A Stirring Story – January 2021

Snow Day - January 26, 2021

While the winery and vineyard work continues with the typical chores of the mid-winter, the big news here continues to be results from various wine judging events and blind tastings. Then, ‘A Stirring Story’ follows this first section…

We found out, and reported to you in December’s blog, that six of our gold medal winning wines from 2019-2020 (above) scored well in Wine Press Northwest’s 2021 Platinum Awards. Most notably, our 2017 Willamette Valley Reserve scored unanimously in blind judging with three different panels of judges, and not only was awarded a double-platinum for that unanimous decision but was noted as the highest-scoring Pinot noir out of the forty that were entered in the contest! This wine is a 50-50 hybrid of the Eola Hills (from Zenith Vineyard just west of Salem) and our own South Willamette Valley terroir (from nearby Walnut Ridge Vineyard), the wine was described as follows: “Neil and Sue Shay entered one of Oregon’s most decorated examples of Pinot Noir, and it went on to be the top-scoring Pinot Noir of our judging. There’s purity of fruit with its Rainier cherry and pomegranate approach, joined by secondary notes of forest floor, earthiness and anise. Refined tannins and brilliant acidity combine to give it impeccable balance. (50 cases, 13.4% alc.)” Note, this low production wine is now one of most awarded wines along with the 2016 Reserve Chardonnay, and about to go into our wine library, meaning that right now is going to be your last chance to get this wine at the lower, pre-library price. Check it out at the end of the blog, where we have a bunch of new specials listed!

Now, since the last post, we have heard back from Wine Enthusiast magazine. We had sent them six of our newly bottled wines late last fall to be tasted. To be honest, we were a little nervous, we suppose its sort of like seeing your kid perform a solo at their high school concert or play, you want it to go well, but you never know how it’s going to turn out…

Long story short, we will go right to the scores: