Trip to the Finger Lakes, August 2023

Now on to the following weekend. My wife D and I drove up to other D’s house in upstate New York which I last visited in 2017. G and H were already there, having taken the train from New York City a couple of days earlier.

D shared many amazing bottles from his cellar with us as can be seen from the photos.

He also introduced me to Zaya 16 year old rum, which it turns out I can get in the local booze store at a very advantageous price, hurrah!

My wife isn't really into wine, so on the Saturday she and I went for a hike on the Finger Lakes trail, starting at Sugar Hill State Forest. We got slightly lost but otherwise it was an enjoyable trail, not too muddy and with the occasional mushroom and some little frogs.

On Saturday evening, we had a wonderful dinner party with the five of us, and D’s friends Bob, David and Charlene. This included a trio of wonderful Californian cabernets from 1973: Beaulieu Vineyard, Freemark Abbey and Sterling Vineyards, followed by a pair of Sauternes from 1983 - Chateau Lafaurie-Peyraguey and Rieussec. The hardship! I don't think my wife had ever seen a dining table laden with so many wine glasses and antique silver cutlery.

On the Sunday, we went out to a few wineries for tastings. Things seem to have changed a lot in the six years since I was there last, and everything seemed more touristy and commercial. Where previously the tastings were around $5 if memory serves, now the standard charge seemed to be $15.

We started off at Domaine LeSeurre, where I particularly enjoyed the semi-dry Riesling from 2020 and had visions of sipping it on our deck. Since our deck is currently under construction, that’s unlikely to happen this year, but I did buy three bottles and have consumed two of them already, so can confirm it’s a lovely wine to drink well-chilled in hot weather, and only 12% alcohol. I was hoping to buy a bottle of their sparkling wine too, but was told that I’d have to join the wine club, which was a little offputting, so that didn’t happen.

Next up was a winery I hadn’t visited before, called Weis. As the name suggests, this is run by somebody from Germany. I really enjoyed this tasting. They had an interesting white called “Heart of the Lake” which is made from a new grape variety called aravelle. There was also a nice light fizz which contained this grape. The pinot noir was light and pretty, and the cabernet franc was also in the lighter style. I seriously thought about joining the wine club, but have since discovered that I can order some of their wines from the booze store here in PA, so may just do that some time!

Then it was on to Ravines. As in 2017, the wines here continue to impress and though they’re perhaps a bit more expensive than the local competition, they are built to last. I absolutely loved the pinot noir which was really interesting and a little wild, and the late harvest vignoles was a must.

We had lunch at the café/pub in Hammondsport and in the afternoon attempted to visit Dr Konstantin Frank, but it turned out that the tasting offerings here were too touristy and/or outdoors for our liking, so in the end we abandoned them and moved on to McGregor. This was nice because we got to sit at a table inside and our flights of wines were brought to us, along with a few nibbles, so we could sit and discuss amongst ourselves more easily without having someone hanging around waiting to pour the next glass. As on my previous visit, the star of the show was the Russian River Red, which has now been renamed Saperavi Grand Reserve. We tasted the 2017 vintage which was quite a tannic monster and needs at least another ten years, I’d say.

Enormous thanks to D for driving us around, having us to stay over the weekend and sharing so many treasures from the cellar. We had a wonderful time!

International Pinot Noir Celebration, part VI

After a brief pause, we attended the second of the large tastings. It was another hot afternoon and I’d made the strategic decision to only taste things that G recommended, but fortunately there were quite a few. I’m sorry that this list doesn’t go into any detail. I’d naively assumed that we’d be given some sort of list of wines/wineries which I’d be able to annotate, but no such thing was provided. Fortunately, G was better prepared than me and had brought along a notebook, so the best I could do was ask him to make a note whenever we encountered something I particularly enjoyed.

