Instinct plays a big role in wine. Instinct plays into the selection of everything from vineyard site and harvest dates to the selection of what wine to drink with particular friends on a birthday dinner. When we rolled up the driveway of Utopia Vineyards, smack in the middle of the Ribbon Ridge...
Making great wine takes time, but there's no reason for an up and coming winery to reinvent the wheel. ArborBrook planted their first vines in 2001 and released their first vintage only three years later. Eight years after that, they're pouring superb wine from the 2010 vintage. How could this...
A quick glance around Bergström's tasting room is, well, deceptive. The abundant greenery outside yields to dark wood and earth tones inside, and the colors make the tasting room seem smaller than it is. At least that's how it felt by the door where I planted myself for the tasting, but I was...
One of the problems you can run into while tasting in the Willamette Valley is simply being overwhelmed by good wine. I once had a humanities teacher tell me it was easy to become inured to masterpieces when visiting Florence, and I suspect it's something like that. But there are standouts; some...
Just off Highway 99 on Main Street in downtown Newburg is Anam Cara's unpretentious tasting room, which had been recommended by Jen, Domaine Trouvere's gracious tasting room host. The big windows up front spill light onto a table and chairs where customers can relax as they taste. Further back...
Rex Hill Winery is an easy access stop off Highway 99 before Newberg in the Chehalem Mountains AVA. There was some nasty construction going on when we were there (sewer line, we were told), so we were guided around to the back of the building. It was here that we found a delightful and telling...
Downtown Newburg, Oregon is becoming a wine and food lover's dream, with tasting rooms and good restaurants sprouting up all along the street. Artisanal Cellars is next door to Fox Farm's tasting room and around the corner from the Painted Lady restaurant-two must see places in town. Winemakers...
When touring through Willamette Valley wine country, there are occasionally-well, often-places that require a little extra planning, either due to their hours of business, location, or occasionally both. Alloro Vineyards has just expanded the hours of their tasting room an extra day, to Friday...
Just outside Yamhill, Oregon, lies the Laughlin Loop, a particularly glorious collection of excellent wineries, any of which would be worth a trip of its own. The Loop offers wine tasters the convenience of one target destination, a lot of variety and quality and minimal driving. Gran Moraine...
Just entering Soléna Estate's sumptuous tasting room is to be reminded of the old saying, Wine is made in the vineyard. The very handles of the big oak doors are made from old, cured, Pinot Noir vines. The other saying might be, Go big or go home, because it's easily one of the most spacious...
In the heart of the Yamhill-Carlton district, Willakenzie Estate sits in the middle of the increasingly noteworthy Loughlin Loop. Covering over 400 acres, big and beautiful is an apt description of their operation, which takes its name from the marine sedimentary soil that makes up the...
Although Burgundy might hail as the holy grail of Pinot Noir, there are other places in the Old World that have been producing wine from the grape for almost as long. And while the majority of Oregon wine producers emulate the Burgundian style, Barnaby Tuttle of Teutonic Wine Company swings...