Twelve

Lots of Vineyard Activity

2011-07-10T13:19:00.000-07:00

We're in the middle of bloom where flowers emerge and berries are set. The first picture shows a cluster that's almost finished and one that's just getting started. We're on about the same schedule as last year.

What's even more amazing is how fast the shoots growing. In the last 30 days, growth can be measured in multiple feet. If you look at the middle and last picture you can see the difference a month makes. Shoots have gone from 6-10 inches to 4-6+ feet. Pretty amazing. They grew at least and in many cases more than a foot last week.

Classic Cars in McMinnville

2011-07-10T09:09:00.000-07:00

As part of the Turkey Rama celebration in McMinnville, they closed off 3rd Street and held a classic car contest. I've included some pictures. The candy apple red Camaro is a personal favorite. And what muscle car fan's heart doesn't speed up a bit when they see the SS 396 logo. The Corvette with the flip up doors was interesting. Saw them drive away with a giant trophy in the passenger seat. And the blue T-bird was gorgeous.

Facebook v. Blog v. Website: Overrun by Social Media

2011-07-10T09:07:00.000-07:00

I have to apologize for the lack of activity on the blog. We got started with Facebook and have been neglecting adding all the same entries here. I haven't quite figured out how to keep everything in sync, but I'm going to start dividing time a little more equally. And don't get me started on Twitter :-)

Another Great McMinnville Retaurant - Thistle

2011-02-05T21:33:00.000-08:00

Just had dinner tonight at Thistle after closing the tasting room. They are famous for using very local ingredients and also famous for their chalkboard menu of 6-8 starters and 4-5 main courses that changes every day. I had a savoy cabbage gratin starter followed by the beef cheeks with kale in a black chanterelle cream sauce. Both were excellent, the sauce with the cheeks was concentrated bundle of deep earthy flavor that made the dish for me. My wife had the cold dungeness crab salad and gnocchi with hedgehog mushrooms. We wound up basically splitting each othjer's dishes so I got to enjoy those too. Then I saw the petrale sole entree before I left and felt bad about not getting to try that. Eric and Emily know what they're doing and have created a must stop location for anyone visiting wine country. Check them out here.

Nick's Italian Cafe in McMinnville

2011-01-30T10:41:00.000-08:00

Nick's is one of our favorite restaurants in the world. And this is a belated note. Since we opened our tasting room in McMinnville and they are about 150 feet up the street, we've been in there quite a bit this year.

If you want interesting food they have it - for example, Thursday's night's Fritto Misto included two types of fried oranges and a crispy beet chip that I would buy bags of if they made enough. And I've had lots of wonderful fritters with veggies and fish and bruschetta with octopus and other toppings. But I just love the execution on the basics - my meal last Thursday was a bowl of minestrone soup and a wood-fired sausage pizza paired with a glass of barbaresco. It simply doesn't get any better for me.

Twelve is in the 25th Anniversary IPNC

2011-01-30T10:27:00.000-08:00

We will be a featured winery at the biggest and best pinot party in the world - the International Pinot Noir Celebration - in McMinnville in July. I've been there 3 or 4 times as a fan (before winery) and a couple of times since I got into the business. I seemed to remember we poured our 2004 Pinot at the 06 event, but my lack of specifics can be explained by anyone who has actually been to one of these.

You start at 9AM Friday morning with tasting seminars, a huge lunch with wine, afternoon activities with wine, a pre-dinner tasting of thirty of the best pinots in the world, a ridiculous multi-course grand dinner with more wine and then you wake up Saturday morning and do it all again except the grand dinner is replaced with an authentic NW salmon bake and even more wine. And finally you make your way into a sparkling wine breakfast on Sunday that has food from around the world. World-class chefs prepare all the food, the best sommeliers in the country pour all the wine and you just have to enjoy the party. This year's event will be special, because it's the 25th anniversary - I'd expect lots of well-aged, spectacular Pinot from Oregon, France and elsewhere to make an appearance. If you can't make the weekend, there's a Passport to Pinot tasting on Sunday afternoon where you can taste the 60 or so featured wines and grab some of that world-class food. More info at www.ipnc.org

More Scores

2011-01-30T10:24:00.000-08:00

Spectator scored the 2008 Twelve Pinot Noir 144 (our reserve) 92 points. They gave the 2008 Twelve Pinot Noir Uh-Huh 89 points. Very interesting to us. The Wine Spectator and Wine Advocate agreed on the 2008 Estate (89 WA, 90 WS) and the 144 (91 WA, 92 WS) but seemed to have a difference of opinion on the Uh-Huh (92 WA, 89 WS). Stop by the tasting room and taste for yourself.

2008 Twelve Pinot Noir in the Wine Spectator

2011-01-10T21:50:00.001-08:00

We finally submitted wines to the Spectator. The 2008 Pinot Noir scored 90 points. We don't know if they'll rate the 144 or Uh-Huh. They don't always taste wines that are made in really small quantities and both of those were only 100 case lots. They are also the best wines we've made to date so let us know if you want some.

Dinner with a LOT of wine

2011-01-10T21:39:00.000-08:00

Our friends, John and Robin Spencer, had a gumbo night last Saturday. The gumbo was awesome and we went through a pretty serious array of wines. Keith Gover had the foresight to actually write down all their names which is the part I usually forget. The Montrose was outstanding (although still very young), I really liked the 2009 Harper-Voit from Drew Voit (whose day job is making wines at Shea Vineyards), and I thought the Riesling went best with the gumbo. I'll also put in a plug for the 2008 Twelve Uh-Huh - we just bottled that in July, but it is really starting to show at how good it will be.

Here's the list. I didn't get to try them all.

Whites & Sparkling:

1997 Soter Extended Tirage Pinot Noir Brut Rose - Yamhill-Carlton, OR

2007 Domaine Vrignaud "Fourchaume" - Chablis, France

2009 The Four Graces Pinot Gris - Dundee Hills, OR

2009 Olssens "Annieburn" Riesling - Central Otago, New Zealand

Pinot Noir:

2006 Carabella - Chehalem Mountains, OR RP86

2006 Gypsy Dancer "A & G Estate" - Dundee Hills, OR WS90

2006 Lemelson "Thea's Selection" - Willamette Valley, OR RP89 WS89

2006 Roots "Racine" - Yamhill-Carlton, OR

2006 Shea "Pommard Clone" - Willamette Valley, OR RP93 WS93

2007 Panther Creek "Shea" - Yamhill-Carlton, OR RP87 WS84

2008 Twelve "Uh-Huh" - Yamhill-Carlton, OR RP92

2009 Harper Voit "Strandline" - Willamette Valley, OR

Other Reds:

1997 Fontanabianca Barbaresco "Sori Burdin" - Piedmont, Italy RP89 WS90

1998 Clarendon Hills "Brookman" - McLaren Vale, Australia RP93 **corked**

2003 E. Guigal Chateau d'Ampuis Cote-Rotie - Northern Rhone, France RP96 WS94

2005 Chateau Montrose - Saint Estephe, France RP95 WS94

2007 Efeste "Ceidleigh" Syrah - Red Mountain, WA RP91+ WS93

Thanksgiving Weekend Tasting Hours

2010-11-25T13:11:00.000-08:00

We'll be pouring on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday this weekend in our tasting room in downtown McMinnville (581 NE 3rd Street). We open at twelve and our tasting fee is $5. That covers the 2008 Estate White and all three 2008 Pinot Noirs (Estate, 144, Uh-Huh). We'll also be pouring at the winery (At ADEA, 26421 Hwy 47, Gaston, OR) on Friday and Saturday from 11-4. Tasting fee is $15 and also includes wines from ADEA and Matello.

