Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
-
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2006 Pinot Noir Willamette Valley is medium ruby-colored with an expressive perfume of spice box, earth notes, cherry, and raspberry. Friendly and easy-going, it also has good concentration and depth leading to a lengthy, fruit-filled close. Drink it over the next eight years.
Ponzi Vineyards remains a reference point for American Pinot Noir with winemaker Luisa Ponzi at the top of her game.
-
Wine Spectator
On the lighter side, with floral and roasted beet aromas wafting through the cherry and red berry flavors, persisting nicely on the elegant finish. Drink now through 2013.
Home of some of the planet’s most amazingly elegant and expressive Pinot noir, the Willamette Valley is a pastoral, mixed landscape of green, bucolic rolling hills, dramatic forestlands and small, independent, friendly wine growers. As a leader in environmental stewardship, the valley has some of the nation’s most protective land use policies, with two-thirds of its vineyards farmed sustainably and over half, organically. While the valley claims a cool, continental climate, and is heavily influenced by the cold, moist winds of the Pacific Ocean, its warm and dry summers allow for the steady, even ripening of Pinot noir.
The potential of Willamette Valley Pinot noir continues to attract the investment of serious growers and winemakers both locally and from abroad, as naturally the finished wines bring accolades from professionals and enthusiasts. With a range of styles from delicate dried cherry, raspberry and hibiscus to stronger notes of truffle, mocha, plum and spice, a fine Willamette Valley Pinot noir is a perfect expression of both character and grace.