Sauvignon Blanc with perfect ripeness and excellent acidity.

J. Christopher Pinot Noir Willamette Valley 2010
Price: $33.00       Sale $29.04          Case $337

The Willamette Valley Pinot Noir is the flagship J. Christopher wine. The 2009 is blended from excellent vineyards in three of the Willamette Valley’s AVAs: Dundee Hills, Chehalem Mountains and Eola Hills. Made with native fermentations and up to 18 months of barrel time, this is classic Oregon Pinot Noir.  Appellation: Dundee Hills, Chehalem Mountains and Eola Hills

Soter "North Valley" Pinot Noir 2010
Price: $32.00       Sale $28.16          Case $327

(90 points) Soter’s 2010 Pinot Noir North Valley is informed by fruit from five growers in disparate sectors whom winemaker James Cahill says have proven over the last half dozen years to be those with whom a collaboration that demands organic certification, strict quality control and a common vision proved viable. “A couple of our growers are dear friends,” Cahill adds, “with whom I’d like to think that collaborating on this wine has been a mutually satisfying relationship close to the heart.” The bottled result is certainly highly satisfying. Nut oils and vanilla join ripe, fresh red berries on the nose and on a satin-textured yet refreshing palate, with a savory streak of salinity serving to activate the salivary glands in a delightfully long finish. This is how an “intro-level” Willamette Pinot should taste: not just encouraging the next sip but also a move up the qualitative ladder to single vineyard selections based on the experience of an allure that only ever accrues to Pinot Noir. Enjoy over the next 3-5 years. - The Wine Advocate

Soter "Mineral Springs Ranch" Pinot Noir 2010
Price: $55.00       Sale $48.40          Case $561

Our 2010 Mineral Springs Ranch Pinot Noir is a reflection of a classic Oregon vintage that delivered ample wines with both density and purity.  The season was generous enough to provide us with fully mature grapes that could make a wine of convincing ripeness.  Harvest was completed on October 25 and required the assistance of friends and family to bring in all the Estate fruit prior to the onset of rain that evening.

Ruby red with brilliant clarity, this wine reveals characteristic Mineral Springs Vineyard aromas of spice, red-raspberry and cranberry fruit and a classic Oregon earthiness.  The entry is silken, even mouth-coating, and juicy, ripe berry flavors dominate the palate.  Lively acidity reminiscent of fresh peaches and fine tannin are in perfect balance.  Chocolate, earth and fruit linger with pleasing persistence.  -James Cahill, Winemaker

Penner Ash Pinot Noir Willamette Valley 2010
Price: $51.00       Sale $44.88          Case $520

(91 Points) Bing cherry, plums, and exotic spices on the nose.  Framed by fine, textured tannins that lead to a creamy palate of red berries, bramble, black fruit, and dark chocolate.  Balanced acidity throughout that finishes long with tobacco and wood spice.  Stephen Tanzers International Wine Cellar

Abacela Albariño Umpqua Valley 2011
Price: $17.00       Sale $14.96          Case $174

Winemaker Notes:  This wine exhibits aromas and flavors of crisp apples, pears, yellow peaches, lemon, kiwi, and delicate white flowers all carried on a frame that skirts the razors edge between creamy textures and steely minerality. Great with seafood, shellfish, hard cheeses, Spanish style tapas, and much more!

Abacela Tempranillo Umpqua Valley 2009
Price: $19.00       Sale $16.72          Case $194

Winemaker Notes:  This is the eighth release of our fruit forward, less tannic and earlier maturing Tempranillo, which was delicious upon bottling. The fruit sources included our West Slope block. The beautiful aromatics, focused red fruit flavors, and seamless finish will continue to improve over the next four to six years.

Menu

Duck Confit Spring Rolls with savory Wild berry compote

Chicken Taquito with roasted red peppers and avocado lime aioli

Chinese five spice poached shrimp and chive crispy wonton with hoisin cardamom syrup

Crispy wonton brie cheese puff with cherry pie dipping sauce