We're done with Harvest 2010

2010-11-14T08:09:00.000-08:00

Barreled (or barrelled - I'm not sure) the wine from the last three fermenters yesterday. It's been a whirlwind this year. The entire process from the start of picking the first grapes to everything in barrel or tank has taken 25 days. This is two weeks faster than a typical harvest, but we've never picked the entire vineyard in a single day before either.

Attached are some pictures of the barreling process - you can see the barrels and the fermenters, the stainless steel torpedo in the fermenter, the hose inside of the torpedo and the wine being pumped into barrel.

2010 should turn out to be quite a good year. The 'numbers' - sugar and acid levels - wound up right where you want them after the grapes spent a little time cold soaking. The flavors were there due to the late October picking dates, so all in all, we're very pleased. Had a nice mix of a couple of medium bodies wines from the 115 clone fermenters, some full-bodied Pommard and some black as ink, robust Wadenswil. We'll have some fun blending.

Robert Parker Wine Advocate Scores for the 2008s

2010-10-31T21:45:00.000-07:00

We just got our scores from Jay Miller's Oregon report for the Wine Advocate (Parker actually doesn't do the Pinot Noirs, Jay does). I added a phrase or two from the review along with the score.

2008 Twelve Pinot Noir: "Bright and vibrant on the palate with an edgy, elegant personality" - 89 points.

2008 Twelve Pinot Noir 144: "similar aromatic and flavor profile to the Yamhill-Carlton bottling (the wine above), but with greater depth, concentration, succulence and finesse" - 91 points

2008 Twelve Pinot Noir Uh-Huh: "plush, velvety wine with layered fruit, outstanding volume, impeccable balance and several years of aging material" - 92 points

We'll be releasing the last two on November 20 at our official grand opening of our tasting room in McMinnville. If you can't make that nor the Thanksgiving weekend tastings, send us an email or give us a call if you want some. We only made 100 cases of each of the reserves.

Tasting Room Grand Opening - November 20

2010-10-24T19:49:00.000-07:00

We've been working on finishing the tasting room since we had our soft opening in July. We now have lighting, a bar, a sink and some other accessories and are ready to have an 'official' grand opening in conjunction with the release of our 2008 Pinot Noir reserve blends - the 144 and Uh-Huh.

Come see us on November 20 from 12-8 at 581 NE 3rd Street in downtown McMinnville. the 20th is also the monthly Art and Wine walk in McMinnville, so after trying our wines you can wander down 3rd Street and check out a bunch of other places that will be featuring guest artists and wineries.

Harvest Update

2010-10-24T19:40:00.000-07:00

2010 will go down as the fastest harvest we've ever done. We picked the entire vineyard in one day which we've never done before and hope to never repeat. And we processed all the fruit in one long shift on the sorting line which we also hope to never repeat.

On the bright side, the fruit looks really good. Sugars have soaked up (we leave the crushed berries in a cold place for a couple of days before we start fermentation) to 23+ Brix which means low to middle 13s on alcohol. Flavors were great, seeds were ripe, should be a very nice vintage. Some pictures of harvest are shown above.

2008 Pinor Noir Reserves

2010-10-17T14:13:00.000-07:00

We opened our as yet officially unreleased 2008 144 and Uh-Huh for some lucky people during the last two Saturdays at our new Tasting Room in McMinnville. The 144 (made from old vines picked on Oct 29) is showing incredibly well especially considering these were just bottled at the end of July. The Uh-Huh (our first whole cluster fermentation) is a little tighter - just needs some more time in the bottle. Really long finish. Both are very nice wines. Official release will be November 20 in the tasting room.

And we've retired the black graffiti label for the 144 and replaced it with the ballerinas shown above. The Uh-Huh label will stay the same.

Sorry for the lack of posts - Harvest Update

2010-10-17T13:58:00.000-07:00

I've been trying to figure out how to balance the blog and our new Facebook page (twelvewine). Can't figure out if I should just double post or try to create original content for each place. The latter is going to be extremely hard, so some variation of the former is going to have to happen.

In that spirit, Let's get up to date on harvest. Weather over the last couple of weeks has really been helping. Our canopy is still mostly green and the birds haven't made too big of a dent, so we're looking forward to letting the grapes hang out there as long as we can. You'll see lots of picking over the next week, because the weather forecast starting next weekend is ugly. We're going to try and pick as late in the week as possible. One thing we've learned is that if you wait long enough in Oregon the weather forecast tends to change. Maybe next weekend will just be a one-off storm - we'll see.

Looks a lot like 2008 out there - smaller than normal crop, good flavor formation, nice brown stems, just waiting to see if we can get a little more sugar.

Grapes on 9-12

2010-09-12T10:15:00.000-07:00

You can see much more color versus last week. This is a picture from the same block shown in the previous post.

Clusters are changing color . . . . finally

2010-09-06T11:28:00.000-07:00

Slightly blurry picture that I took yesterday of some Pinot Noir clusters. We expect a late harvest, but it's too soon to tell if it will be later than 2008. We picked our last grapes on October 29 that year.

Multi-year blends? Good idea or bad?

2010-09-06T11:10:00.001-07:00

Cleaning up in the tasting room last night I wound up pouring what was left of the 2005 Pinot Noir 144, the 2007 Pinot Noir 144, the 2008 Pinot Noir and the Second Floor Pinot Noir into a single bottle. It's more efficient than carrying four partially-filled bottles home.

Linda and I were looking forward to a rare home-cooked meal - the tasting room has taken up most of our free time over the last seven or wight weeks and we just don't have time to make nice dinners. I grilled a piece of Alaskan Chinook Salmon from Newman's Fish in Portland (and I am not 'fishing' for a discount with that plug :-). I just like that store. The smoked salmon is awesome too) and we had some couscous and a salad with some nicely ripe tomatoes from our friend Kelly's garden. The blended wine from the tasting room really went well with the food and it actually tasted quite good, so I spent a little more time sipping and tasting that wine.

Which led me to think - why aren't there many multi-year blends of wines outside of champagne? Do people immediately assume a label that says 'non-vintage' means less quality? Or does the market simply just expect single vintages for certain varietals like cabs or pinots? I believe Cameron has made pinot blends with multiple years, but I haven't seen many others around here.

I may try one this year. I have a little 2008 that I haven't bottled yet and I think combining it with some of the 2009 could create a really interesting wine (and, more importantly, provide another excuse to design a new label). Haven't decided yet. Anyone with an opinion please feel free to comment.

Awesome Winemaker's Dinner at Joel Palmer House

2010-08-21T15:55:00.000-07:00

Went to a great dinner last night. Featured the combination of a five course Joel Palmer meal with many wines from ADEA Wine Company. We make our wines at ADEA, so we're not completely unbiased, but Dean and Ann make some really nice wines there.

First course was a gazpacho that was really two soups - a tomato ginger and cucumber lemon poured side by side into the same bowl along with a pickled chanterelle. Matched wonderfully with the 2009 Rose.

Then we had elk and mushroom consomme (that was definitely a first) along with some wild mushroom risotto. These were matched with two 2006 Pinots - the Dean-o's and the Momtazi. Big wines for big flavors - dark and meaty and earthy - I loved the Momtazi with those dishes.

