Red Carpet Wine - 2006 Oregon Pinot Report

RED CARPET WINE Since 1964 400 E Glenoaks Blvd Hours: Mon-Thur 10-8
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2006 Oregon Pinot Report

A few friends of RC and some staff just returned from Oregon on another “business trip.” We thought it’d be the perfect time to scope out the just released 2006 vintage and invite some folks down to our third installment of Pinot Palooza.

Domaine Drouhin We arrived in Portland around 2pm on Sunday and headed east to Patton Valley Vineyards and had a great visit with winemaker/ proprietor Monte Pitt. We asked Monte where we should have dinner and he steered us to The Painted Lady Restaurant for an amazing dining experience. The hard work started Monday morning at Domaine Drouhin. From there we went to visit Josh Bergstrom at his winery and got tuned up for a visit at Beaux Freres. There just happened to be a trade tasting at Beaux Freres and we stumbled across some past and future Pinot Palooza participants like Siltstone, Broadley and DePonte that are excited about coming down to sunny California in June. They are having a long winter this year and it was rainy the whole time we were up. We worked our Cristom way back towards the guest house and had a great visit at Stoller Vineyards. About this time we were all craving a Taylor’s Refresher Cheeseburger or Ahi burger but unfortunately there’s none in Oregon . So Phil had the Dundee Bistro whip up some Albacore Burgers for dinner and they hit the spot.

We started Tuesday off visiting Cristom and had a blast with our host John D’Anna. These are some amazing wines coming from their different vineyard blocks. Our next stop was lunch and a visit with Mark Vlossak at St. Innocent’s new facility. Mark prepared a great lunch paired with several different vintages and selections of his Pinots. We finished off with a visit to good friend Tony Soter’s winery in Mineral Springs and called it a day. Wednesday was our last day in Oregon and we finished it off in style at Domaine Serene and then Archery Summit.

What a trip! We definitely received an education on Oregon Pinots. The overall vintage character is a rich and forward fruit with ripe supporting tannins and full crops. Good quality and good quantity are about as good a report as I can give and 2006 certainly delivered. Many of these wines have now made it to our shelves and the others are to follow soon. We will have a strong contingent of Oregon producers at Pinot Palooza on Saturday June 7^th, 2008 so don’t miss out.

Cheers!

Robert


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