Patricia Green Cellars
1. 2001 Chardonnay Quantity made- 500 cases Vineyard sources- Four Winds- Wente Clone (66%), Shea 108 Clone 33% Oak- 15% new oak, rest neutral barrels Yeast- Native yeast fermentation for first half of fermentation, then added Prisse de Mousse (Champagne yeast) Comments from Avalon: Patty and Jim like an elevated acidity in their highly in demand white wines- they go for a good texture and mouth feel- which this wine definitely has. There are hints of tropical fruit nicely integrated with flinty, mineral qualities. Lots of delightful complexity. Ann commented that it reminds her of a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc- lots of minerals matched with spice and fruit. A most pleasant bottle of wine. From the winemakers: We combined the two wines as we felt that they were perfect complements to one another. The Four Winds is high toned in nature with wonderful aromatics and nice touches of green apples and Bartlett pears on the palate. The wine is medium-bodied and nicely elegant with just a touch of the nutty quality that made some people think of good Macon or village Meursault with our 2000. The Shea wine is much lower-toned with almost a muscular sort of framework that gives it more than a handful of density. The two wines combine to bring out the best in each other. When blended the wine has the fruity aromatics of the Four Winds with a touch of the cinnamon laced fruit from Shea and a great deal of weight provided by the 108 Clone without becoming ponderous due to the flashy acidity the Four Winds possesses. As always we rein in the use of new wood in the Chardonnay. There are 3 new barrels and 4 once filled barrels while the other 14 barrels are mostly 4th use or older. There is a touch of toast in the wine but it is mild at most. There are 500 cases of this wine.
Quantity made- 800 cases (the 500 cases of the 2000 disappeared immediately last year) Vineyard sources- Bradley Vyd in western Umpqua (66%) Estate and Four Winds (33%) plus one barrel of Balcombe that was aged in Hungarian oak Yeast- Native Avalon Comments: Patty and Jim work hardest on this, their least expensive Pinot noir. They try to offer the best possible $20 Pinot noir they can each year in their "Oregon" product. To find good grapes at a price that allows them to offer this wine for $20 suggested retail, they turned to Patty's connections in Southern Oregon and came up with the Bradley Vineyard in westernmost Umpqua Valley. It is a 22-year-old vineyard of self-rooted Pommard clone Pinot noir. The wine has an earthy barnyard nose and a big round, supple bing cherry and spice flavor. The finish is dry, the wine is well balanced, and Jim says it should age for 5-6 years. It is immediately accessible and drinkable, a lovely, very complete Pinot noir. Very nice for the price, as good or better than any other Pinot noir available at the price, and it has a hint of that wonderful "Patty" nose and flavor that characterizes her wines. This would be a wonderful glass pour for a restaurant wanting a great wine at a great price. From the winemakers: " It's a bit funny that what we are known for is our line of expressive vineyard designated Pinot Noirs when the wine we work hardest on both conceptually and in the cellar is this one. Crafting high caliber Pinot Noir that can retail for $20 starts months before we begin thinking about our other wines. This wine needs to show the expression of our winemaking style, be balanced and have enough complexity to make it interesting and be affordable for us to produce. Well, the cost of Pinot Noir fruit in the northern Willamette Valley did not get any cheaper in 2001 especially for older vine fruit. So we went off the board a bit. Patty called a contact from her old-timey days of working in the Unpqua Valley and came up with 11 tons of Pinot Noir from a 22 year old vineyard set up high and back in one of the innumerable valleys in the Umpqua growing region (about 150 miles south of our winery). Bradley Vineyard makes up about 64% of this blend and it brings high toned aromatics, bright, focused cherry fruit and some nice inherent structure that serves as the backbone for the wine. The wine is accentuated by the addition of fruit from Four Winds Vineyard for some roundness, depth and bramble and a few barrels of 2nd and 3rd production fruit from the Estate Vineyard for some fore-palate brightness and intensity. Voila! A pretty damn fine and interesting wine composed of fruit from 3 distinct viticultural areas making it truly an Oregon Pinot Noir. There are about 805 cases of this wine which makes it one of the larger bottlings we produced in 2001. For years we have worked to produce an Oregon Pinot Noir that showed the house style, showed the things that make Oregon Pinot interesting and in a way that made it an everyday sort of wine without being simple. We think this may be as fine an effort as we have turned out. The wine has the signature bright, flashy fruit that is the hallmark of the 2001 vintage while also bringing in some earth tones, peppery spice and enough structure to give the wine some guts and age ability without making it too hard for immediate consumption. This is going to be a popular item across the country and there probably aren't going to be any second chances at this one so load up!" 3. 