Ken Wright Tanager Vineyard 2019 - I'm currently looking after a case of the Guadalupe for G, as this was unavailable

Bryn Mawr Vineyards 2021

Belle Pente Kiona’s Block 2019

Fiddlehead Cellars Lollapaloosa Barrel Select 2015

Division Pinot Noir “Deux” 2021

Chosen Family Wine Co 2021

Sokol Blosser Orchard Block 2021

Greywing Farsing Vineyard 2019 - I'm currently looking after a six pack of this for G

Talley Vineyards 2021

Cobb – not sure which wine or vintage this was, but it was an unexpectedly pretty pinot from California. It turns out that California has a lot of micro climates with its mountains and sea.

Then it was off to the long-awaited Salmon Bake! This is a big dinner where they serve wild salmon which has been cooked over an open fire on wooden stakes. There was also roast pork, and a wide selection of salads, cheeses and sweet things. We sat at a table with a few other people and again someone came round pouring us nice things from time to time. The woman next to me also contributed a bottle of wine which she’d bought from a winery earlier in the day, which was very kind. A band played jazzy music in the distance and the atmosphere was very festive. At one point a man went round some tables with a salmanazar of red wine which was clearly quite difficult to pour from, but was one of our wines of the evening.

Finally, on the Sunday morning, there was an extra-special champagne brunch which included additional food such as sushi, and someone came round pouring glasses of fizz from time to time. We sat with some Americans and it turned out that they had spent some time living in England not far from where G and I went to school, which was a fun coincidence.

Then it was back to the apartment to pack up and get a car back to Portland. An honourable mention should be made to “Famous Dave’s BBQ” near the airport where we had a meal later in the day. Their ribs and burnt ends were very tasty and it was quite a relief to drink a pint of cold pineapple cider after all the fine wine over the past few days.

In conclusion: I’m very glad I went - I learned a lot about Oregon pinot noir, ate some fantastic food and met some nice people. It was a great way to celebrate our 50th birthdays!

International Pinot Noir Celebration, part V

In the afternoon, we’d all signed up for a session with the title “Sparking Wine: The Art of Blending” which turned out to be something of a misnomer, as nobody really talked about blending. Instead, five producers of fizz talked about their wines.

I appear to have had nothing to say about the first one from CHO Wines except that it was quite expensive – I've written down $95 but can’t find this wine on their website. I found the 2014 Fiddlehead Cellars “728 Bubbles” blanc de noirs more interesting and quite winey for a fizz, and it was only $65. They're based in the Santa Rita Hills area of California. 

Next was a wine from Nautilus Estate in Marlborough, NZ. This was only $40 and very bubbly. It reminded me strongly of the kinds of New World fizz that were around when I was an undergraduate – stuff like Yalumba Angas Brut. For me, it was clean but completely lacking any character. 

Then we moved on to two champagnes. The first was Laurent-Perrier which was perfectly nice but nothing out of the ordinary. The second, from Henri Giraud, was much more my cup of tea. This was the Hommage au Pinot Noir NV. It was a much more golden colour than the others and had a lot of mushrooms, yeastiness and richness. Someone mentioned salinity, which wasn’t a word I’d ever heard used to describe champagne but fitted the bill. This retails at around $100 which seems like a fair price for it.

Incidentally, the first three wines had been poured before everyone entered the seminar room, and the last two were poured halfway through the seminar, which meant that they were significantly colder. I've probably already said this but if there’s one thing I learned from the IPNC, it's that serving wine at the proper temperature makes a huge difference.

International Pinot Noir Celebration, part IV

On the Saturday morning, we had another fantastic breakfast and this time I located the proper coffee stand which was worth the wait. Then it was time for the “grand seminar” which was a series of panel discussions and tastings held in the theatre at Linfield University. This fell into three parts and I believe the presenters rotated between three different venues due to capacity constraints, so it must have been a bit strange for them to be giving the same talk three times in rapid succession. The format for each session was that the chairman spoke for a few minutes and then each representative from a winery spoke for a few minutes. It wasn’t at all clear when we were supposed to be tasting the wines, so I found myself surreptitiously doing it while they were talking.

