ROCO Winery’s founder and winemaker, Rollin Soles, makes an impression as soon as he walks in the room. We arrived at his tasting room outside of Newberg, at the north end of Oregon’s Willamette Valley, at 9 a.m. for our appointment with him on a rainy Saturday morning in March. Rollin arrives a few minutes later and takes over the room before he says anything. He has a triathlete’s lean body, a big handle bar moustache, broad smile and a twinkle in his eyes that make you think he would have some great stories to tell. Even though he left Texas almost 30 years ago, he still has plenty of a Matthew McConaughy like drawl. We waited for the “allright, allright”… but it never came. Underneath the drawl, and the twinkle and the warmth is an educated, and articulate man who is passionate about wine and is making some of Oregon’s finest Pinot Noir.
Read MoreThis month the #Winophiles are taking a look at French varieties made into wines around the world. While we could think of many examples from various regions we have visited, we want to shine a spotlight on our own backyard where the Okanagan Valley is making some truly world-class Chardonnay. (To read the other articles related to this month’s topic, please refer to the links at the end).
Chardonnay has an association with Burgundy that is an unbreakable bond. That is simply because so many of the world’s most profound Chardonnay wines come from that region. The great wines of Puligny Montrachet, Chassagne Montrachet, Meursault and Chablis, among other Burgundy sub-regions, make the reference-point wines from the Chardonnay grape. But Chardonnay is a chameleon-like grape that has been successfully planted all over the world and shown its ability to adapt to new terroirs with the potential to make great wine outside of Burgundy as well as within. One of those regions that is rapidly gaining notice is the Okanagan Valley in British Columbia, Canada.
Read MoreIt was 2019 when we discovered Résonance Wines, the Oregon outpost of Burgundy powerhouse, Maison Louis Jadot. We were preparing to do a series of articles on Willamette Valley wineries that had Burgundian roots. Our research uncovered the relatively little-known winery located in Yamhill-Carlton that has rapidly become one of the most talked about in Oregon.
That conversation has been uniformly filled with praise and the scores of their wines from the major publications have echoed our own: excellence across the board.
Since that first meeting, we have made it a point to stop in at Résonance each time we go to the Willamette Valley; either to interview their very talented winemaker, Guillaume Large, or to at least stop by one of their tasting rooms, enjoy a glass, and of course, buy a few bottles.
With this year’s visit we have seen a continuation of the innovations and the acquisitions as well as the development of their wines as the vineyards have moved into a more mature phase. Like their wines, this story just keeps getting better with time.
Read MoreOur second visit with the team at Force Majeure took place at their beautifully renovated new tasting room, housed in an old schoolhouse in Milton-Freewater. There we met and tasted with Carrie Alexander, Head of Sales and marketing and her uber-talented husband, Todd Alexander, Force Majeure’s winemaker.
Read MoreWe’ve had several visits to Résonance Wines in Oregon’s Willamette Valley. We always make it a stop whenever we are in Oregon because the wines are just that good. Résonance is the Oregon outpost of the iconic Burgundian domaine of Louis Jadot. The winery is now run by Jadot’s former cellar master, Guillaume Large. On our most recent visit, Guillaume and his wife Lucie took us on a walk of this beautiful property and showed us something very unique and very special indeed.
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