Lover of Wine – Travel along on our adventures – DAVID & JANEEN

The Grand Seminar, Saturday morning, was a panel of five Burgundian wine makers discussing their experience in Oregon. The moderator was Eric Asimov who is the chief wine critic of The New York Times. The panel included Véornique Boss-Drouhin who started making wine in Oregon in 1988 at Domaine Drouhin Oregon and wine makers from Maison Louis Jadot – Jacques Lardére now with Résonance in the Yamhill-Carlton AVA, Domaine des Comtes Lafon now with Lingua Franca in the Eola-Amity Hills AVA – Dominiqu Lafon, Méo-Camuzet – Jean-Nicolas Meo now working at Nicolas-Jay in Yamhill-Carlton, and Domaine Marc Roy – Alexandrine Roy at Phelps Creek Vineyards. Each of the wine makers discussed their experiences in Oregon and why they came to the area as well. It was a lively discussion but not much of substance presented.

 

 

After the Seminar, we went outside to the shaded area on the lawn and had a lovely lunch. We had the pleasure of sitting with the wine maker from Durant Vineyards. Established in 1978 they have spent forty years producing Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Pinot Gris fruit for some of the best wineries in Oregon. Over the last dozen or so years, they have been making their own wine selling it under their label.

Lunch included some tasty treats and lovely wines from other producers as well.

For the afternoon session, we went to a seminar about Alsatian wines. Alsace is best known for its white varietals (most importantly Riesling and Gewürztraminer) and sparkling Cement d’Alsace, but Pinot Noir has flourished there since the middle ages.  . A generation ago Pinot d’Alsace was a pale light-bodied red for easy drinking, but in recent years there has been a surge of media interest as it was transformed into a deep colored, powerful and complex wine through improved vineyard practices and winemaking.

Moderator Stuart Pigott, who has championed Alsatian, wines for thirty years, along with three esteemed winemakers from the region, provided an overview of Pinot noir in Alsace, and guide you through a tasting of some of the most exciting new wines. We had experienced Pinot Noir from this area some years ago but it was interesting to see how thee current generation of wine makers is moving Pinot Noir to a whole new level in this area.

Saturday Night Salmon bake

 

A long-standing tradition at IPNC is the Saturday evening Salmon Bake. This starts off with wild salmon roasted on alder stakes over a huge custom-built fire pit. This includes other wonderful ham, roast beef, salads for days and desserts. Of course there are wines. Not only do the Somm’s from IPNC bring wines from the IPNC Wine vault, but wine makers, participants and everyone brings something interesting to share.

Desserts

 

After returning to the Campus, there was a walk around tasting featuring about 30 different wineries. One in particularly I wanted to meet was J. Hofstatter Winery.

I had met the winemaker two years previously, Martin Foradori Hofstattier, and as we are going to be close to his place early October I wanted to connect with him and arrange a visit. Of course there were others to taste and visit and Janeen was able to have her picture taken with

 

 

Véronique from DDO.

Previously, Page Knudsen Cowles had gifted us with a brand new photo book chronicling the history of Willamette Valley Wineries, and Janeen decided to get photos signed with as many attendees as possible. The mission started with the introduction of this year’s participating vintners, and continued throughout the weekend.

During the walk around tasting she was able to get Adam Campbell who is the winemaker and owner of Elk Cove Winery. Adam’s parents started the winery in 1995 making them an early pioneer in the Valley and he was raised on the property.

 

 

 

 

 

Friday evening grand dinner provided hors d’oeuvres and refreshing drinks for the waiting in line time, and assured attendees with disabilities extra time ahead of the crowd. We were fortunate to be seated with the only champagne producers presenting their wines this year, and were also able to try both new and older Pinot Noirs brought to us by Brandon.

 

 

 

 

Nate, from Argyle, stopped by with some bubbles.

 

Needless to say, there were a number of wines opened and tasted at our table.

Fresh seafood was the theme of the meal, except for the Solar Eclipse dessert, which glowed with edible glitter around a globe of chocolate enclosing a sunshine bright sweet center.

 

 

IPNC – The International Pinot Noir Celebration – is held each year over the last weekend in July. This is a time when wine makers, consumers and industry and media for the wine world of Pinot Noir gather together in McMinnville Oregon to drink, eat and hopefully learn something useful. The host site is Linfield collage in the middle of McMinnville. We have been coming for over 10 years (don’t really remember the first year we came) and have enjoyed it every time. The weekend starts with what is called pre-IPNC dinners. This year, as we have done for the last 4 years, we have gone to the Salud dinner.

 

Salud is an organization that was formed some 30 years ago to provide free healthcare for farmworkers. The dinner is both a chance to acknowledge the vital work they perform but also to offer some support financially to the organization. It is a great cause so we have gone for the last 5 years to this event.

