Winemaker Notes
On the nose, cherry, cola, spicebox, vanilla and fig. The palate is silky, smooth, vibrant and creamy.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Spectator
Plush and expressive, with supple raspberry and cherry flavors accented by orange peel and spicy cinnamon details. Drink now through 2024.
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James Suckling
Fragrant pinot with orange zest and red flowers, as well as wild red berries, leading to a palate that has a fresh and zesty feel. Really juicy finish.
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Wine Enthusiast
A diverse clonal mix adds texture and detail to this estate-grown wine. The fruit is a bit on the lean side, with flavors of red currant and wild raspberries. The tannins carry an earthy, herbal tone on through the extended finish. The best drinking window should be 2022 to 2030.
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
Home of the first Pinot noir vineyard of the Willamette Valley, planted by David Lett of Eyrie Vineyard in 1966, today the Dundee Hills AVA remains the most densely planted AVA in the valley (and state). To its north sits the Chehalem Valley and to its south, runs the Willamette River. Within the region’s 12,500 acres, about 1,700 are planted to vine on predominantly basalt-based, volcanic, Jory soil.