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Phone: 1.88.CUVEE (28833)
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Phone: 1.88.CUVEE (28833)
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Amalie Robert Estate Earns Top Score for 2007 Pinot Noir!
Amalie Robert Estate and the 2007 Oregon Pinot Noir Vintage – A Primer The wine press gave the 2007 Oregon Pinot Noir vintage an effective and lingering black eye. Or, as our friend Dick Erath likes to say, “The kiss of death.” Well, no one asked us. So, here is our view of the vintage. Some things are obvious, others are not. Under the obvious category we have the United States Congress spending $14 trillion dollars worth of our (yet to be created earnings and therefore yet to be collected) tax revenue by the end of the 2010. This is truly astounding. Well, we better get to work. Under the not so obvious category is the 2007 Oregon Pinot Noir vintage. It seems that some folks were shocked to discover it rains in Oregon in the fall. Yes, it is true, the Willamette Valley is a marginal climate for growing Pinot Noir. We are not guaranteed a postcard perfect growing season and dry fall weather every year. However, we are guaranteed to get the vintage of the year. Let’s take a look, shall we? We have a pretty detailed view of the 2007 vintage. We live where the vines live, and keep pretty close tabs on the growing conditions as well as soil moisture, canopy health and most importantly where our harvest windows fit with Mother Nature’s prerogatives. The trip from the field to the winery is no more than a few hundred yards, and this allows for nimble harvest operations - aka just in time harvesting! Ernie manages the vineyard operations as well as driving all the tractors. He monitors the growing season and determines what needs to be done and when. He lives in the moment with an eye toward the harvest. There is no doubt the 2007 growing season was a cool one with just about 1,900 degree days. This is more akin to a Burgundy vintage and a welcome relief from the hot vintages of 2003, 2004, and 2006.
The elephant in the room seems to be the rainfall we received in September and October. It has almost become a running joke: Interviewer: “When did you pick?” Winemaker: “After the rains.” Interviewer: “OK, good.” In fact the 2007 Oregon Pinot Noir vintage is really 3 vintages. As we review the 3 vintages, keep in mind the following harvest criteria that most winemakers use in determining when to harvest. 1. Are the grapes in the range of sugars and acids to make commercially viable wine? 2. Have the grapes developed aromas and flavors that showcase the soils and the vintage? 3. Will the extra hang time be offset by water logging or rot if we wait to harvest? 4. Of course, if you are buying fruit, the winegrower has an opinion on when to harvest. Ernie calls the first vintage “Impending Doom.” As September wound down, the forecast was for rain, and a lot of it. This garnered the attention of many winemakers and growers. Bear in mind, that those grapes are not yours until you bring them in. There is an entire year’s worth of effort, and in some cases an entire winery’s worth of wine hanging in a single vineyard. For those who chose this harvest window the harvest began in mid to late September and promptly ended on September 27th. Rainfall over the next 4 days was a modest 1.55 inches. We held fast and let the vintage ride. Now, what happens with all of this rain? First off, an inch of rain is about 27,000 gallons over an acre of land, which is 43,560 square feet. So to put this in perspective, we are looking at just over 2 quarts of water per square foot. Marry this with the fact we had virtually no rain at all since the 19th of August when we received 0.60 inches in one day. The rain was absorbed by the first couple inches of dry soil and the cover crops and grasses that are growing in the tractor rows. In other words, the vines keep moving along with a little drink that the soil and cover crops let pass through to the vine roots. Really, this rain event was no big deal. But there’s more to the story. This first rain was a shot across the bow for most vineyards. Others were not so lucky, or perhaps not prepared. The major late season issue we are concerned with in Oregon is Botrytis. Botrytis is also called bunch rot. Botrytis is great for making Sauternes, but is not attractive in Pinot Noir. Botrytis typically starts to grow from the inside of the grape cluster, and is hard to detect until it is too late. Pinot Noir clusters are very tight, and you can’t always tell if you have an infected cluster. Once these infected grapes make it to the fermenters, an enzyme called Laccase starts to grow. Laccase will impact the already delicate color of Pinot Noir along with contributing uncharacteristic flavors and aromas. This is where experience on the sorting line can really make a difference. However, great fruit coming into the sorting line is the goal. Botrytis spores are with us year round, but can only grow when the weather conditions are favorable to it. These weather conditions typically occur twice a year, early in the season when the vines are flowering and setting fruit and late in the season when we are tempting Mother Nature’s rains. We can take preventive steps early in the year, but not in the fall. We choose the ounce of prevention method early in the season to insure healthy fruit. So the result of these September rains, paired with seasonal temperatures gave rise to a Botrytis “bloom.” For those who were unprepared, the clock started ticking. We see the second vintage as the “Just Right” vintage. October began with another 0.85 inches of rain and then a harvest window began to appear. It was time. We began harvesting on the 6th and concluded our 46 ton Pinot Noir harvest on the 14th. That was the good news. The even better news is that we only had to return about 100 pounds (0.05 tons out of 46 tons) of fruit back to the vineyard due to Botrytis infection. The 2007 vintage was clearly a grower’s vintage. After 10 years of farming our site, and responding to Mother Nature’s cues along the way, we rode out the rains and harvested mature and healthy fruit.
The third vintage of 2007 was the “after the rains” vintage. There is a saying regarding investing that goes something like “Bulls make money, Bears make money and pigs get slaughtered.” The rains returned to the Willamette valley with a vengeance on October 16th. Over the next 7 days, we logged 2.80 inches of rain. We were busy in the winery, but our thoughts turned to the Syrah and Viognier hanging tough. Unlike the thin skinned Pinot Noir, these grapes are “built to take it” and they did. Or as Ernie said “They’re gonna get wet.” Then around the 24th, the monsoon was over. The skies lightened up and we had a nice dry spell that lasted until November 14th. We let the Syrah and Viognier bask in the late October and November (Okto-vember) sun. We thought they had enough on November 7th and brought them into the winery. Remarkably, these grapes had no rot at all. So, that is the story of the 3 vintages that make up the 2007 Oregon Pinot Noir vintage. Depending on the vineyard site, early may have been exactly perfect. For Amalie Robert Estate, we found our harvest window from October 6th through the 14th to be just right. We have ripe flavors and trenchant acidity that bode well for long lived wines. The Syrah and Viognier have special needs, and Mother Nature accommodated them with some very nice hang time. All in all, we believe the 2007 Amalie Robert Estate wines can be summed up as “Pretty fruit, Nice acid. ®” Stephen Tanzer’s International Wine Cellar Josh Raynolds - July/August 2010
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