2001 Four Winds Vineyard Pinot Noir Quantity made: 345 cases Vineyard sources: Four Winds Vineyard, Pommard clone on rootstock Yeast- Native Avalon Comments: I loved this wine, it is such a wonderfully Burgundian Village-style offering. It has a classic Burgundian barnyard nose, and lovely, berry predominating fruit. Jim says this is their most perplexing wine- they do nothing different to achieve the style, it is the vineyards' terroir and native yeast that produce this decidedly French styled wine. Jim says that sell most of this wine on the East Coast, to people who know and love the barnyardy wines of the vineyards high in the hills of the Cote du Beaune, not the premier cru vineyards, but the village style wines that show gamy and wild influences. The funk of the nose is partnered with flavors of black raspberry, chocolate, exotic spice, and the simple friendliness of a rustic styled wine. As is typical of PGC wines, it is delicately balanced and shows hints of complexity that intrigue and draw you in to the wine. If there was ever a wine made for Provencal cuisine, it is this one. I made a Cassoulet this weekend with it and served it with the Cassoulet and crusty bread and hunks of cave aged Gouda and let me tell you, that was some wonderful eating and drinking! From the winemakers: "When you get to this wine you know we are as all about terroir as we can be. Gone are the sweet, high-toned mid-palates and perfumed cherry noses. This site is set toward the Coast Range in western McMinnville and it is a different experience altogether. Four Winds is an isolated vineyard that Jon Steinhart and Julie Donnelly planted back in 1994. We have been fortunate to work with the site since its first harvest in 1997. We have farmed this vineyard to capture the qualities that set this site apart not only geographically but also within the context of our cellar. Being closer to the Coast Range and at an elevation of over 700 feet this site has a good deal more maritime influence than any of our other sites as well as a good deal more weather. These factors along with the mix of Nokia and Jory soil and the blend of Pommard and various Dijon clones all contribute to making this vineyard's wine quite distinct. The immediate distinction is in the nose. This wine has that certain gaminess, that gout de terroir, that barnyardy quality that the occasional Pinot Noir can get. If you like rock 'em, sock 'em West Coast Pinot Noir fruit bombs this is probably not your thing. If, however, you like the off-beat villages of Burgundy such as Fiixn, Auxey-Duresses and Pernand-Vergelesses than this might be up your alley. On the palate the sauvage nature of the aromatics gives way to ripe blackberries, bramble, peppery spice and toast from 36% new oak. The mouth feel is very round with loads of plushness and just a hint of tannin on the finish. This is an interesting little vineyard whose wines have gained in complexity each year we have made them. 345 cases this year." 4. 2001 Eason Vineyard Pinot noir Quantity made: 510 cases Vineyard sources: Eason Vineyard, in the Dundee Hills off of Brey Orchard Road, along with Domaine Drouhin's Estate vineyard, Balcombe Vineyard and the vineyards of Domaine Serene. It is at about 450 ft elevation, at the bottom of the road in a concave slope. It would seem that this lower site would ripen more quickly than the sites above it, and might produce more fruit per acre with good results, but no, Patty and Jim have to cut off lots of fruit to keep the harvest below 2 tons an acre, or there are no flavors. The vineyard was planted in 1986 to Pommard on root stock, and Patty and Jim have managed the vineyard since 1994. Oak: 33% new Yeast: Native Avalon Comments: The wine's nose is a rich mix of floral, buttery vanilla bean, and anise, the flavors are of swwet berry and cherry fruits, with a silky texture in the mouth and a long, long finish with fine tea type tannins. It is a jazzy, round red wine, just delightful, especially in its expressive silky, glyceriny finish. Yumm! Ann thinks this wine screams to be served with lamb chops, new potatoes, mint jelly, and fresh spinach. Whatever you have it with, prepare to enjoy. Will age for 5-6 years. From the winemakers: "Sometimes a vineyard just becomes the apple of your eye. Eason Vineyard is that for us. We have worked with the fruit from this site since 1994 when Patty and Jose agreed to a deal with the owner, Ward Eason, to rescue this site from the blackberries that had overtaken nearly the entirety of the 4.3 acre site. For 8 years we have worked on recovering and upgrading this vineyard that was planted in 1986. The past two vintages have more than rewarded out efforts. The vineyard, interestingly, is just about 2 miles down the hill from Balcombe Vineyard but is much lower in elevation at about 425 feet and is set into the side of the hill in a bowl shaped configuration making it a warm, relatively early ripening site. We are very protective of this site and limit the crop load to less than 2 tons per acre every vintage. Even with the larger sized clusters of 2001 we came in at 1.9 tons/acre. Eason displays great depth of black cherry fruit, kirsch, licorice, iron and smoky but subtle toast from 33% new oak. The wine is slightly more masculine than Balcombe Vineyard with a greater sense of structure delivered in the back of the wine and a denser, less ethereal mouth feel that highlights the warm spice tones that the vineyard's fruit produces. This wine is as well balanced as any of our Pinots and with the age of the vines as a backbone should be an excellent candidate for several years of cellaring. There are 505 cases of this wine. 5. 2001 Balcombe Vineyard Quantity made- 500 cases Vineyard sources- Balcombe Vineyard, off Brey Orchard Road at 750 ft elevation, just down from Domaine Drouhin at 900 feet. The vineyard is on a convex slope, was planted in 1986. Oak- 55% new oak, rest neutral barrels- toast on the new barrels was a little heavier than on the other wines Yeast- Native yeast Avalon Comments:Well here's a story- who would' a thunk! This is the same vineyard that, pre PGC, was used to grow grapes for Willamette Valley Vineyard's "Oregon Trail" Pinot noir- a very ordinary wine, certainly showing none of the potential of what has become source for PGC's most popular and age able Pinots. OF course, PGC crops back to a little over 2 tons and acre and the vineyard was producing over 5 tons an acre for the WVV wine. Jim says that they have performed extensive cover cropping, pruning, replanting, etc since 1997, when Patty took over management of the vineyard- a key point- Patty and Jim manage most of the vineyards their fruit comes from, nothing like having day to day control over the grape growing process for getting the best possible fruit for wine production. The wine has a silky easy mouth feel and a sultry, sensual quality that was so enticing in the 2000 vintage. Although only a stone's throw from the Eason vineyard, this wine has much more licorice, black pepper, and deep flavors than the Eason. The nose has butter, toast, smoke, and liquour-like fruit. The flavors are black berries, cassis, creamy blueberry, hints of bing cherry, fresh leather, chocolate, licorice, and black pepper. The finish is long with hints of tea tannins and roses. From the winery: "The 2001 Balcombe Vineyard was probably the wine of the vintage for us. For the past two years Balcombe Vineyard has produced the highest toned, silkiest and most aromatically expressive wine in the cellar. The 7.25 acre vineyard is set high up in the Dundee Hills. While the elevation and its great exposure provide it with the suppleness and texture that make Pinot Noir so incredible those two factors force us to work harder in this vineyard than any other. Since we operate in a fairly marginal climactic part of the world we always have an eye on the calendar as we get deeper into October. In 2001 we felt that the larger sized clusters would be delayed in achieving physiological ripeness in this generally late ripening site. Consequently we dropped fruit on numerous occasions and ended up with a resulting tonnage of about 1.4 tons per acre. While we harvested less fruit than we are generally accustomed to the quality is supreme! This is pure Dundee Hills Pinot Noir. It has deep aromatics of black cherries, crushed raspberries, fresh rose petals, red earth spices and a touch of sweet oak. The wine has the signature velvety texture, richness and long, spicy finish that make Balcombe extraordinary and highly sought. For those of you in the know there is also a bottling called Balcombe Block 1B that was sold on futures that is more masculine and powerful. The regular bottling of Balcombe Vineyard is perhaps the wine we get most excited about (the 2000 bottling was the wine we featured at the 2002 International Pinot Noir Celebration). There are only 470 cases of this wine." 6. 2001 Shea Vineyard Quantity made- 1000 cases Vineyard sources- Blocks throughout the Shea Vineyard, 97% Pommard clone, 3% Wadenswil clone, all original plantings from 1989. Shea is on Willakenzie soil. Oak- 35% new oak, rest neutral barrels Yeast- Native yeast Avalon Comments: Patty and Jim made wine for Shea Vineyards as well as for their own label this vintage and had an advantage in the large number of barrels of different Shea blocks from which they worked. They even had a section of the winery called "Shea Stadium" for the whole section was barrels from different parts of the vineyard! While this wine was in barrel, it was the one everyone wanted more of. It has a nose full of violets and black cherry, flavors to match, with hints of dried rose petals, sugared plum, and berry, and a long, silky and rich finish. This vintage of the PGC Shea was very fruit forward while in barrel but has tightened up in bottle and needs at least 6-8 months to come around. While tight when tasted 11/8/02, the wine has lovely lush hints of big black plum and cherry flavors, with a lovely finish with fine tea-like tannins. Jim says this wine will cellar for 5-7 years. From the winery: "What can we say
other than that this vineyard is a complete pleasure to work with?
I guess the other thing to say
would be that we have around 1,100 cases of this bottling as opposed
to 137 cases in 2000! A coup for Pinot Noir lovers! The nose is an array of floral tones dominated by spring violets. While medium-bodied in nature Shea Vineyard Pinot Noir carries a subtle richness to it that gives it a texture and density that is both appealing and striking. Complex rings of fruit are layered through the mid-palate. Ripe black cherries are the predominant note but hints of blackberry, blueberry and dried rose petals fill out the wine. The wine has exceptional length and finishes with floral qualities that are jazzed up with wet stones and subtle spices. The wine has terrific balance and it only saw 33% new oak so the touch of toast is greatly downplayed in this wine. If it sounds like we enjoy drinking this wine you are correct! It's a wonder there is any left at all! This wine, amazingly enough, constitutes our largest bottling in 2001. 1,020 cases made." 7. 2001 Estate Pinot noir Quantity made- 500 cases Vineyard sources- PGC Estate vineyard- Willakenzie soil, subclass Wellesdale- sandstone subsoil Oak- 50% new oak, rest neutral barrels Yeast- Native Avalon Comments: When Patty and Jim purchased their vineyard and winery in 1999, they began a large-scale intensive vineyard management program including cover crops, re-trellising, tearing out much of the vineyard and replanting, changing the canopy management, in essence, turning the vineyard into their dream of what they want their Estate vineyard to be. So 1999, there was really nothing, 2000 was their first and excellent estate Pinot, and with the 2001, we see where they are heading, and it is very nice indeed. The 2001 Estate is 20% whole cluster fermented. As Jim explains it, when the stems are ripe enough that they are neutral in flavor, these "good" stems (versus icky green tasting stems) heighten the intensity of the wine. The anaerobic fermentation that occurs between grapes that are tightly sealed around the stem in a whole cluster leads to a more explosive, perfumey, tangy flavor, lending complexity and depth to the wine. This wine reminds me of one from Dujac, famous for their 100% wholes cluster fermented wines that are intensely perfumed. We see some of that here. From the winemakers: "Between 2000 and 2001 we took the radical step of taking out nearly 6.5 acres of 15 year old vines in the Estate Vineyard. Why? Everything that we have done on the Estate property is part of a long term goal to make this one of the great Pinot Noir vineyards in Oregon. Sometimes you have to back up to go forward. In the case of these older vines there were unhealthy plants, a trellising system not well suited for Pinot Noir or this climate and distances between the rows of vines that were not in line with our vision of this property. The effect of all this? In the short term it means that instead of this being our largest bottling as it was in 2000 it is much smaller at about 525 cases (down 300 cases from 2000). In the long term it will mean even greater quality of wine from a site and region that we believe in wholeheartedly. A recent tasting of the 2000 Estate, 2000 Beaux Freres and 2000 Brick House was very exciting as it showed a clear similarity between these Ribbon Ridge wines! The 2001 Estate shows the qualities that we believe this region (and eventually appellation) will come to be known for: Namely a silky mid-palate, excellent tannic structure, a huge core of black cherry fruit, earth-toned spices and a distinct note of minerality on the finish of the wine. 5 fermenters were chosen to represent the Estate wine. Two of those fermenters had 50% of the fruit left as whole cluster to enhance the aromatics, provide greater structure and accentuate the perfumy cherry qualities of fruit in the mid-palate of the wine. Our best barrels were chosen for the elevage and the wine is 47% new oak. We feel this vintage represents a true jumping off point for our Estate bottling as we had full control of the vineyard for the entire growing season. Many exciting things and wines will follow of the next few years but this is as good a start as we could have hoped for.
