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Tendril Wine Cellars Child’s Play Pinot – Chardonnay 2017

Tendril Child's Play Pinot - Chardonnay 2017

An offshoot label from Tony Rynder’s Tendril wines, Child’s Play 2017 Pinot Chardonnay is a blend of 70% Chardonnay and 30% Pinot Noir. The nose grapey nose with intriguing layers of Fig Newton, sultana, white flowers, poached pear, and yellow plum. It’s medium-bodied on the palate with a zesty vein of acidity adding lift, cutting through perceptible […]

Kangarilla Road Chardonnay 2017

Kangarilla Road Chardonnay 2017

Lots of breadth and range in Kangarilla Road’s 2017 Chardonnay. Sourced from a single vineyard within the Adelaide Hills, 50% of this wine was fermented in new French oak Hogsheads, with daily lees stirring. White peach, underripe pineapple, orange pastille, blanched almond, dried mint, and toast leap from the glass—it’s lithe and citrus-driven on the […]

Trimbach Pinot Gris Alsace Réserve 2013

Trimbach Pinot Gris Alsace Réserve 2013

Brimming with aromas of peach pit, apricot, paraffin, pastry cream, and white flowers, Trimbach’s 2013 Pinot Gris Alsace Réserve is full and fleshy on the palate with a gorgeous, driving vein of oyster shell and saline that pulses through the core like a magnetic wave. Highly recommended. 13.5% ABV | Sample Trimbach 89 Points

Stoller Family Estate Club Exclusive Chardonnay 2016

Stoller Family Estate Club Exclusive Chardonnay 2016

Perhaps one of the most unusual chardonnays I’ve run across in Oregon—Stoller’s 2016 Club Exclusive Chardonnay is partial-malo and partly aged in stainless and in one of the winery’s concrete squares. Had I have tasted it blind, I might have pegged it as a Bordeaux blanc, the profile has a lovely herbal note to it; aromas […]

Open Claim Vineyard Chardonnay 2015

Open Claim Vineyard Chardonnay 2015

There is a story to this wine, and one that explains the reason why the bottle was shot in its thoughtful tissue wrap—you see, I took it on a date, this was the second date, mind you, with a person who by all accounts enjoyed wine immensely. And somewhere in the midst of that date, […]

Château de Saint Cosme Little James’ Basket Press Blanc 2014

Château de Saint Cosme Little James' Basket Press Blanc 2014

An inexpensive yet charming offering from Château de Saint Cosme, the 2014 is a blend of 40% Sauvignon Blanc and 60% Viognier. Four years on, the Sauvignon blanc dominates with pronounced aromas of pineapple, muskmelon, white peach, lemon verbena, and dried grass clippings. In the mouth, it’s medium bodied—the acidity hits the sides of the […]

Wine By Joe Joe To Go Pinot Gris NV

Wine By Joe Joe To Go Pinot Gris NV

From one of Oregon’s most forward-thinking winemakers, Joe Dobbs—the Joe to Go series of canned wines is meant to be convivial, light, refreshing, and portable. That being said, canned wines and the canned wine trend is here to stay, and there are some perfectly quaffable examples out there, this being one of them. Straw yellow […]

Forge Cellars Riesling Classique 2014

Forge Cellars Riesling Classique 2014

Forge Cellars Classic Dry Riesling 2014 hasn’t lost its agile edge, though perhaps, there has been a little softening with the passage of time. Lemon yellow in the glass, exhibiting quite tones of lemon drop, yellow peach, waxy yellow apple skin, lemon blossom, chalkboard dust. There’s quite a lot of body, but that signature burst […]

Troon Vineyard Whole Grape Ferment Riesling 2017

Troon Vineyard Whole Grape Ferment Riesling 2017

Limpid, shimmering copper in the glass, 2017 Troon Vineyard Whole Grape Ferment Riesling is a fabulous orange wine—a delicious romp through ripe apricots, orange zest, almond paste, linden blossom, and dried honey. In the mouth, skin contact lends textural dimension, there are beautiful oxidative tones offset by pink grapefruit infused acidity. All in all, Troon […]

Tendril Wine Cellars Pretender White Pinot Noir 2014

Tendril Wine Cellars Pretender White Pinot Noir 2014

The aptly named Pretender is a White Pinot Noir from Tendril Wine Cellars, and offers a rather glorious, pure-fruited nose of white peach, melon, grilled pineapple, and quince. On the palate, texturally, it’s like biting into a ripe market peach—peach fuzz brushes across the palate before subsiding to a lemon-and-pomace-infused acid spine. Nicely done. 13.0% […]

CHRISTINE HAVENS
McMinnville, OR

christine@christine-havens.com