The theme for this particular IPNC was sustainability, a tricky subject. Climate change is clearly a big issue for the wine industry, and there are steps that can be taken to reduce emissions such as using lighter glass bottles or even other forms of packaging, cutting back on capsules etc. I enjoyed hearing about permaculture, electric tractors, regenerative agriculture and phytotherapy, the building up of natural defences.

But some speakers took it a little too far, in my opinion. The representative of one winery in New Zealand informed us that they ask their visitors where they have come from and where they are going afterwards, and include this travel in their records of carbon emissions. Another speaker made a reference to Black Lives Matter and it all started getting a little political. Quite honestly, I didn’t attend the IPNC in order to receive a lecture on social justice from someone much, much richer than me… One was also aware of the vast number of bottles of San Pellegrino lying around all over the place which presumably were imported from Italy!  

Moving swiftly on… Of the wines that we tasted during these sessions, I particularly enjoyed:

- the Blanc de Noirs Extra Brut Reserve 2016 from Brundlmayer in Austria which was very champagne-like

- the Savigny 1er cru Aux Vergelesses from Domaine Simon Bize et Fils. Chisa Bize gave a very good talk. She’s from Japan and took over running the domaine after her husband died ten years ago. It was interesting hearing how she had questioned their approach to winemaking and gradually modernised it. Santenay has never been one of my favourite villages in Burgundy, but she is producing some very pure, delightful wines which thankfully lack the offputting gravy/meatiness that one sometimes encounters. I see they are represented by Jeroboams in the UK

- Sunday’s Child 2021, a pinot noir produced by Hope Well in the Eola-Amity Hills region of Oregon, which had some agreeable complexity to it.

We returned to one of the lawns where we found a table for another excellent lunch. The wine people at this table were from Coline Clemens and we’d actually chatted to them in the queue for dinner the previous evening. They were good company and they had chilled their wines, which made them very drinkable despite the relatively high alcohol level. A good time was had by all!

International Pinot Noir Celebration, part III

In the afternoon, the coach returned us to McMinnville and we had some time off before heading over to another lawn for the first of two major tastings. There were roughly 70 wineries present at the event, with 35 presenting on the Friday and 35 on the Saturday. Each winery only showed one wine, and it was up to them which vintage they provided, so we weren’t necessarily comparing like with like. Wines from the 2020 vintage were notable by their absence...  

We started out with enthusiasm and then by about two thirds of the way through, I found myself beginning to flag. It was a warm evening, and a lot of the wines had a kind of nervous, high-toned tension - although some attempts had been made to cool them, the weather was not entirely pinot-friendly. A few of them did stand out, but my list covers both evenings so I’ll save it for a later post.

After the tasting, dinner was held on yet another lawn. We were joined by Robert Watkins and another member of staff from Mt Beautiful in New Zealand and it was interesting to hear about the IPNC experience from the point of view of a producer. They aren’t charged to attend, unlike some other wine festivals, apparently, and indeed receive some travel expenses, but are expected to contribute a considerable amount of wine to the IPNC’s stash. Presumably these are stored somewhere and brought out on future occasions.

Once again, the food was amazing. Opinions were divided on the chilled raspberry and roasted beet soup, but the seared Oregon albacore tuna went down very well. There was also a roulade de lapin with a marionberry jus - we came across marionberries several times during the weekend, and they turned out to be a type of blackberry unique to Oregon. 

A sommelier went past occasionally, pouring small amounts of library wines from the IPNC’s stocks. These offerings seemed to be quite random, and we were unfortunate enough to receive at least two red Burgundies from 2006, my least favourite vintage ever. But all in all, it was a good evening and we staggered back to the apartment feeling content.

International Pinot Noir Celebration, part II

The coach tour felt a little like a school trip and there was a rather amusing video about how the “motor coach” was cleaned in three different ways. Our destination was kept secret until the last minute. Since I was unfamiliar with any of the wineries in the area, the suspense was somewhat wasted on me. Eventually it was disclosed that we were going to Lingua Franca.