Quantity made- 170 cases Vineyard sources- One block of Balcombe Vineyard, 1B, a block of 12 year old vines with such unique characteristics that is best processed and bottled as a single block Oak- 57% new oak, rest neutral barrels Yeast- Native yeast Avalon Comments: This 1 ½ acre part of the Balcombe vineyard has a vein of soil running though it that is shallower and rockier than the surrounding land. The result from the grapes grown in this block is a wine that is darker and denser, that exhibits more of the characteristics usually called "terroir", and a distinctive and very impressive finish with intense berry, cassis, creamy fruit, nuts, and licorice. There is a wonderful gamey note to the wine, a heavier black fruit, muscular quality. Balance and ageability are top notch with this wine, it is well structured and should age up to 10 years. Ann says this wine would go well with barbequed raccoon (her father was a coon hunter). I think personally, I'll look for a different recipe, but for you coon hunters, this is your wine! From the winemakers: "We have decided, in an effort to show the site as distinctly as possible, to divide the bottling of Balcombe up. This bottling is made up entirely of one of the five blocks in the vineyard. As in the 2000 vintage Block 1B tends to produce the darkest, deepest and most tannic fruit in the vineyard. There were only 7 barrels of this wine. The wine is incredibly dark in color and has a big nose of ripe, succulent black cherries, blueberries, mocha, iron, red spices and, depending on the barrel, well integrated sweet French oak. This is a fairly muscular, powerful wine with a deep mid-palate and fine tannins on the back of the wine. If you like them chewier, big and age-worthy this is your wine. It has characteristics that are in line with the normal bottling of Balcombe but we feel there is not only a greater sense of depth and strength in this wine but a greater sense of terroir as well. It all comes out to just about 165 cases of wine. This is EASILY our most popular wine." 9. 2001 Bonshaw Vineyard Quantity made- 95 cases Vineyard sources- Four Winds- Wente Clone (66%), Shea 108 Clone 33% Oak- 15% new oak, rest neutral barrels Yeast- Native Avalon Comments: The Bonshaw vineyard is one part of the PGC Estate vineyard with very different characteristics from the rest of the vineyard. One of PGC's best customers call this wine "flamboyant" and we agree. It is pure muscle in your face, very hearty and full bodied, with a big barnyard nose. The site is only approximately 1 ¼ acres, although the slope is so steep it's hard to tell. It is the first section picked each year and gets very ripe. Even with the hugeness, the flavors are complex, with rich plum and silky, rich, plush fruits, baked stone fruits, and spicy pepper notes. It was picked at a Brix of 25.5 to 26, and had a higher PH than many of the vineyards in 2001, with a PH of 3.75. The wine could cellar as long as 8 years. These wines will settle, expand, and exhibit a broader range of flavors than it does presently. Right now it pretty much shows as "huge!!!" Ray says have this with Elk steak, venison, if you can't get game, try it with roasted leg of lamb with lots of garlic and pepper. From the winemakers: "This is a very particular 2 acre block from the Estate Vineyard of old vines that were grafted to Pinot Noir in 1999 and produced Pinot for the first time in 2000. This block is located on the steep, west-facing slope of the vineyard and was the first Pinot Noir PGC picked in 2001. As it did last year the wine shows a very different display of fruit than any of their other wines. There are hints of cherry but the wine has a nearly preternatural sweetness reminiscent of boysenberries. The wine has great richness from the exceptional ripeness but is exceptionally well balanced with a racy streak of acidity that carries the sweet fruit of the wine making it deft and interesting through its long finish. 