Kitchen Counter Chronicles

by Jean Yates

August 27, 2003

What's on the Kitchen Counter?
Family give great wine feedback, and revisiting award winners

Under a thin layer of the dust of late summer, that brown mist that settles on everything if you live out in the country off a dirt road, green and brown bottles bright with appealing labels are ranked in rows next to my kitchen sink. It's vacation time, and that means that friends and relatives have descended on Oregon for a taste of rural life. I get annual "up close and personal" feedback from my darling, outspoken family members, who never hesitate to show their wine preferences. Just check the glass recycling bin at the end of their visit!

I've also revisited some wines that won awards this month. Here's the highlights, the wines that kept getting tasted again and again, the ones that were just irresistible.

Wines that have recently won Awards and Ratings

Robert Parker's Wine Advocate just came out, and in the pages and pages of "The Value Report", Pierre Rovani lists only one Oregon wine-Elk Cove Pinot Gris 2002.

Pierre Rovani says:

"One of the finest Pinot gris I have ever tasted is Elk Cove's 2002. Melon balls, spices, white peaches, and honey can be found in its extravagant aromas. Medium-bodied and well-balanced, it slathers the palate with creamed apples and currants. This is a rich, lush, medium-bodied wine with excellent grip and depth. It should be drunk over the next 18 months." -- Pierre Rovani

I have to agree. This is one of the richest Pinot gris I have tasted and it has a big bodied "over the top" character that will please a crowd. This wine is going to get a huge rating in Wine Spectator and sell out instantly. The wine has an exquisite nose of peach, pear, apricot blossoms and fruit, flavors of rich, buttery, perfectly balanced white stone fruit and citrus, and a long, crisp, glyceriny finish with notes of herbs, flowers, lavender, cocoa, and spice.

The Oregon State Fair Wine Awards included a Gold Medal to tiny Winters Hill Winery for their Golden Nectar Dessert Wine.

Ann, Avalon's store manager says: "Made from frozen grapes in the style of an ice wine, this wine opens with the floral notes of the white narcissus, and the intense flavors of honey, pears and apples have an underlying spiciness that leads to a crisp and refreshing finish."

Ann and Carl, Avalon's managers, taste wine constantly and they keep coming back to Winters Hill when we decide what to order. The Winters Hill "Nectar" comes in a 375 ml split and the label is silk screened onto the bottle. This is one of our popular gift wines at the store, it is so attractive and delicious. And now Winters Hill took another big award, at the Portland "Bite".

The "Bite of Portland" is one of those big festivals of late summer that Oregonians flock to before the rains set in, and they give a few highly coveted awards. Their Gold Medal this year for Oregon Pinot noir (only one is given) went to Winters Hill's 2000 Pinot noir.

In honor of the Gold Medal, Avalon is putting the wine on sale at $21 a bottle or $18.90 by the case.

Here on the sink are bottles from a guy named Darren Dimmick whose Matin du Soleil Viognier got Gold at the Portland "Bite". Darren walked into the store last month and proceeded to pour out a series of really rich and flavorful wines at such great prices.... remember when Kiona and Di Stefano were $16 a bottle, before the national attention and increased quality raised their still suberb value wines to the $22-25 price? Well, here's my new "old" Kiona style wine... He calls them "Solera", althought he winery is called Dimmick Cellars.

For $15.99, I just have too many of these Solera bottles going home to the kitchen counter, where friends seem to gravitate to Darren's bottles. (Note to self- get some more wine from Darren as friends drank all the samples down super fast!)

Summer 2003 Top Picks by my Friends and Relatives

This is a totally unscentific survey of what all the relatives and friends who come to my house on vacation each summer chose from my cellar. The methodology consisted of counting the empty bottles in the recycling bin after all the family and friends who came to Oregon for vacation had gone home.

1. Patricia Green Sauvignon Blanc 2002
Simply the best Sauvignon Blanc of the season and the most popular wine at my house, family and friends just keep opening this wine. I stashed some under the stairs (no Judy don't even think about it!) for this fall, as I think it'll still be super at Thanskgiving with turkey dinner.

2. O'Reilly's Pinot noir 02
Approachable, easy drinking, soft and fruity, a steal ($13.99) from Owen Roe's great winemaker David O'Reilly. Kept finding this wine in the refrigerator, family liked it chilled on hot hot days.

3. Patricia Green Shea Vineyard Pinot Noir 01
Dang- I told them not to get into my fancy stuff! They cleaned me out.... (memo to self --- combination lock and heavy chain?)

4. Beaux Freres "Les Cousins" Pinot noir 01
Actually, this pile of bottles was my doing. I was not that impressed with this wine when it was first released, then Steve, assistant winemaker at Beaux Freres, gave me a bottle this summer and I could not keep myself from reaching for more. Like most Beaux Freres wines, this cuvee has gained weight, flavor, and complexity since it was bottled 18 months ago. Thank goodness it's only $28, or $25 something by the case....

Have a relaxing Labor Day!

