Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Medium ruby-purple in the glass, the 2016 Pinot Noir Slope gives up blueberry coulis, crushed blackberries, black cherries and cranberry sauce with touches of pomegranate, loamy earth, tar and charcuterie. The palate is medium-bodied with very intense flavor layers, expertly framed and fresh, finishing very long and flavorful. This will benefit from another year in bottle.
Rating: 94+ -
Wine Spectator
Graceful and delicate, featuring silky cherry and raspberry flavors, laced with orange peel and underbrush hints, building richness and structure toward fine-grained tannins. Drink now through 2029.
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James Suckling
A very modern, complex style with rich aromas of red cherries and plums, laced with baking spices, fresh forest leaves and stones. The palate has a very supple, smooth-honed feel with a creamy style of tannin, carrying fresh, red-cherry flavors in pure, bright mode. Good definition too.
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.”
Running north to south, adjacent to the Willamette River, the Eola-Amity Hills AVA has shallow and well-drained soils created from ancient lava flows (called Jory), marine sediments, rocks and alluvial deposits. These soils force vine roots to dig deep, producing small grapes with great concentration.
Like in the McMinnville sub-AVA, cold Pacific air streams in via the Van Duzer Corridor and assists the maintenance of higher acidity in its grapes. This great concentration, combined with marked acidity, give the Eola-Amity Hills wines—namely Pinot noir—their distinct character. While the region covers 40,000 acres, no more than 1,400 acres are covered in vine.