Other pre-IPNC dinners are sponsored by various wineries in the Valley with celebrity chefs from various restaurants preparing great meals

 

The following day starts the actual IPNC experience. The entire group – usually about 800 people – are divided into two groups. One group stays on campus while the other goes out to a winery via a chartered bus. Included in the registration are all meals – again most prepared in temporary kitchens set up on the Campus grounds or at the Wineries.

Our first day was off campus. So, after the introduction of all the wine makers, we headed over to bus 4A. One of the things that happens is you don’t know where you are going until you are on the bus and in most cases not until you actually arrive at the winery.

Each bus has a host winemaker and ours was Lynn Penner-Ash.  Our bus headed into the Dundee Hills and stopped at Archery Summit, site of a pre-dinner the night before. After a brief presentation & Q & A with the vineyard manager, we divided up into five groups of 10 and sat down in the winery to try our skill at blending a

cuvee using wines from three different Archery Summit vineyard site wines. We were assisted by one or two wine makers from different wine regions (ours were from Russian River CA) and made at least three or four differently proportioned blends before deciding as a group on “Migration Oregon”. This kind of hands- on experience is what makes learning at IPNC such fun.

After making our blend we moved to the patio for lunch.

There were three different courses – really all main dishes – starting with Halibut followed by Salmon and finally Lamb Ribs.  There was WAY to much food and not enough wine!

There was a nice dessert but I failed to take a photo.  Must not have been very lovely.  After lunch, back on the bus and back to Campus for the afternoon walk around tasting before the Grand Dinner.

Recently I had a fellow wine taster mention a small winery located in Dundee called Ayoub Wines. As I had never heard of it before I did a little checking and it seems that Mo Ayoub spent time at Stags Leap in Napa working with Robert Brittan and after a few years decided to relocate to Oregon and craft Pinot Noir under his own label. When he arrived, and purchased several acres of vineyard land on a east facing slop above the small town of Dundee. Planting about 4 acres in 2001, on Jory soils, he planted various Pinot Noir Clones (for those who care, he put in 667, 777, 114, 115 and Pommard 4).

A small producer he is only making 2,000 cases a year. Working out of his home/winery above Dundee he feels that winemaking should reflect a combination of tradition and innovation. Ever evolving, like the wines, Mo’s winemaking approach includes experimentation with a commitment to bottling only the most successful, elegant lots from the barrels. As an appointment only property, I reached out hoping we might get a few minutes for a tasting.

So, on Thursday afternoon we drove up the hill and landed at his home/winery. Mo met us at the door and proceeded to take us out the back patio that overlooks his vines. It’s unusual to have an east facing vineyard in the area – most have a south or west facing planting style. Mo feels the warmth of the morning sun and the cool, shade, of the afternoon is best for his approach to winemaking.

On his kitchen counter were 9 bottles of wine. It seems that last evening he had a major reviewer at the house and wanted to make sure he (the reviewer) got the full treatment of his wines. While the wines had been opened for 24 hours the all showed extremely well. Starting with his Mosé (his approach to a Pinot Noir Rosé) we found our way through a lovely Chardonnay and several different years of his Pinot Noir. We particularly liked his 2015 Estate Pinot Noir, 2015 ??? Vineyard Pinot Noir (he is not allow to say what vineyards he has sourced the fruit from but they are all well known), his 2015 Memoirs Pinot Noir and the 2016 Chardonnay. We were so taken that we ordered wines for shipment later this year! And took 2 of his Mosé (Rosé) with us for later.

Nice wines presented well with great age potential. I was pleased to find this new producer even though I have repeatedly said I don’t want to “find” a new Pinot Noir I need to have in my cellar.

For dinner, we went to Thistle –

while it may be small in table numbers and Spartan in design, it is memorable , this is a great restaurant. We got a table for two near the menu, which is a the black board on the wall, and proceeded to order from the cocktail list while we decided on starter and entrees.

 

 

 

 

Emily, our server was friendly and prompt.

Janeen started off with the field greens salad with preserved lemon, filberts and goat cheese and I had the Summer Squash with carrots& creamy herb dressing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This we paired with some rosé bubbles from Portugal.

For our main Janeen had the Albacore with artichoke, olive and remoluade while I had

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rabbit shank with potato, salsa verde and fava greens. This was paired with a lovely Vouvray Everything was delicious – and while I haven’t had rabbit more then a couple dozen times, this ranked right up there as the best. Janeen’s comment about the Albacore was she wished she know how to make it as great as she was tasting.

We passed on dessert and talk a walk around the block before heading back to our cottage.