Jean

August 19, 2003

Washington Wines
New and excellent wines and wineries

I just returned from a week in Washington, seeking out new wines and new civilizations- oh wait a minute that's Star Trek. Whatever, I can say that the Washington wine industry is almost scarily expanding and the wines and wineries, for the most part, are wonderful. Yow. How many wonderful wines can Washington produce? If I was trying to sell $75 Cab in California or $100 Bordeaux in France, I'd be trembling in my big ol' dirty winemakers' boots.

Big Red Bargains

For $30- $45, Washington is offering a wild array of big red wines, with the emphasis on BIG. Yet not simple- these are wines with excellent structure and fascinating expression of terroir. An example? Fielding Hill- wine made from two year old vines- yes, TWO year old- and I was waxing all arty and crazy over their initial releases, exotic terminology flowing fast, and no, I was NOT swallowing. We are sending their new wines to the Big Reds Club in December and that is going to be one heck of a Xmas present, let me tell you. Their production is tiny but their future is huge. Read more about them here.

The Next Big Wine Touring Thing?

I stopped by the town of Zillah and discovered new wineries popping up like cedar-shaked, steep roofed mushrooms all over the hills above town- the roads out in the country there are totally straight, set on a grid, and you drive (or bicycle) along past a constant line of signs pointing to interesting sounding wineries- Silver Lake, Sheridan, Hyatt, Maison de Padgett, Portteus, Wineglass Cellars, Horizon's Edge- those are just some fo the wineries that are open- there are another 5-10 in various stages of development.

According to Scott Greer, owner and winemaker at Sheridan Vineyard, the wineries around Zillah have formed an association to promote wine tours and special events. This area could be the "next big thing" for wine touring, given the quality of the wines, the scenery, and the close confluence of so many interesting styles and varietals in an area that can be traversed from one end to the other in 20 minutes by car or a comfortable hour or so by bike.

Sheridan Vineyard -- 92 points for Initial Wine Offering

Sheridan Vineyard, in Zillah, sells grapes to such wineries as Andrew Will and Quilceda Creek, and has just recently started producing what will eventually be 5-7000 cases of wine a year. The vineyard site gives owner Scott Greer a real step up over wineries dependent on purchased grapes. You could not ask for a vineyard site with more potential, planted to grapes already proven to make outstanding wines. The dry, shallow soil, blasting heat, and cool to cold nights close to harvest are all positive factors when trying to grow grapes capable of producing complex and interesting wines.

We have a small amount of Sheridan's 2000 "Red" and are looking forward to covering their release party in October for the 2001 vintage. Sheridan Vineyard will be celebrating the completion of phase one of their winery building, moving out of a tiny garage into a beautiful, high ceilinged, airy and climate controlled estate. Future plans include a tasting room, a patio circling the building and showing off the stunnning view, and interesting architectural trellising and details. Read more about them here.

Where to Stay

I stayed at the Best Western Pepperbridge in Yakima, and was very very happy with the experience. There are not a lot of lodging options in this area, and I have been disappointed in the past. The quality of chain motels is very dependent on the management, and the manager at the Pepperbridge in Yakima, Dorothy Seipp, is excellent. I revelled in the high speed internet connection in the room, and found the quality of the experience way above what I expected for the price. They are most knowledgable and guided me to the most distant wineries with good maps and lots of helpful suggestions. Rates range from $70-100 a night, but check their website for special coupons.

The Santillanes family owns four motels in the area, and as a small business, they seem to take a lot of care to make sure their customers have an enjoyable experience. I get so ticked off at places where I feel unacknowledged and not valued, it's nice to stay somewhere I feel appreciated for the money I am spending with them.

The Yakima Pepperbridge Inn is is a good location, in the middle of the valley, for day tours across the center of Washington. While I was there, an annual Harley Davidson rally was in progress- Harleys lined up from one end of the parking lot to the other- most impressive. And the Harley owners were a pleasant and polite group.

Perusing the Palouse-
Not to be Missed

I drove down from Spokane to Walla Walla at one point in my tour and the beauty of the "Palouse" made it truely memorable. The Palouse is an area of rolling hills, covered with wheat fields, textured from the farm equipments' tracks, from the wind, and from the strange and undulating shadows as sun and clouds pass overhead.

If you are planning to visit Walla Walla, make sure to at least drive as far up the Palouse as Dayton, where Patit Creek Winery is located. If you go all the way to Spokane, a visit to Arbor Crest and Townshend wineries is well worth the time. Arbor Crest's big reds are quite reasonably priced, and tiny Townshend makes amazingly complex Cabernet Sauvignon. We sent the Townshend Cabernet Sauvignon 98 to the Big Reds Club in August. We have a little of the Patit Creek Merlot in stock as well. Christina, Avalon's Editor and Staff Write, recently relocated to Spokane, so expect a lot of "insider" info on the wine scene there from our intrepid reporter and wine lover.

Here's hoping you are all having a lovely August, and please feel free to contact me for more info about any of the places or wines described here.

Jean