We moved to wild salmon with chimichurri sauce that was matched with a pair of 2007 Pinots. Never would have thought of trying a spicy sauce with Pinot, but the acidity of the 07's made it work. Main course was a buttery piece of Filet Mignon from Painted Hills matched with an 04 and an 05 Dean-o's. Chris said he spent three days on the demi glace and it showed. A spoonful of the sauce and the chopped mushrooms followed by a taste of the 04 Pinot was the best match of the night.

I kinda remember the dessert course - some really fresh berries, and oatmeal scone and cheese I think. Good match for the 2008 Pinot Blanc (from our vineyard) which has a little residual sugar to match the sweets.

Really great dinner and a lot of fun. Thanks Joel Palmer and thanks ADEA. Forgot the camera so I don't have pictures. I'll remember next time.

Vineyard Update

2010-08-01T17:43:00.000-07:00

Wow, it seems like it's taken forever for the vineyard to get going. The cool spring definitely slowed things down, but we've had some great weather over the last month and we're finally making some progress. We had a good crop set - you can see a picture of the clusters. And you can also see Charlie, the guardian of the vineyard, protecting the immaculate Pommard 1 block at the top of the hill. Looks totally vicious, doesn't he. He'd absolutely lick you to death before you could set foot in that block :-)

Vertical Tasting This Week

2010-07-22T07:44:00.000-07:00

The IPNC is in town this week, so we decided to offer a vertical of the 2004 through 2008 vintages. Come by and try our last five years of Pinot Noirs. (And if you stop by on Sunday, it's quite possible that there will be a 2009 barrel sample available.)

581 NE 3rd Street, McMinnville, OR 503-435-1212

Tasting Room is now open!

2010-07-11T12:34:00.000-07:00

We now have a tasting room with regular hours. We share a space in downtown McMinnville with Honest Chocolates at 581 NE 3rd Street. We'll be open Wed-Thu from 11-6, Fri-Sat from 11-7 and Sun 12-5. Come by and see us!

Friends Don't Let Other Friends (Especially Winemakers) Take Pictures at Parties

2010-06-26T09:47:00.000-07:00

I attended a very fun dinner at the Heathman Hotel in Portland to kick off the countdown to the Best of Oregon event in August. This event features something like 20 wineries and 30 restaurants and will be held at the Reserve Golf Club in Hillsboro. The dinner matched wines from five wineries with courses prepared by the Heathman. We poured the 06 Pinot 144.

105.1 the Buzz (local radio station) and KOIN 6 (local CBS station) are sponsors. They had run contests where tickets to the dinner were the prize. I had just returned from the annual big trade show for my day job. Male/female ratio was something like 95 to 5 and that probably overestimated the female attendence. The dinner in contrast featured 5 males and about 35 women. No one's complaining, I just don't see that much (actually ever).

Anyway, everyone had a good time, wine was consumed, and then we took some pictures at the end. The mess at the top of the post was taken by a fellow winemaker who shall remain nameless for now. It shows me with Daria (afternoon drive time host) from 105.1. I'm pretty sure you can tell that I'm on the left (as you are looking at the picture).

I did tell the audience that they could see the main inspiration for the name Twelve by going to You Tube and typing "it goes to eleven" and Daria gets much respect from me for not only immediately knowing what that meant but also immediately shouting out another classic quote from the movie - "there's a fine line between clever and stupid." I can only hope that I'm on the right side of that line.

2009 Vintage - Just liked the picture

2010-06-26T09:36:00.000-07:00

We always stack the barrels two-high in the winery, but for the Memorial Day Weekend tasting, we put them four-high to free up floor space. So here's a shot of most of the Twelve 2009 vintage in barrel. Did a little barrel tasting with some guests last weekend. These are starting to show well. Similar to the 06 vintage if you liked that one. I do apologize for the picture quality - it's a phone shot.

2008 Estate White is an Oregon Wine Press Value

2010-06-11T17:50:00.000-07:00

The 2008 Estate White, a blend of 80% Pinot Blanc and 20% Pinot Gris, was selected as a Value Wine for the month of June by the Oregon Wine Press. Article is here. A snippet of the column is shown above. We knew people would like this wine. Email if you want some. We will have this in our soon-to-be-opened tasting room in downtown McMinnville. More blog posts on that very soon.

Aliens in McMinnville

2010-05-15T17:14:00.000-07:00

Every May McMinnville, Oregon hosts the second largest UFO Festival in the United States (largest of course is in Roswell, NM). Why McMinnville? Only because one of the most famous UFO pictures of all time was taken there. That's the first photo. The rest of the pictures are from the Saturday afternoon parade. All I can say is the Star Wars fans will spend serious dollars on costumes, Avatar was popular this year, and I'm still wondering how the dog actually was turned green. And the Pumpkin Cannon, I mean the Alien Defense Cannon, makes me want to take a break during crush and go watch that thing in operation. It's a lot of fun and a huge event in McMinnville. There were thousands watching the parade.

If a Tree Falls in the Vineyard When No One is Around . . .

2010-05-08T09:45:00.001-07:00

Here are some pictures of something that happens about every five years - a tree just falls down. This one happened to fall from the neighbor's property and landed in the upper Pommard block. The tree was easily 70 feet+, but it only about 20 feet landed in the vineyard. Amazingly it fell between two posts, so there wasn't a whole lot of damage. About 20 plants, some wires and the deer fence were damaged. Charlie (the dog) had a lot of fun walking back and forth on the trunk. I didn't even know dogs did that.

And no, the logging described in the last entry didn't knock the tree over. This one was done in by some pretty strong winds - there's a huge chunk of ground standing upright at a 90 degree angle around the roots.

Budbreak and Clear Cut

2010-05-08T09:32:00.000-07:00

Two interesting and opposite things happened recently. We had budbreak in mid-April and I included a picture looking down a row. You can see all the small shoots. The cover crop was planted last fall and was just disked (sp?) under last week. I'll have to take a new picture. Weather started out great but has been cold - we need some heat to get these plants growing.

Second picture is of what's going on next door. Our neighbor passed away and her children have decided to log the property. You can see the clear cut of the hillside. Certainly won't be as scenic in some parts of the vineyard for a while. I am generally in favor of property rights - the " if you own the land, you shouldn't have too many restrictions on what you can do with it" philosophy, so I really don't have a problem with it. We had a similar clear cut up the hill several years ago and the trees do grow back.

Real German Food

2010-04-17T09:21:00.000-07:00

Sorry about the lack of activity on the blog recently. I've just returned from a round-the-world trip ( Japan to Israel to Germany to home) and didn't have much time to blog. We just made it out of Europe ahead of the volcanic ash. We flew out of Munich Thurs afternoon - Heathrow had already closed and right after we took off they closed Amsterdam and DeGaulle. I think I'd still be there if we were scheduled to leave a couple of hours later.

Highlight of the trip was a homemade traditional meal at the home of Hanns and Susanne Windele. It's the beginning of the white asparagus season in Germany - this is a huge deal over there - it's a very popular dish. I'll admit that I'm not a huge asparagus fan. I find the green version a little too bitter for my taste and tough to pair wine with. And my only experience with white asparagus was being served some really soggy spears that were about an inch thick at a tourist trap restaurant in Munich.

When prepared by someone who clearly knows what they are doing like Susanne, however, white asparagus becomes amazing. I grabbed this picture from Wikipedia, because I had this exact meal - steamed white asparagus with hollendaise sauce and potatoes along with some prosciutto and smoked duck breast. Suzanne says she's always careful to cook it just enough so that there's some bite to it. I was astounded by taste - nice flavor, no bitterness, just crunchy enough and some sweetness that I didn't expect at all.

