A wonderful tasting of Oregon Pinot Noir was hosted by Indra & Diane and held at the spacious home of their friends Vince & Karen. The tasting was followed by a substantial meal of Italian food catered by Locanda Ravello of Danville and a Valentine’s Day cake.
There was definitely a clear favorite in this tasting, Bottle #5 (Eola-Amity Hills 2015 Hartford Court “Warrior Princess” @ $60) with ten 1st place votes of the 23 tasting. There was also a clear least favorite, Bottle #2 (A to Z 2014 Oregon Pinot Noir @ $12) which was the only wine with a screwtop in the tasting. It had ten 7th & 8th place votes. On the other hand, Bottle #8 (Willamette Valley 2014 Brittan Vineyards “Basalt Block” @ $40) was one that you either loved or hated: ten people made it their #1 or #2, while 7 people made it their #8! I can’t recall seeing this amount of variation on one wine before. The writeup for this wine says that it “takes a full 24 hours to open up” so perhaps that explains some of the varied opinions.
Indra said the wines were all purchased at K&L. Full Tasting notes for all the wines tasted can be found here: Tasting Notes – 2019-02 Oregon Pinots
Here are the individual voting results:
To see a Wine Enthusiast article on the state of Oregon Pinot Noir, click here: Oregon Pinot Noirs.
Co-hosts Vince & Karen who opened up their spacious home for this tasting.
There was plenty of room to mingle during the pre-taste.
ANNOUNCEMENT
WHAT: Oregon Pinot Noir
WHERE: Danville
WHEN: Sat. Feb. 9 at 6 P.M.
HOSTS: Indra & Diane
The tasting will be at the home of their good friends Vince Chow and Karen Christensen. Vince and Karen have a brand new and much larger house than theirs that will be a great venue, much quieter and more intimate than a restaurant. They live in Danville on the Alamo-Danville border, 5 minutes south of Walnut Creek right off of 680. Parking is on the street, or take BART to Walnut Creek and then take Uber or Lyft.
Diane will be doing the Valentine’s Day theme again. We haven’t settled on the cuisine but Italian is the ‘cibo d’amore’ so we are leaning that way.
We will do the usual 23 space single pour, with preference to members and then preferred guests. If you would be willing to share a single pour (or really prefer your own pour) please let us know. If you haven’t RSVP’d already, please do so as soon as possible so we have time and space to invite our 5 new members, preferred guests and visitors.
We leave you to ponder this incredibly unromantic quote from Othello in contemplation of this our third Valentine’s Day tasting:“I pray you, do not fall in love with me, for I am falser than vows made in wine”.
Cellar Society of San Francisco 