The bus stopped in the vineyard next to some well-maintained chardonnay vines and everyone hopped out and donned sunhats as the sun was beaming down and it was very warm. We were given a quick talk by Thomas Savre, the Director of Winemaking at Lingua Franca, who is French and has trained at many of the big names in Burgundy. Apparently Comte Lafon is a consultant at Lingua Franca and had been visiting earlier in the week. 

There were also contributions from other wine makers including Ken Wright, who was very experienced and knowledgeable. He mentioned that the vines grow down an extraordinary distance – something like a foot a year until they max out at around 20 feet down. This is why old vines are such a big deal – they’re rummaging around down there for all the interesting trace elements, which younger vines can’t do. I’d never really understood this before, so that was interesting to hear.

Then it was off to the Lingua Franca winery itself for a tasting followed by lunch. There was plenty of opportunity to mingle with the winemakers and other attendees and the atmosphere was convivial. The four course lunch was very impressive, especially given that it was served in a winery and not a place set up for fine dining. 

We tasted six wines from different producers and I enjoyed three of them in particular: the 2019 Ken Wright Cellars Tanager Vineyard, the 2021 Lingua Franca The Plow, and the 2019 SUNU Wines Matteri Vineyard. These were light, pretty and enjoyable, and not too alcoholic. But a quick check of the prices revealed that the going rate was around $75 a bottle. So much for my hope that Oregon pinot noir might replace my Burgundy habit!

International Pinot Noir Celebration, part I

The blog has been on something of a hiatus lately due to major life events i.e. moving to the US at long last! I arrived on 16 June (or June 16, as they say over here) and have been acclimatising since then.

Now that I’ve moved, my wine drinking patterns have changed somewhat and the good stuff is likely to be in concentrated bursts of activity. Fortunately, there have been two such bursts in the last few weeks: the International Pinot Noir Celebration at the end of July, and a trip to the Finger Lakes in early August. It will probably take several posts to cover them all.

Starting with the IPNC, this has been going since 1986 and is held in Oregon, in the town of McMinnville which is about an hour away from Portland. This was the furthest west I’ve ever been! It turned out to be an excellent introduction to Oregon pinot noir. There were also a few producers from other places such as California, France, New Zealand and Austria.

I met up successfully with G and H at Portland airport on Thursday evening and we got a car to our student apartment in McMinnville where our wine friend D from upstate New York was waiting for us. This turned out to be the perfect accommodation as it was within walking distance of all the activities. The only weird thing was the height of the beds, which were about four feet off the ground with no ladder – presumably aimed at athletic young men. I ended up putting my mattress on the floor which solved the problem.

We had pizza delivered and I’d picked up a couple of wines at the airport to get things rolling. One of these had appeared to be a tempranillo when I saw it in the shop, but on closer inspection it was a tempranillo / riesling blend, which I think it’s fair to say was not entirely successful. Described on that website as “a fun combination of grapes one wouldn’t expect to find in Oregon” – hmmmm! I will learn to check the label more closely in future. Fortunately the other bottle, a pinot, was drinkable so all was not lost.

On the Friday morning, we had an amazing buffet breakfast on the lawn with some particularly wonderful raspberries and apricots. The opening ceremony consisted of an elderly celebrity couple giving a quick speech in praise of pinot noir, including a memorable quote along the lines of how the first time you taste it, it's like your head leaves your body and then reattaches in a slightly different way. This was followed by a long parade of people from the various wineries, which took some time to get through.

One noticeable thing for me, attending for the first time, was how everyone assumed that one already had an encyclopaedic knowledge of Oregon AVAs. I hadn’t even encountered the term AVA before but someone at our table explained to me that it stands for American Viticultural Area and is a bit like an appellation in Burgundy. It would probably have been helpful to have a map of how they all related to each other, but the info for the festival was all on a mobile phone app and I don't think this was included. Serves me right for not doing any homework, I guess. 

After breakfast, it was into the coach for a vineyard tour… More to follow!