Hanns pulled out a bunch of Alsace wines from his favorite microproducer who I had never heard of before (and can't currently remember - blame jet lag) and they proved to be a good match. We tried Sylvaner (this guy actually makes old vine Sylvaner), a Pinot Gris with some serious body, and a bone dry, crisp Riesling that was my favorite.

Thanks again Susanne and Hanns - you transformed a simple dish with a couple of ingredients into an experience I won't forget. I'm going to invite myself back next April and I'll bring some of my own wine this time :-)

Snowboarded and Didn't Die

2010-03-26T11:10:00.000-07:00

I, my brother and my two sons took a "mancation" to Whistler for three days of snowboarding. OK, my brother is a skier, but he's just not as evolved as us West Coasters ;-) We figured it would be in great shape after the Olympics and it was. If you've never been there, Whistler Blackcomb is the largest ski area in North America. The first picture in fact was taken from the top of Blackcomb Mountain and shows a small part of the bowls and trails on Whistler Mountain next door.

Second picture is taken from a gondola car on the Peak2Peak gondola which connects those two mountains. That gondola is an amazing piece of engineering. There are two towers at each end and then 1.9 miles of unsupported cable in between. It's supposedly the longest such gondola in the world. In the middle where the cable is lowest, you are 1400 feet high. And it only takes 11 minutes to get from one side to another. On the second day, Whistler was enveloped in a cloud, so we took the gondola over to Blackcomb in search of runs where you could see more than 15 feet in front of you.

Third day (when my brother had to fly back) we had a dream day of spring snowboarding - bright sunshine, soft snow, no lift lines, and temps in the low 40s. We just went until our legs gave out.

The second best part of Whistler is the village. You come there and never have to leave - bars, restaurants, hotels, movie theatres, shopping all on a pedestrian only area right at the bottom of the lifts. Had one great meal at Araxi. I've been to Whistler four times and this place just never disappoints. I wanted seafood and ordered salmon sashimi and tuna, but I got to try the venison and a stunning loin of lamb. The people who sat down next to us couldn't take their eyes off our food. We explained what everything was and made their ordering easier.

If only the place wasn't so expensive, we'd do it every year. The exchange rate isn't helping either. I've been there when a Canadian dollar was worth 70 cents US, but it's almost 1 to 1 now.

Vineyard is Ready

2010-03-26T11:06:00.001-07:00

Just a couple of shots of the vineyard after pruning, tying down, and mowing the cuttings. Always looks the neatest and cleanest in the spring. It was a super clear day and you can see the town of Carlton is the upper left hand corner of the second picture.

2008 White Will Be Bottled Soon

2010-03-14T19:26:00.000-07:00

[UPDATE: We have a name and a label. We decided to make things simple and call this Estate White. And then we tried to get the label approved by the TTB. After three tries we were finally successful. I don't even understand exactly what was wrong with the original submissions, so I can't explain them to you even if I want to.]

We've been providing updates on this wine for far too long. We have good news- we have a bottling date. We will bottle the wine during the weekend of April 3-5. It's been on the lees for 15+ months and as a result has a wonderful texture and body. This is the first vintage that we blended the Pinot Blanc with the Pinot Gris from the same block. We had historically sold the Pinot Gris to some home winemakers in Washington, but we decided in 2008 to add it to the Blanc. The wine is currently being held in the tank shown in the picture above. We expect to have about 125 cases.

Flavors of Carlton

2010-02-28T16:16:00.001-08:00

We had a great night at the Flavors of Carlton Charity Auction. They raised over $52,000 for the town's main charitable organization - Carlton Together Cares. Thanks to Ken Wright Cellars for hosting the event like they have every year.

We bid on and now own some Oregon wines from the early eighties - I've had very little Oregon Pinot from those years, so I'm looking forward to opening those soon. As one of the 18 wineries that were participating, we poured our unreleased estate 2008 Pinot Noir by accident. I could have sworn that I donated some 2007 Reserve, but I must have pulled a different case out of storage. Anyway, that is going to be a very nice wine.

Too Much Travel

2010-02-28T15:53:00.000-08:00

I've just returned from my second consecutive week on the road. One is San Jose - one in Dallas. So there were lots of breakfasts, lunches and dinners. Only two meals stood out (is it me or are all steakhouses pretty much the same?) - a grilled cheese, sliced green apple and walnut sandwich at the Modern Art Museum in Fort Worth (more below) and stone crab claws at Truluck's in Dallas. It was my first experience with stone crab - out here in Oregon it's almost 100% dungeness crab - and, wow, those claws were amazing. And they come with mustard, which really worked in a weird symbiotic way. Had a really good wine that night too, a Jermann Pinot Grigio, which was to a basic Pinot Grigio what calculus is to adding single-digit numbers. I have always had good wines from that producer.

I spent the last day with my sister in Dallas - which is how I got to the Modern Art Museum. They had a collection of paintings from the last decade of Andy Warhol, i.e. well after the soup cans. I was blown away by a couple of the self portraits but most of all by his version of Michelangelo's Last Supper. Also loved his quote on one of the posters in the gift shop which I have attached above.

Valentine's Day Weekend Tastings

2010-02-28T15:48:00.000-08:00

We participated in a Valentine's Day Weekend tasting at ADEA with the rest of the Gaston 6 (ADEA, Biggio Hamina, Bishop Creek, Cancilla. Matello, Twelve). I was a little dubious about whether the local area was ready for another "everybody is open" weekend, but it looks like the industry is moving that way. We had a better crowd than I anticipated - about 2/3 of the typical Thanksgiving Weekend attendance.

2007 Twelve Pinot Noir 144 - Update

2010-01-30T09:53:00.001-08:00

Opened a bottle of this last night. I'm completely biased, of course, but I am really starting to like this wine. Our reserves seem to need at least a year in the bottle before they start to integrate and show well, and this one was no exception. The fruit is emerging nicely - it's a focused, concentrated ball of red berry flavors, the tannins are there but not harsh nor bitter, and the acidity balances everything. I think this wine along with most of the 2007 vintage will improve with age for a long time. Here's a link to a review from a blogger based in Seattle .

And just to comment on the 2007 vintage in general, I attended the Willamette Valley Winegrowers Association dinner a couple of weeks ago and had the chance to taste some other 07s. There are a lot of good wines out there - I tasted an Evesham Wood that was great, and I should be punished for not remembering which blend it was. I can also highly recommend the Bishop Creek 07s. I should have taken notes on everything that I tasted - I'll do better next time. There's a Carlton event in February where I'll have the opportunity to taste a wide variety of 07s.

Sunrise - January 28, 2010

2010-01-30T09:48:00.001-08:00

Our kitchen faces east, so if we're up early enough we can catch the sunrise. This one was particularly pretty. The mountain peak out in the distance is Mt. Jefferson.

Pinot Blanc Update

2010-01-24T08:23:00.000-08:00

Good news on the Pinot Blanc. We've been sold out for months, but are getting close to bottling more. We should have some in the March-April timeframe.

Pruning Time

2010-01-24T08:15:00.000-08:00

January is the month for pruning the vines. We cut off all of last year's growth except for the two shoots that will be tied down to the fruiting wire and become this year's canes. You can see the two shoots per plant in the picture and all the cuttings. We put the cuttings in every other row to minimize the number of rows we have to drive the tractor through with the mower. You can also see the cover crop in the rows which reduces erosion and adds nitrogen back to the soil.

This is the oldest block in the vineyard (25 years) which explains both the thickness of the trunks and why they are so far apart. Later this year we will be releasing an 08 reserve blend from these old vines that is simply the most elegant wine we've ever made. It's still resting comfortably in barrel while we do our normal agonizing over what to call it.