10. 2001 Shea Vineyard Block 7 Quantity made- 145 cases Vineyard sources- Block 7 of Shea Vineyard Oak- 35% new oak, rest neutral barrels Yeast- Native Avalon Comments: Patty and Jim made the wines for Shea Vineyard in 2001 and chose this one block to pull out as a separate bottling. It is from the steepest and highest part of the Shea Vineyard, and it was cropped at 1.25 tons per acre. The grapes were extremely small, the grape skins a super black color, and the flavors are HUGE. The nose is barnyard and big black marionberry, the flavors are of leather, marionberry, cola, big black fruit and berries, spicy oak, and a big, wonderfully balanced, long, complex finish. This is the one wine of the PGC 2001s that can really take some aging- at 10-12 years of proper cellaring this wine should still be lively. From the winemakers: "There may not
be a site more heralded in Oregon than Shea Vineyard. We have the
good fortune of having the largest
representation of Shea Vineyard wines, not just this vintage, but ever
assembled anywhere! This is, in part, because we are making Pinot Noir
for our label and for the Shea Wine Cellars label. Due to this we have
wine from 7 different blocks in the vineyard (there are over 120 barrels
of Shea in our winery and we have one whole room that has nothing but
Shea wine in it and it has been dubbed Shea Stadium-pure torture for
this life long Red Sox fan). There are only 6 barrels of this particular bottling and this will be the only time the label will ever appear so it is a true rarity! 11. 2001 "Notorious" Pinot noir Quantity made- 45 cases Vineyard sources- Two barrels of Balcombe with lees added back in (see comments below) Oak- 100% new oak Yeast- Native Avalon Comments: This is the best wine PGC makes, aged in 100% new Cadus barrels and yet you don't taste the oak as being out of balance. They truly unique part of the making of this wine is the aging on lees. The lees are the solids left in the bottom of a barrel and 5 gallons of lees were added back to each of the two barrels of Balcombe vineyard juice that were chosen for this wine. Lees can be bitter, coarse, or have no flavor, but in the case of the Balcombe vineyard, the lees sometimes have a wonderful quality. When added back into the barrel they add viscosity, density, richness and sweetness. The lees by themselves are similar in flavor to blackberry yogurt, fluffy and rich, and they are only added to new barrels- the flavor enhancement does not work in neutral barrels, The wine's nose is exotically rich, coffee and chocolate, the flavors are silky and viscous, with intense black fruit, spice, and pepper well integrated with the intense yet balanced tannins- there are hints of pomegranate, persimmon, autumn fruits, and tea in the long long finish. This wine will age well for up to 12 years. From the winemakers: "Mostly winemaking consists of growing great fruit and then making a huge effort not to screw it up. Once again we managed to do something in the cellar that we thought was pretty interesting and pretty exciting. This year there are two barrels that we have chosen to represent our most interesting wine. Both barrels are from Balcombe Vineyard and were allowed 11 months in new Cadus barrels. The wine, much like the one barrel we produced in 2000, has characteristics of the Balcombe bottling except the fruit is even sweeter (if that is possible), the mid-palate richer and more velvety and the finish has a touch more structure and nuance to it. While the wine is 100% new oak it is very difficult to tell due to the quality of coopering that Cadus employs. This wine is very sensuous and will be the best cellar candidate we made in 2001 although if you taste it you will have a hard time not wanting to open a bottle or two right away! 47 cases will be produced."
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