Oregon Pinot Noirs have been hailed as some of the best.  What got them this distinguished status among the world’s best Pinot Noirs?

The grape growing conditions of the Willamette Valley are ideal for this varietal.  Iron-rich red soil, combined with warm sunshine and nourishingly damp climate make for the perfect growing conditions.  There was something magical about the 45th parallel, that imaginary line around the Earth that brought us fantastic Cotes du Rhones from France and Piedmonts from Italy.  Tapping into this little-known fact, Dick Erath experimented and planted over 23 varieties in the hills of Dundee over 40 years ago.   Through some trial and error, the Pinot Noir grape flourished in Oregon’s warm Summers and cool wet Autumns.  The marine climate allowed bright fruitiness to come forward through a well-developed grape.

Erath Winery put Oregon Pinot Noirs on the map in 1972.  Today, the Willamette Valley is home to hundreds of wineries, making it the Sonoma Valley of Oregon.  If you are visting Portland, Oregon, don’t miss Erath Winery located in nearby Dundee.  The tasting room is open 11am-5pm everyday.  You can also arrange a tour of the cellars by calling ahead.

The legendary Erath Winery has a wine club that is free to join.  You enjoy 20% off regular pricing on any of your orders.  The catch is that they only ship 4 times a year, but each shipment comes with a selection of 3 wines costing less than $85.  These wines are fantastic and well worth the anticipation!

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So who knows about The Gold Medal Wine Club? They’ve got 5 different wine clubs and all of them offer highly rated award winning wines. If you’re looking to grow your own wine cellar or send a wine club gift to someone special I’m sure they’ll appreciate any of the 5 clubs from Gold Medal. The Gold and Platinum series are ideal as gifts… they are good value and still great wines. But if you’re buying for a real wine snob I suggest the Diamond Series. All of these wines are 93+ and are sure to please.

Everyone knows a Pinot fan… and now you have the perfect gift for them. You can get a Pinot Noir wine club from Gold Medal. Most of the selection comes from California but some also comes from around the world. If you’re really looking to experience different parts of the world then I’d suggest the International Series. The special part of this club is that these wineries cannot be found in the US. So they’re great additions to your cellar.

They’ve also got some tasting notes videos on their site. So if you’re not sure what to look for in a wine they’ve got you covered. The videos give some background on the winery, what to eat with the wine, etc. I think it’s a great idea!

They also do gift baskets… so if you’re looking for a one time gift rather than a recurring wine club I’d suggest the basket. Everyone’s always excited to get a gift basket.

Well I’m off to the grocery store. See you next week!

California Wine, International Wine, Pinot Noir, Uncategorized, Wine Club, Wine Club Gift, Wine Education 93+, Gold Medal Wine club, International Wine, Pinot Noir

Wine Club Insider back with you.

As I mentioned, I was out of town doing some work the past week, returning Late Thursday, just in time for a task I was semi-dreading, to be honest… I’m all about helping out, but lately, I’ve been so busy, volunteering wasn’t top of my priority list - I mean, I’ve got lots other other “real” things to do, ya know?

I, like many of you, I expect, am busy, and for the next couple of weeks, I’ll be as busy as any time all year, as we have our largest event of the year coming up - www.adventuresportsweek.com - if you want to see what it’s all about. Well, one of the things we set out to do when we changed our lives around a couple of years back was to try to give back of ourselves if we could, and as luck would have it, it was time to do some givin’.

We live very near an amazing natural resource, Farragut State Park, and with the severity of our winter, there was lots of damage to trails and paths. With our event coming up there in a couple of weeks, myself and a couple members of our working group gathered up chain saws, shovels and rakes on Friday, and hit the trails, clearing dead fall, branches and the like.

12 hours of carrying a chain saw uphill later, we had cleared and restored over 9 miles of trails. Let’s just say this was a job. There’s still 4 miles to go that I’ll try to get to this week, but the main stuff is done.

On top of that, a dear friend who had just had surgery emailed us Friday night in a panic; she was in charge of an aid station for the local marathon, and the group assigned to help out bailed, so she was stuck with no help, and 1800 thirsty runners coming on Sunday morning, so we passed the email around our crew, and as of 6:30 am on Sunday, we were out manning the water station, which was tough, considering I’m way more used to running the marathon than helping at it.

I have to say, though, that it ended up being a great experience! We brought music, oranges, cookies, Heed sports drinks, muffins and a megaphone, and turned our little aid station into a party zone, and the runners loved it! They were so appreciative, and it was well worth the time to help out a friend. The weather was perfect, and all in all, it was a blast!

The bottom line is that despite being swamped, volunteering was a fulfilling and worthwhile experience, and no matter how I felt at the outset, I walked away feeling much better about myself and what we accomplished, and you know what, I’ll still manage to get caught up on my project.

I encourage you to find something you can do to give back and help others without benefit to yourself… you’ll end up giving you and others a gift beyond price. Trust me; you’ll never regret it, and the glass of Mondavi Coastal Pinot at the end of the weekend tasted better than ever!

Cheers,

Wine Club Insider, out!

Pinot Noir, USA Wine, Uncategorized giving back, Helping others, Volunteerism

Wine Club Insider back with you…

I seem to be about 12 hours later than usual today, and I apologize… we have a large event coming up and I was in (unscheduled) meetings all morning, but here we are, so let’s call it Australia time, and we’ll be all square!

Earlier this week, I was thinking of the various wine clubs I either belong to or have belonged to, and began pondering what kinds of people join wine clubs, so I did some asking around, and the results may surprise you.

My first thought was that your regular wine schnobs like me would be the main culprits, and, to be sure, we make up a fair share of the members, but there’s an entire other segment of “wineclubers…”

Wine has kind of evolved into the drink of the hoi poloi, but if you do some research into the history of wine, you find that it was the drink of the people… the real people. It was the beverage that was drank at every meal, that was the water of life at weddings, at communions, at lunch with your falafel… this new “ooohh, wine is fancy” thing is, to a degree, understandable, but also has taken one of God’s greatest gifts out of the reach out of many, whether in price, or just in aura.

Some of our best friends are what you might call “redneck,” having come to the light from our a beer drinking background. “Pete” didn’t now squat about wine, but could speak eloquently about any of fifty kinds of beer. Now, they belong to three wine clubs (including one we gifted to them) and “Pete” enjoys a great red, and a nice glass (or bottle!) of port as much as anyone I know.

Another set of friends, “Keith” and “Sarah,” came from even further from Napa, so to speak, and after a couple of dinner parties, they enjoy a nice Gewurtz, and a spicy Pinot with diner now.

There are truck drivers I know that are on Pepperbridge’s list, a gas station owner who gets his allotment of Harlan, a meat salesman who is a ten year member of Leonetti, and a flower shop owner who is a long time customer of Araujo…

Yup. Turns out your job doesn’t have anything to do with whether you love wine. Turns out that drinking it out back by a fire pit is sometimes just as good as sitting in a chateau, and, if your real friends are with you, it can be even better.

Cheers,

Wine Club Insider out.

California Wine, Fine Wine, Pinot Noir, Shiraz, USA Wine, Vineyards, White Wine, Wine Club, Wine Club Gift, Wine Education, Wine Lovers, Wine Reviews, Wine Tasting Araujo, Friends, Harlan, Leonette, Pepperbridge, who joins wine clubs, wine club gifts, wine clubs

Wine Club Insider back with you.

Sitting here watching the snow come down (again!) and just about getting ready for spring… Don’t get me wrong; I love winter probably more than the next guy, as I love XC skiing, snowshoeing, running and even biking in the snow, but I’m getting itchy to do some riding up in the high hills.

Speaking of high hills, we did some snowshoeing in the mountains a week or so ago, and took a bottle of J. Lohr Paso Robles Cab up in a Nalgene bottle to celebrate the summit. I’ve got to say there’s something about having a good glass of wine out of a camp cup while eating dehydrated Shepherd’s Pie made on a Jet Boil! It was great! (Seriously!) and the new dehydrated meals are really pretty good, especially at 6000 feet in the snow!

The Wine Club - www.thewineclub.com - has one of the better online wine selections anywhere, with hundreds of offerings, including a very nice dessert wine selection. They have been one of the leading online dealers, and also have three retail shops in Santa Ana, Santa Clara and San Francisco.

They are going to be starting a Wine of the Month program in March of 2009, and I’m interested in seeing what they offer, as they have a great inventory to choose from. Keep your eye out for what could be a great opportunity!

Another one that has caught my eye recently is the Pacific Northwest Wine Club - www.pnwc.com- which specializes in wines from the - you guessed it - Pacific Northwest and British Columbia. They offer two bottles a month, and also have several tasting events throughout the region. Their newsletter, Vin Affairres, is informative, and well written. They also have gift memberships available starting at $24.99/month.

Finally, there is the “Sideways” Wine Club at www.sidewayswineclub.com. They are a direct descendant of the movie, and seem to have a great selection. Their website is entertaining and informative, but I’m going to check out their selection of Merlots before passing judgement…

Have a great weekend, and we’ll see you Monday!

Cheers,

Wine Club Insider out.

California Wine, Dessert Wine, Fine Wine, Merlot, Pinot Noir, Red Wine, Sweet Wine, USA Wine, Vintage Wine, Wine Cellar, Wine Club, Wine Club Gift, Wine Education, Wine Lovers, Wine Reviews, Wine Tasting Dessert wines, Hiking, Pacific Northwest wines, Sideways, Wine Club, Wine Club Gift

Wine Club Insider back with you after a couple weeks vacation.

I’ve been going some outside stuff; some snowshoeing, XC skiing, even some snow biking, as well as attending the GIANT Outdoor Retailer’s show in Salt Lake City… boy, if wine had a weekend like that, we’d never got sober! Anyhoo, I’ll be back with you on Monday and Thursday from now on, so let’s get to it…

I met a couple of my friends there for the weekend, and I took a nice bottle of V. Sattui Pinot Noir to share, as well as a bottle of surprisingly good Fusee Syrah, which we drank over a late night business meeting.

The Pinot was so tasty that I decided to open a second bottle tonight. Now, Pinot is perhaps the most finicky of all the major red wine grapes, though it can be one of the most magnificent when done properly…

Andre Tchelistcheff said “God made Cabernet Sauvignon whereas the devil made Pinot noir,” while Vanity Fair’s Joel Fleischman described Pinot Noir as “the most romantic of wines,” and Master Sommelier Madeline Triffon calls pinot “sex in a glass”. Peter Richardsson of OenoStyle christened it “a seductive yet fickle mistress.”

No matter which way you feel, it’s becoming an increasingly important wine, being grown (and well!) in Canada, Austria, New Zealand, Germany, and prominently in Oregon’s Willamette valley, and California’s Sonoma and Russian River Valley… Oh, and have you ever heard of Burgundy?

Yup. Pinot Noir is the grape that made Burgundy famous. That and Dijon mustard, Coq au vin and the Cote-d’ Or.

Some of my favorite Oregon Pinots include Willamette Vineyards, David Bruce, Andrew Rich, Elk Cove, and of course Domaine Drouhin… one cool thing about Oregon Pinot Noirs is that there is actually an Oregon Pinot Noir club! Yes, a wine club just for Oregon Pinots.

www.oregonpinotnoir.com has everything you’ll ever want to know about Oregon’s number one wine export.

Now, moving south to California, you get a different type of flavor… I think that for years, California Pinot was thought of as light and fruity, but over the past decade or so, the winemakers have been making a great effort to give it some real depth, and have, to a fair degree, succeeded.

My 2006 V. Sattui Pinot (www.vsattui.com) from tonight is a Los Carneros appellation, and I must tell you, depth isn’t an issue. This is a big wine. Maybe not Domaine Drouhin big, but very tasty. You’d like it.

Until next Monday,

Cheers,

Wine Club Insider out.

Burgundy, California Wine, Fine Wine, French Wine, International Wine, Pinot Noir, Red Wine, USA Wine, Vineyards, Vintage Wine, Wine Club, Wine Club Gift, Wine Education, Wine Lovers, Wine Making, Wine Reviews Burgundy, Pinot Noir, Russian River Valley, Sonoma, Willamette Valley, Wine Club

Wine Club Insider back with you.

Just got back from a triathlon club meeting… I’m aiming for a 70.3 (1/2 Ironman) in a couple of months, and was actually presenting some stuff tonight… great fun, good fitness, and it justifies the wine as a “training aide…”

It’s coincidental that we’re talking about Merlot today… I got to try the VERY nice 1999 Willard Family Merlot from Caterina Winery - www.caterinawinery.com - that I mentioned last week… it was even better than the last time I tasted it a year or so ago, and looks to have another 5 years or so until its prime… wow, what a nice wine!

Merlot is the other Grand Daddy of red wine grapes, or should I say “Grand Pere?” The other key Bordeaux grape, it is also, like Cab Sauv, an offspring of Cab Franc, and predates the Cab Sauv by a few years.

Merlot is a more medium bodied wine, and ripens earlier than Cab Sauv. It also blends very well, making it uber-popular with wine makers world wide.

The movie “Sideways,” for all its quirky charm, and heaped with blessings from the Pinot Noir industry, did many wine drinkers world wide with lead character Paul Giamatti’s irrational dislike for Merlot. One of the bits of ironic humor was in the final scene when he sits at the table in the diner to drink his treasured bottle of French Bordeaux… which ends up being a Merlot!

Yes, two of the world’s most famous, rare and expensive wines are both close to 100% Merlot…  Petrus (around $3000/bottle for futures) and Le Pin (even more than that!) are both Merlots.

Merlot is also going to be the number one red wine grape (again) by the end of 2009, it looks like, surpassing Cab Sauv.

Merlot is often used to add body and softness to the oft-harsher Cab Sauv, and is grown most everywhere Cab Sauv is, though tends to do better in the cooler areas of the AVAs where it doesn’t ripen quite so early. It is the largest varietal in France, and is becoming more and more popular world wide. In the USA, it is hugely popular in Napa, and is making greater inroads in the Pacific Northwest, where wineries such as Leonetti, Chateau Ste. Michelle, Isenhower, and yes, Caterina are making notable and praiseworthy wines.

Myself, I love it. A great Merlot is a joy to drink… softer somehow than other reds, often “fleshy,” and filled with flavors of currant and plum, two of my favorite tastes in wine.

So, put whatever prejudices you might have aside, and take up a glass of good Merlot and join the rest of the world in appreciating this grand old grape! There might even be a Merlot wine club out there somewhere… hmmm…

Back tomorrow with Cab Franc, another of my favorites!

Cheers,

Wine Club Insider out.

Bordeaux, California Wine, Fine Wine, French Wine, International Wine, Merlot, Pinot Noir, Red Wine, Vineyards, Vintage Wine, Wine Club, Wine Education, Wine Lovers, Wine Making, Wine Reviews, Wine Tasting Bordeaux, Chateau Petrus, Le Pin, Merlot, Napa, Washington wine, Wine Club

Wine Club Insider back!

One of the cool web sites I frequent on at least a weekly basis is www.winezap.com.

Winezap is kind of like a little community where you can actually get to “know” your online “neighbors” as you rate/discuss/argue about wine.

So, every week or so, I get an email in my regular box about the latest wines that have been rated by their distinguished panel of experts…

I think that having a few folks with respected, or at least educated palates can give us a basic groundwork to at least discuss wine, so I appreciate their efforts.

Some of the wines I received reviews on tonight were (and the reviewer):

Bordeaux, Burgundy, California Wine, Chardonnay, Fine Wine, French Wine, International Wine, Italian Wine, Pinot Noir, Red Wine, Shiraz, Sparkling Wine, USA Wine, Vintage Wine, White Wine, Wine Cellar, Wine Club, Wine Club Gift, Wine Education, Wine Lovers, Wine Reviews, Wine Tasting Wine Club, Wine Club Gift, Wine Reviews, winezap.com

Wine Club Insider back.

As the snow/slush/sleet continues to fall here in the Northwest, adding to the five feet we’ve already accumulated, I’m sitting in front of a fire, sipping on a glass of Corbett Canyon Reserve left over from New Years Eve… I’ve got to tell you that for an inexpensive wine, it’s pretty tasty! It’s a Central Valley product from Ripon, California, and as is becoming the norm, it’s hard to get a bad bottle of wine from California…

I think that the vintners from California have gotten so smart and do such a good job with their properties, and with their actual crafting of the wine that even “cheap” California wine is darn good, especially when compared with the product from a decade ago, or with similar priced wines from many other regions and nations. Go Left Coast!

Here are a couple of other wine clubs for you to consider:

The Wine Insiders (hey, I like the name!) at www.wineinsiders.com offers three choices of level (pretty normal) but also offer 3, 6 & 12 month options, with wine club gifts starting at $89, and ranging up to over $500 for a 12 month Connoisseur’s Club membership.

Their top level club is pretty substantial, with great options, including some nice Barolos and California Pinot Noirs.

www.winegiftclub.comis another online provider with a great selection of services. While their actual wine clubs are a bit limited, they make up for it by providing a great choice of seasonal gifts, including champagne, wine gift baskets, wine and food baskets, etc. You can choose your price, as well as your products, and they custom build your basket for you and ship them out. Right now, they’re getting geared up for Valentine’s Day, so check them out and be ready for the big day! (C’mon… don’t miss this one, guys… even if she says she doesn’t want anything, we know better… you’ll seldom go wrong from being too romantic, or spoiling her too much!)

Hope it helps, and I’ll be back tomorrow.

Cheers,

Wine Club Insider out.

California Wine, Cheap Wine, Fine Wine, International Wine, Italian Wine, Pinot Noir, Red Wine, USA Wine, Wine Club, Wine Club Gift, Wine Education, Wine Reviews Valentine's Day gift, wine baskets, Wine Club, Wine Club Gift

Wine Club Insider back with you on January 3rd, 2009! Where did the time go? It seems like barely a year ago and we were welcoming in 2008…

I hope everyone had a safe and happy New Year’s eve celebration. Ours was very nice, aside from the five FEET of snow we have, which limited parking to our party a bit. Still, we had a great day of paintball, fireworks, hot tub, good food, and, or course, good wine!

For our midnight celebratory toast, we cracked a nice bottle of Roederer champagne, which is, I must say, as good as the reviews say it is! Crisp, light, but with a body not at all common amongst many champagnes.

Today, I would like to revisit a site we touched on a few weeks ago:

Gold Medal Wine Club, at www.goldmedalwine.com, is one of the better wine clubs, I would have to say, and certainly has one of the larger selections, with 5 main choices, including their Pinot Noir club.

The reason I’m mentioning them again is that they have launched several new features that are pretty interesting.

They have a spot where you can answer some questions about wine and earn a discount, as well as they have a taster’s blog, where you can compare notes about the wine club offerings. They also offer free greeting cards, and are currently sponsoring a trip to Portugal contest.

One of the neatest features is that they offer a “live chat” opportunity, where you can actually chat with someone right now about the various wines.

You can also get upto 45% off winery-direct reorders, which can really add up when you find a wine you like.

On that note, when you find a great wine that you like, it’s not a bad idea, space permitting, to buy a case, if you have the chance, and the price is right. Wine is a growing thing, and you can never be sure what next year’s vintage will bring. If you find something you like, and you can get 45% off, like from Gold Medal WIne club, then buy a  case, and enjoy!

Overall, some nice upgrades to the Gold Medal WIne Club site, so check it out.

Cheers,

Wine Club Insider out

California Wine, French Wine, Pinot Noir, Red Wine, USA Wine, Uncategorized, Wine Club, Wine Club Gift, Wine Education, Wine Lovers, Wine Reviews Gold Medal Wine club, upgraded website, Wine Club, Wine Club Gift