Flash Snow Storm

2010-01-24T08:05:00.000-08:00

We were hit by a fast and intense snowstorm in late December. As is typical out here in Portland, all the TV weather people said there was zero chance of snow. We saw the fastest accumulation of 4-6 inches of snow that I've ever seen. It melted quickly over the next few days, but snow always makes the vineyard look beautiful. Here are a couple of pictures of the beginning of the storm.

Uh-Huh Sighting

2010-01-02T11:12:00.000-08:00

There is or will be or was a case of our 2006 Uh-Huh Pinot Noir at the Allison Inn in Newberg. Sometime during the dinner I documented below, I or, more accurately, Dean Fisher from ADEA, committed one of my last three cases of this wine to Tom and the Allison. [Note: I am keeping the rest for myself.] We delivered to our distributor just before Christmas, so I believe you can try some if you get there soon. 91 points from the Wine Advocate and the best wine we've released to date.

Awesome Christmas Presents - Part Two

2009-12-27T12:17:00.000-08:00

[UPDATE 1-24-10: I've since discovered two great uses for the power cap. We lost our power the other night and with the cap I didn't need a flashlight to move around. And the second, which is much more practical in the winery, involves looking into barrels to see where the level of the wine is. You have to do that all the time and now I won't need a flashlight. Very cool.]

I received something called a Panther Power Cap. It looked like a normal baseball hat, but had LED lights built into the brim. To be honest my first impression was what am I ever going to do with this. I included a picture of the hat with the original label - it not only lights up, but does it in three different ways.

So about ten minutes later I had to get behind the stereo system ro reconnect a DVD player. My stereo is of course in a cabinet against a wall and has lots of wires that I'd have to disconnect to pull it out far enough for easy access to the back. So I usually wind up doing the 45 degree tilt, sliding it out a bit, and groping around to connect cables.

The hardest part is reading the tiny text under the connectors that tells you what's what in the back. So I put on the Power Cap and shazam! I could read the text on the connectors without needing a flashlight. Then later in the day I needed to get some wine out of the cellar. I have a light fixture that is intermittant. And now more times than not it just doesn't light. That's why I have a flashlight by the door. I donned the Power Cap, switched it on high, and again could easily read labels and find bottles.

I'm now officially sold. Our circuit breakers are in a room under the stairs with no light at all and I can't wait to use the Cap when something trips.

Awesome Christmas Presents - Part One

2009-12-27T12:13:00.000-08:00

One member of the family definitely liked his Christmas present. Charlie, our dog, received a new bed. Here's a picture of him tentatively checking it out then another of him getting comfortable. He's a very happy dog.

One Thing I Won't be Doing for Christmas Next Year

2009-12-27T11:48:00.000-08:00

My wife has always wanted to see one of the traveling Chrismas music shows, so we attended the Mannheim Steamroller concert in Portland on the Saturday before Christmas. I think we realized about two songs in that we really wanted to attend the other traveling Chrismas show - the Trans Siberian Orchestra. I had a premonition before the show when I was reading the program and got the instinct impression that Mannheim Steamroller was trying a little too hard to justify their existence.

How many bands consider it necessary to make points about how many hotel room nights they've booked or how many yard of video screen they've hung or how more many records they sold than Springsteen and Bon Jovi? I saw Springsteen in April and he didn't mention anything about the band's history or that he had sold more records than someone - he just played (really well, I might add).

It really hit home when one of the keyboard players introduced himself as the "featured keyboard player" and then introduced the other keyboard player - who happened to be his wife. Is his wife less valuable to the band because she's not "featured"? I can't imagine that going down too well in my house. And who cares who the featured keyboard player is anyway? Very odd.

They are perfectly fine musicians. The women playing recorder was awesome. I think we were just expecting a little more rock-n-roll and a lot less of the medieval vibe. I did check around with some friends a couple of days later who all said that the show we should have seen was the Trans Siberian Orchestra. Now that could wind up being equally lame for a whole set of different reasons, but now we're committed. We're going to have to go see for ourselves next year.

Halfway Around the World and Back Again

2009-12-14T21:45:00.000-08:00

Made my semi-annual India/Egypt/UK trip over the last two weeks. I felt a bit guilty walking around Noida, India in a short-sleeve shirt while Carlton had a week of below freezing temps. Did get to see the Nile for the first time. But it was at night and from the middle of downtown Cairo the Nile actually didn't look much different from the Willamette near Portland.

Couple of interesting pictures. First probably only appeals to gadget geeks. The Intercontinental Hotel in Cairo features interesting elevator controls - you put in the floor you want to go to, the control then displays which elevator to get onto, and once you're inside there are no buttons, it just takes you to your floor automatically. While that prevents the kids pressing every button, it also prevents you from changing your mind during the trip. I did get stuck going up and down and in and out trying to find the lobby until I figured out I needed to enter a minus sign before the number to get there. Maybe these are everywhere now, but it's the first time I've seen them.

Second picture was just amazing to me. Seeing a Christmas tree behind an obelisk and the Sphinx was just bizarre. I don't even think they celebrate Christmas, but I forgot to ask about it

Allison Inn: Jory Restaurant - Thumbs Up

2009-12-14T21:20:00.000-08:00

Finally made it out to the pretty spectacular Allison Inn in Newberg on the Sunday of Thanksgiving Weekend. I had seen it on a tour before all the drywall was up, so it was great to see the finished product. We had just completed three days of pouring wine and could best be characterized as wiped out. We had heard very good things about Jory (and they even have our 06 Pinot Noir 144 on their list).

The bar area that surrounds part of the kitchen is beautiful (I can't wait to sit there for a late lunch), but we had a group so we sat at a table. They're obviously used to winery people, because they had no problem opening a bunch of bottles of wine that we brought. The rack of lamb was outstanding. I wish I could remember all the appetizers I tried, but I wasn't feeling too much pain by the end of the night (had a designated driver). We had a couple from Seattle join us for us for a while to try some wine - we're a friendly group and love meeting new people.

I do want to thank Tom and the staff there - some restaurants aren't as thrilled about people bringing their own wine.

Thanksgiving 2009 - Fried Turkey and Wine Tasting

2009-12-14T21:09:00.000-08:00

I'm always surprised at how many people haven't tried a fried turkey. We started cooking them that way a couple of years ago and we wouldn't ever think of putting one in the oven any more. You can cook a 14-15 pound turkey in about 50 minutes and it comes out moist - what's not to like about that? So here's a picture of the turkey frying and the end product. Looks very tempting even with the bad lighting. We had a very nice 1999 Belle Pente Murto Vineyard Pinot Noir with it.

Day after Thanksgiving we were pouring wine at ADEA Wine Company with four other wineries. $15 tasting fee = 20+ open Pinot Noirs. This is one of the best values and most laid back places to try wine in Willamette Valley. Come see us sometime. Next big open house will be Memorial Day Weekend but we can make ourselves available on most weekends if you call to set up a time. One note - the 2007s are starting to come together - major improvement over how they were showing at the '08 Memorial Day tasting.

2008 Vintage - First Consumer Trial

2009-11-26T15:41:00.000-08:00

We bottled our 2008 main estate blend in early October. We think it's pretty good, but we've had no one outside our facility taste it yet. So last Sunday we had a call for an appointment and I remembered that I had a case of 08 in my trunk. These bottles were going to be used for samples because the labels were all at odd heights - every time you change a roll of labels on the machine you hope you've set it in same place as the last roll. Sometimes you're a bit off.

So I decided this group would be the first "outsiders" to taste one of my 08s. I poured them the 07 estate, 05, 06 and 07 reserves and the 08 estate. This was an experienced group - they've been drinking Oregon Pinot for 20 years. The 08 estate, even with only a month of bottle age, was really impressive. They forced me (OK, strongly encouraged might be more accurate) to take them into the barrel room to try the 08 reserves which are still aging in barrel. Then they went and bought two cases of reserve futures (I don't even usually sell futures - they were persuasive) and most of the case of the 08 samples.

So all I can conclude so far is that the 08s will be very well received when they are released. These are very elegant Pinots. There may be an Uh-Huh bottling and there is a strong possibility of a completely new label. If I can get the bottles, we will bottle our first magnums ever.

What's Your Favorite Oregon Vintage?

2009-11-26T15:07:00.000-08:00

Last weekend we poured our 2005, 2006 and 2007 reserve Pinot Noirs at our Weekend Before event [Note: There are two traditional open house weekends in Oregon - the weekend after Thanksgiving and Memorial Day Weekend. Every winery including all those without regular tasting hours pour wine during those two weekends and many are also open the weekend before.]

I was interested in what people thought about those three vintages and I have almost the perfect setup for finding out. All three wines had the same clone percentages: 50% Pommard, 25% Wadenswil, and 25% 115. All three wines were aged for about the same amount of time in 50% new French oak [50% means half of the barrels were new]. And even the winemaking was almost identical - every vintage was completely destemmed and fermented in small lots in 1.5 ton fermenters.

So as I told the tasters, the variables were mostly yield and weather. We had a bad fruit set in the spring of 05, so our yield that year was very low. We had a normal crop going in 06 and then it got hot in October (the 09 harvest reminds us a lot of 06). And in 07 we had a normal crop going and then it got cool in late September with some rain.

So which one did people prefer? If you look at purchased bottles, it was 56% 06, 22% 05 and 22% 07. There did seem to be some differences in preference among people who have purchased Oregon Pinot for many years - they seemed to prefer the 07 over the 06. If you remember (and we certainly do) the "experts" were trashing the 07 vintage before we even picked it because it rained in late September. The wines are really coming around now and showing quite nicely.

I was asked quite a bit which one is my favorite and I responded by stating the order in which I'd drink them right now. I'd drink the 07 first (nice acidity with a beautiful laser beam of cherry fruit running through the wine - very refreshing), the 06 second (definite crowd pleaser with upfront dark fruit flavors and a tremendous round mouthfeel) just because I think it could benefit from another year or two of aging, and the 05 third (still very tight but showing more fruit this year) because I think that needs another couple of years.

I'll get another couple of hundred opinions this upcoming weekend and update this post if I find anything interesting.

Swedish Food

2009-11-14T13:47:00.000-08:00

I was in Sweden last week and wound up having an amazing and unexpected dining experience. My previous experiences with Swedish cuisine haven't been all that memorable - for example, heaping plates of cold baby shrimp on lettuce isn't my idea of a mid-morning snack, but seems to be a national dish. A colleague wanted to try someplace he'd never been before in old town Stockholm, so I said let's go.

We wound up in the basement of a hotel at a restaurant called Leijontornet - Lion Tower in English. It turns out that the restaurant sits on top of an ancient outer wall of Stockholm and they actually built the dining room around some of the ruins. Parts of the wall we could see were almost 700 years old. I attached a picture. I didn't have my camera so I had to take pictures with my phone. I apologize for the horrible quality. There are much better pictures on their website.

We were the only two people in the restaurant - I guess Tuesday nights are slow. Two parties showed up later in the evening. The menu showed three choices - four course seafood meal, four course meat, and a seven course combination. The meat menu was interesting and included duck liver, ox tartare, and lamb, but we both decided on the seafood menu (picture attached). I couldn't pass on lobster and truffles.

So we needed a white wine. Our very funny Norwegian server brought out the list (my companion was Danish, so they both compared notes on Swedes throughout the evening - apparently Swedes are an inferior species). Then they let us go down into the wine cellar to look around (benefits of a slow night). It was full of first growths and ridiculous burgundies plus high-end wines from all the other areas of the world. I decided to pull out the personal credit card and we wound up with an '04 Leflaive Batard-Montrachet (picture attached). I'm a sucker for white burgundy and we needed something worthy of the menu. The wine kicked ass all night - we couldn't have picked a better match for the food.

About the food. First thing that came out was what's in the bottom picture - a four item sampler that included a salt pike lollipop, a very thin slice of reindeer jerky, some sort of cod skin and the Swedish version of a pork rind (the clear twirly thing in the left of the picture). The pork was like eating bacon-flavored air and everything else was equally good. Highlights were the mussels in the first course (I'm not a mussel fan at all - these were the best tasting mussels I've ever had), and the lobster, of course. Everything was fresh and from Sweden - even the raspberries and truffles.

I had my eyes opened to good Swedish cuisine. It's not just meatballs and herring. If you get to Stockholm, check out Leijontornet.

Winemaking Update - 10/27

2009-10-27T21:45:00.001-07:00

Fermentation is winding down. Brix readings range from 0 to -2.1. I expect to start barreling down fermenters by the weekend.

New Restaurant - Farm to Fork in Dundee

2009-10-18T12:16:00.000-07:00

My wife and I went out to dinner on Friday night to celebrate our 27th anniversary. We finally made it to Farm to Fork, the restaurant at the Inn at Red Hills in Dundee, Oregon. They focus on local ingredients and have a gourmet deli as part of the restaurant. Can't believe we haven't been here before. We had the carrot soup and pork and duck rillettes as appetizers and the duck breast and scallops for dinner. And (not like this has not happened before) we wound up spending more on wine than the food - we had a 2006 Louis Michel Chablis Premier Cru from a vineyard I can't remember. We both thought the food was excellent and the prices were very reasonable consdeiring the quality. We'll have to go back.

Winemaking 2009

2009-10-18T12:06:00.000-07:00

All the pinot is in fermenters. We used roughly 30% whole clusters in all but one fermenter. (You always need a control lot) We cold soak and gently pump over for a few days before we inoculate with yeast. Right now the first lot that was picked is in active fermentation, the second lot is just starting, and the third lot is still soaking and expected to start soon. We've seen temperatures in the mid to high 80s - which is where we like them. One thing with using whole clusters is that the fermentations take a little longer to get going and a little longer to end. Everything looks good so far - I'll update in a few days.

More Harvest 2009

2009-10-18T11:19:00.000-07:00

Final numbers - 16 tons of Pinot Noir from 11 acres or 1.45 tons per acre. That's a little less than we were expecting. We definitely had some dehydration in the vineyard - it looked a lot like 2003 and 2006 out there. Sugars were higher than normal, but we also saw that in '03 and '06. We deliberately maximized hang time even with the higher sugars to help develop the right flavors. We picked on Oct 6, Oct 9 and Oct 11. The fruit was extremely clean with no noticeable botrytis. The "farmer" part of me is always happy to get clean fruit into the winery quickly, but the "winery" side is always greedy and wants as much hang time as possible.

I think we're going to have very nice wines from this vintage. I attached some pictures from Oct 11. You can see Charlie, the Twelve mascot, patrolling the filled grape bins in one. Our picking crew was amazing - they pick extremely fast and clean, so that we can get the fruit to the winery before the day gets too warm.

