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Christina Kelly,
Avalon Wine Senior Editor

Christina Kelly spent the first half of her career as a journalist for daily newspapers and magazines. She left daily journalism to work in corporate marketing/communications, but as a passionate wine enthusiast, she continues to write about the Northwest wine industry (since 1997) for many national publications.

Christina is a multiple fellowship winner to the Professional Wine Writers Symposium in Napa, including 2012. Christina has written for Avalonwine.com for the past 12 years. She can be reached at winewriter@comcast.net.

Jean Yates
Avalon Wine Owner

Jean first worked with the Oregon wine industry in 1989, when she helped develop marketing brochures for wineries in the South Willamette. She then started Avalon, and has supported the industry through her wine shop and web site ever since. Jean enjoys promoting Oregon and Washington wines and bringing Northwest wines to the notice of the wine-loving public across the country. She previously worked in high tech marketing and research in Silicon Valley.

Jean built and continually updates the Avalon web site, writes our Wine Club Newsletter, numerous e-mail articles on NW wine, and articles for the web site. Her twenty five years of experience working with NW wineries and winemakers gives Avalon a deep knowledge of the industry. She's judged NW wine at various competitions since 1997. Jean's favorite activity is photography, and many of the images on the Avalon web site are hers. She's from NC via Palo Alto, and lives in the South Willamette wine country.

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May 27, 2010, at 10:39 am

Oregon Coattails Pinot noir 08 – Beaux Freres Second Generation

By Jean Yates Avalon Wine, on May 27th, 2010

coattails-label-275pIn only the best vintages, when Jared and Mikey Etzel feel that the quality is justified, will they release their Coattails Winery Pinot noir. The 2008 vintage marks its inaugural release. In terms of winemaking style, their father’s Beaux Freres Estate Pinot noir 08 $71.95 (any 12) is a benchmark for comparison. Both wines are made for cellaring and will be treasures to be enjoyed for ten, even twenty years.

The Coattails Winery Pinot noir 08 $62.95 (any 12) is a powerful Pinot with style and substance. Sporting a fuller texture than the Horsetail, Coattails shows a wide spectrum of fruit starting with red cherry and crushed raspberry, moving to currant, working in black cherry and a sliver of blackberry on the finish. This wine glides, picking up cedar, white pepper and a hint of toast. – Marcus

Coattails Pinot noir 08 is very limited. It’s a cellar selection and needs the same kind of time and care as their Dad’s Pinots. They will sell this high end Pinot primarily to top restaurants. Jared just returned from a trip to Las Vegas, where several famous restaurants picked up the wine for their lists.

Jared Etzel’s Notes:

The 2008 vintage is spectacular (an imbecile could make great wine as long as they don’t try to tweak too much). In the Willamette Valley, cooler weather/lack of rainfall allowed phenolic maturity/maintenance of brisk acid/and low etoh.

The wines of Oregon’s 2008 vintage have the balance, poise and density present in a good vintage of Burgundy yet maintain their identity by having the bright fruit-driven aromatics that you expect from Oregon.

17.5 months in Barrel 60% new Francois Freres and Dominique Laurant barrels. Heavy lees stirring was practiced. Minimal racking. No filtration or fining. Yields kept respectively low around 2 tons/acre. Very low SO2 use. It was an unusual wine as it took 14 months to finish malolactic fermentation. A very rigorous selection was employed with 7 people hand inspecting each cluster and discarding anything with the slightest color imperfection.

May 27th, 2010 | Category: Oregon Wine | Comments are closed

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