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.