First Crush 2009

2009-10-07T06:48:00.000-07:00

We finally picked some Pinot Noir yesterday. It was our Block 1 Pommard which was planted in 2000. It's been the first block picked for the last four years. Yield was only 1.5 tons per acre and 3 tons total. We would have been much closer to 2T/acre if we hadn't had the dehydration that you can see in the last post. There are some pictures of the bins at crush pad, a bin loaded in the sorting line and some clusters on their way to the destemmer. We filled two fermenters - each with 1.5 tons of fruit. We dumped one bin of fruit directly into the fermenter and then destemmed and crushed three bins to wind up with 25% whole clusters. We'll be picking more later this week.

Harvest

2009-10-06T00:08:00.000-07:00

We are picking grapes later today. This is our first pick of the vintage and we're bringing in the Pommard block that was planted in 2000. The fruit is definitely ripe. I've attached a picture of a Pinot Noir cluster and you can see some shriveling from the warm weather we had a couple of weeks ago. We plan to pick the rest of the Pinot Noir before Monday, but we'll see. If we can squeak out some more hang time, we'll go for it. I also attached a picture of some Pinot Blanc clusters (they're huge, as usual) and a picture of the harvest bins cleaned and ready for use. They're upside down to prevent the one that don't have slots from filling up with rain.

We had a little rain last week which actually helped firm up some of the clusters that were showing signs of dehydration. I'll post more pictures from the harvest process over the next couple of weeks.

Veraison 2009

2009-09-02T20:30:00.000-07:00

We're through veraison or the 'changing of the color' of our Pinot Noir grapes. Here's a picture from 10 days ago showing some clusters in the middle of the transition. Now it's just waiting for harvest and hoping for the best weather possible to continue the ripening process.

Ridiculously Good Wine

2009-08-10T23:11:00.000-07:00

Had a 2005 Comtes Lafon Volnay a couple of days ago. Love this producer. There's a place called Willi's Wine Bar in Paris which always has several years and several kinds of Comtes Lafon white and red Burgundy. I have been known to sit at the bar and splurge on a bottle with dinner.

This was the village Volnay not his single vineyard. Spectacular. I know he's justifiably famous for his white wines, but the reds are just as good. I just wish I could afford more of the 2005 Burgundies - I tasted a bunch of them at the 2007 International Pinot Noir Celebration and they were all outstanding.

Blending

2009-08-09T23:01:00.000-07:00

I'm starting the blending process for the '08s. Blending is one the most fun things you do at a small winery. Usually start in July, but the day job has been really busy. There are 50 barrels which have been separated into 11 lots. You can see a picture of some small bottles filled with samples above.

The current target is one main estate blend and two reserve wines. There are a lot of interesting components to work with - the Wadenswil this year has a tremendous upfront fruit component and the lots we picked last that hung for almost the entire month of October have some beautiful texture and balance. We'll carry the reserve blends over harvest and bottle sometime next year. Haven't made our mind up yet on the main blend. Check back for updates.

Venezuela in the House!

2009-08-09T22:26:00.000-07:00

I get a call at about 10AM on Saturday the 8th asking for an appointment later in the day for tasting. I needed to be up at the winery anyway to work on blending, so I agreed. It was a Washington state phone number - Seattle area code, but the person calling had a bit of an accent. My hopes weren't too high - I've learned that the later the appointment the much higher the probability of a no show. Which is why I never open bottles early any more. People just seriously underestimate the amount of time you typically spend tasting per winery. Right around the time of the appointment I get a call - same person letting me know they're running late but that they still plan on being there. (Note to anyone making an appointment at a winery - we love status calls. Let us know if you changed your mind and aren't going to make it or you're running late or whatever, we really appreciate those.)

So around an hour later, two ladies and a gentleman arrive. Turns out that Irene who had made the calls is a native of Caracas, Venezuela and is visiting her friend Carolina (originally from Venezuela, but now in Seattle) and Carolina's new husband Juan Antonio. That's Carolina on the left in the picture above and Irene on the right. More amazingly, Irene had found and selected Twelve for a visit solely through the web while she was still in Venezuela. Irene knew our story, our labels, and which wines we no longer had. I've never had a more prepared visitor.

So we tried a 2007 Pinot and a vertical of the 2005, 2006 and 2007 Pinot Noir 144 (our reserve) and then Irene asked me about the "ooh-ooh". I figured out that she meant the "Uh-Huh" (which comes from the KC and the Sunshine Band lyric "That's the way uh-huh uh-huh I like it") Just the fact that she knew about that wine meant I had to go find a bottle and open it. I have maybe three cases total of that wine left, but you have to reward people who do their homework. Then we did a little barrel tasting of the 08s.

We shared war stories - Carolina told me about her mother pouring her $200 super high-end Malbec for her friends (who would have been just as happy with a $6 Malbec) and I told her about my wife accidentally using a $90 Chardonnay as a cooking wine. And we compared last names. Irene and Juan Antonio's were pretty easy. Mine - Lenyo - is very rare in the US and so consistently gets butchered (Lenno, Len-ee-o, Leeeno, etc...) that it was immediately ruled out as a name for the winery. But Carolina topped me - her last name, Uzcategui, looked pretty close to something you'd get out of a random letter generator. It is pronounced yoose-kah-tey-ghee and it's a Basque name.

So we took pictures and they headed out to dinner at Tina's. And I can now chalk off Venezuela as a country from which Twelve has had a visitor.

Classic England part 2

2009-08-02T20:56:00.001-07:00

The restaurant was right on the river shown in the second picture of the last entry. Food was excellent. Wine list was typical for England - Australia, Chile, Argentina, France and South Africa well represented, nothing from Oregon. Check out the picture above of the amazing carving that's on the walkway to the restaurant. Didn't even notice it on the way to dinner (jet lag). Found it at breakfast the next morning.

Classic England

2009-08-02T20:38:00.001-07:00

The day job took recently took me to a small city in England about 45 minutes west of London. Here's some pictures of the a classic English country hotel - The Newbury Manor. An aged but well-preserved pile of bricks in an immaculate garden setting. They even have real keys for the room doors. The grounds were in excellent condition in mid-July. More in the next post.

Vintage 2009 - Looking good (so far)

2009-07-26T09:14:00.000-07:00

The vines are looking great. We had a solid fruit set and we're back to what looks like a more normal target date for harvest - early October. We set a personal record last year when we didn't even begin picking grapes until October 22. We had never picked any other vintage after October 18.

So here are a couple of pictures. The second shows some rows and you can see how we manage the vineyard. We till every other row and leave a cover crop in the rest. This is one method to manage vigor in the vines - you want your vines to focus on ripening fruit, not growing long shoots.

We do a lot of work on the canopy. We position the shoots vertically in the trellis trying to eliminate overlapping leaves. We want a very thin canopy with the max sun per leaf we can get. We pull leaves on one side of the canopy to let more air circulate around the clusters. This is targeted at reducing the possibility of powdery mildew. And finally we hedge the tops of the shoots - again to slow shoot growth and improve fruit ripening.

The first picture shows some clusters. Since the set was good, we actually have to go through and do a 'green harvest'. The plants in a typical year will set more fruit than our target yield. In Oregon, most premium Pinots are harvested at yields around 2 tons per acre. It's all about ripening and developing flavors. Too high of a yield runs the risk of not ripening enough at harvest. So we're in the process right now of cutting off clusters to get to our 2 tons per acre.

So far so good, but Oregon harvests always come down to the weather in the last week of September and the month of October.

Tons of Great Food

2009-07-19T20:11:00.000-07:00

Had a week of vacation and spent it enjoying lots of good food near home.

