Winemaker Notes
Bursts of raspberry, pomegranate, dragon fruit and rhubarb. Spice and floral notes of gardenia, rose petal, coffee and clove. Soft and supple tannins for a mouth watering finish.
This wine is a representation of the ancient marine sediment soil series created over 200 million years by the North American plate sheering the ocean floor off of the Juan De Fuca plate as it subducts beneath. The sandstone and siltstone mother rock provide the uptake of the trace elements to create the regional identity of this Sedimentary AVA.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Spectator
Expressive and detailed, featuring a vibrant core of acidity and handsome tannins framed by cherry and tart blueberry flavors, with dusky spice accents that build tension toward refined tannins. Drink now.
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.”
Yamhill-Carlton, characterized by pastoral, rolling hills composed of shallow, quick-draining, ancient marine soil, is ideal for Pinot noir and other cool-climate-loving varieties. It is in the rain shadow of the Coast Range to its west, whose highest point climbs to an altitude of 3,500 feet. Yamhill-Carlton is actually surrounded by mountains on three sides: Chehalem Mountains to the north, the Dundee Hills to the east and the western Coast Range to its west, which, when it lets Pacific air through, serves to cool the region.
Vineyards grow on the ridges surrounding the two small communities of Yamhill and Carlton and cover about 1,200 acres of this 60,000 acre region, which roughly makes a horse-shoe shape on a map.