WINE BACKGROUND
Oregon's pioneer winegrowers planted using
selections of Chardonnay that and been chosen for California's
climate. They were very late ripening - in Oregon, two or three
weeks after Pinot noir. In 1974, David Adelsheim worked harvest in
Burgundy and realized that the vines there produced fewer and
smaller grape clusters and ripened in tandem with Pinot noir. He
suspected that planting clones with these characteristics might be
a boon for
Oregon's wine industry. David followed
through by helping create a system at Oregon State University that
dealt with all the red tape and mandatory quarantines and allowed
both Chardonnay and Pinot noir clones to be imported. These
so-called "Dijon" clones were eventually released for planting in
1989. As the vines have matured, we've found we can produce
excitingly rich Chardonnay with very minimal influence from
oak.
VINEYARDS
This wine is crafted of grapes from three
vineyards in the Chehalem Mountains - Boulder Bluff (23%), Bryan
Creek (18.5%), and Love (2%), two sites in the Eola- Amity Hills -
Elton Vineyard (34%) and Zenith Vineyard (7.5%), and Stoller
Vineyard in the Dundee Hills.
The contributing vineyards are sited on
both basaltic-origin and sedimentary soils. Basaltic (clay loam)
soils hold enough moisture to get the vines through our summer
drought without irrigation. The sandstone-based sedimentary soils
require clean cultivation to reduce competition for moisture and,
in warm years, a bit of irrigation.
WINEMAKING
Gentle, whole-cluster pressing was used
to separate the juice from the skins as quickly and as cleanly as
possible for this Chardonnay. The majority (85%) of the juice was
fermented in stainless steel tanks to retain fruit purity, flavor
and aroma. The remaining juice was fermented in neutral barrels
to augment textural richness and
create a more balanced and complex wine. In order to preserve
freshness and acidity, this wine did not undergo malolactic
fermentation. The wine was bottled on April 13,
2009.
GROWING SEASON
The 2008 growing season began slowly with
a cooler than normal spring for the months of March and April. Buds began to open around
April 26th giving the growing
season a bit of a delayed start.
Temperatures picked up considerably in
May and helped the vines catch up by accelerating shoot growth, but heat accumulation fell
short of producing an early June
bloom. The favorable conditions surrounding bloom near the end of
June continued to influence fruit
development well into August. Veraison
became apparent in mid August
followed by gorgeous ripening conditions in September.
Hand picking began the last week of September
and continued well into October, allowing the fruit to fully ripen and bask in what could
be called a text book Indian summer for Oregon. Our Chardonnay grapes for this wine
were picked from October 8 to the
18th.