We had a wonderful meal at a brand new restaurant in McMinnville - Thistle. I think we were there on their third night. The owners are Emily and Eric, who also happen to be the only employees. Food was really impressive - I had the beet salad and flatiron steak. There's four or five appetizers and main courses plus a couple of desserts. The menu choices change every day.

We did a whole day in Portland during vacation. We had lunch at my favorite lunch place in Portland - Wildwood - a super consistent, high quality eatery with a great bar area and great lunch menu. Didn't even drink any wine, I went for an updated version of something my late father-in-law introduced me to about 27 years ago - the rye (usually Seagrams) and ginger ale. They made a version with raw ginger that was really refreshing.

Then we wandered around the Mississippi Street fair for a couple of hours (first time and would definitely go again), crossed back over the river to see the movie Away We Go and would up having dinner at one of my favorite dinner restaurants in Portland - the Veritable Quandry. They cooked some Alaskan wild salmon to perfection, but I was blown away by the handmade truffle that we had for dessert. It was simply unbelievable. It clearly highlighted the difference between something fresh and something you get out of box that was filled months ago. Just decadent with a stunning creamy texture.

We closed our vacation week with a experience that I would hesitate to make public if anyone was actually reading this blog. Nick's Italian Cafe in McMinnville - an institution in Wine Country - has started a family dinner on Sunday. It's one seating served family style. You can even bring your own wine. I won't even put the price in this blog - lets just say if it was twice as much no one at my dinner would even have blinked. There was wood-fired flat bread pizza with porcini mushrooms as one of the appetizers, and then huge plates of fettucine with mushrooms and peppers, followed by salad, then a sublime lamb stew, and finally Fred Flinstone sized piles of ribs. Ridiculously awesome, insane price and there was dessert too.

Summer is the Time for Tasting

2009-06-17T21:26:00.000-07:00

Continuing the previous post, when I went up to the winery, I was expecting it to be pretty quiet. I rent space from ADEA Wine Company in Gaston, OR, which is about 12 miles north of the vineyard. Six wineries currently make wine there (ADEA, Biggio Hamina, Bishop Creek, Cancilla Cellars, Matello, and Twelve).

I was quite surprised to see about 30 motorcycles parked outside the front door and a bunch of leather-clad people hanging out having a picnic. Turns out it was the second annual Poker Run for a local bike club and we were the lunch stop. Dean from ADEA was hosting. It's always something - on Memorial Day we had a group with four Pontiac Solstice convertibles.

While I was barrel tasting I got a call from another winery asking for directions for a couple that was tasting there. Long story short, their daughter had attended a Twelve tasting in North Carolina and insisted that they stop at the winery while they were in Oregon. So I met a very nice couple from Tennessee who were at the beginning of a two month RV trip through the northwest.

One of the things I really like about the wine business is the ability to talk to people about wine in the winery. So if you're in Oregon this summer, call and make an appointment to come visit. I guarantee you'll get a host who is deeply knowledgable about the wine and the vineyards (process of elimination - there are no other employees besides me) and likes nothing better than spending time tasting and talking about wine. The appointment hotline is 503-358-6707.

Tasting the 2008 Vintage

2009-06-17T21:15:00.000-07:00

The day after I returned from my around the world trip, I went up to the winery and tasted through some of the 2008 wine that's still in barrel. This is going to be quite an interesting vintage. The wines smell and taste great.

We fermented some lots with completely destemmed fruit, and for the first time ever we did some with varying percentages of whole clusters. Adding in effects of the new barrels from three different barrel producers (Cadus, Damy and Francois Freres), the three clones (115, Pommard and Wadenswil), and the range of ages of the plants (8 to 25 years old), we have a lot of blending choices. We expect total Pinot Noir production to be slightly over 1200 cases.

Trip Around the World - Coolest Airport Wine Shop

2009-06-16T21:40:00.000-07:00

Between Delhi and Cairo I changed planes in the eighth wonder of the world - Terminal 3 in Dubai. People talk about Heathrow being a huge shopping mall, and the Seoul airport has quite a collection of shops, but the Dubai airport is ridiculous. And in the middle of it is an amazing wine shop - Le Clos. It's not very big, but this series of pictures shows it's pretty special. A little weird to be standing in the middle of a bunch of first growths and grand crus in an airport.

They had one of my favorite Burgundies - Comtes Lafon Volnay Santenots Du Milieu from the incredible 2005 vintage, so I picked up a bottle of that along with a 2005 Chateau Montrose. Prices were even lower than in the US.

Trip Around the World - Kimchee

2009-06-16T21:29:00.000-07:00

Kimchee is the national dish of South Korea. I've never had a meal there where it wasn't served. I actually found the Kimchee Museum (yes, there is a kimchee museum) which wasn't large, but was very informative. There is an amazing variety of kimchee across the country. The one fact I remember (was still recovering from the previous night's soju experience) was that hot peppers weren't native to Korea, so kimchee didn't get spicy until someone brought them in.

Like wine, kimchee is fermented and the Koreans talk a lot about the health benefits - low calorie, high fiber, rich in vitamins and lactic acid bacteria. Regardless, it tastes great. Here's picture of one of the displays in the museum. They had over 60 different kinds.

Trip Around the World - Seoul part 2

2009-06-16T21:23:00.000-07:00

It was pretty cool seeing thousands and thousands of South Koreans out celebrating their Memorial Day. Above is a picture of a display of the flags of all the nations that helped during the Korean War. But talking about Korea with out talking about the national dish would be criminal, so that's the topic of the next post.

Trip Around the World - Seoul

2009-06-16T21:04:00.000-07:00

I just returned from an eight-day trip around the world for my day job. I was in Seoul, Delhi, Cairo and Manchester. That's a lot less sexy than it sounds. But I did have a few wine experiences. For example on the left is a picture of the small wine rack outside of my hotel's bar in Seoul. They clearly take their wine seriously in Korea.

The sad thing was I didn't even drink any wine in Seoul. I attended a dinner with customers and drank the traditional soju, which is "wine" made from sweet potatoes. It's similar to sake - about 19% alcohol, clear, packs an enormous punch in large quantities. Following the usual custom of drinking a shot with everyone from the customer's party, let's just say the next day wasn't a whole lot of fun. It also happened to be Memorial Day in Korea and the square outside of my hotel was ground zero for the Seoul celebration. The (very) amplified speeches started at around 8AM.

Introduction

2009-06-16T20:40:00.000-07:00

I've finally decided to take the plunge into Web 2.0. As usual, I'm several years behind the curve - I was late into CDs, late into DVDs, late into big screen TVs and still don't own a Blu-Ray. The odd thing about this is that my day job is in one of the most geeky, high-tech areas of computer software. That's right, I still have my day job.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. First things first, my name is John Lenyo and I live on my vineyard in Carlton, Oregon. We moved into the vineyard in 1998 (two weeks before harvest - not recommended) and our first vintage of Twelve was 2003. We only make Pinot Noir and Pinot Blanc and currently all the fruit is sourced from our vineyard.

I was bitten hard by the wine bug in 1992. I do remember the bottle - 1982 Dunn Howell Mountain Cabernet and the restaurant - the now closed Cypress Club in North Beach, San Francisco. (My previous wine experience had been limited to things like Liebfraumilch and the $1.99 Bulgarian or Romanian brand Trakia - not that there's anything wrong with that of course). Once I tasted that wine, I started down a very slippery slope that involved lots of classes, tastings, some collecting, a preference for Pinot Noir and too many mailing lists, culminating in the actual purchase of 23 acres with a house and a small vineyard.

So welcome to my blog and I can only hope that there'll be lots of interesting content.