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Story Teller Wine Company
I have sacrificed my principles for a great glass of wine. It certainly isn’t the first time this has happened and I’m now zipping head first down that slippery slope everybody is always talking about. But at least my slippery slide to vinous purgatory is lubricated with some mighty fine juice. 2008 Evening Land Vineyards Willamette Valley Pinot Noir 24.00 The Evening Land Vineyards (ELV) project was the brainchild of Hollywood producer Mark Tarlov. Tarlov figured he could buy up or lease great vineyards, get great winemakers to create the wines, then take on some of the most powerful sommeliers and restaurant owners in America as partners. Top quality, high end wines would be made in California and Oregon (and beyond) and they would have a waiting audience in the restaurants of his partners. You can see why this whole concept might rub some Oregonians the wrong way. But when it was discovered that ELV had taken control of the legendary Seven Springs Vineyard, all heck broke loose. When many of the Oregon wineries that had used this fruit for years found themselves out in the cold, you would have thought Russian soldiers had parachuted into the Willamette Valley a la Red Dawn. Lots of people voiced their strenuous protests on all the usual wine boards and many a harsh word was spoken behind the scenes in the Willamette Valley. When ELV brought in a French winemaker to make their Oregon Pinot Noir, well, you could hear the forehead veins popping all the way up and down the I-5 corridor. I must confess, I was one of those people who expressed a bit of concern. OK, I confess, I thought to myself I would boycott this whole operation. But a few months later I learned ELV was bringing in Dominique Lafon of the world-famous Domaine des Comtes Lafon in Meursault to oversee the making of the Oregon Pinot Noirs. Man, that weakened my resolve just a bit. I have loved Lafon’s wines for a very long time. But still, I stood strong. Mainly because I also heard rumors of how expensive these wines were going to be. Pricey and they have all my local customers and quite a few of my national customers in an uproar. It was still proving easy to ignore ELV. Then, a few weeks ago, a customer of mine finally made a request to buy some of the ELV wines. Based on my allegiance to Danny Meyer’s principle of “enlightened hospitality,” I promised to check out the wines. By the way, for more information on enlightened hospitality, see the answer to question number six in the FAQ section of the Storyteller website. Oddly enough, Danny Meyer is also one of the partners in ELV. Anyway, that request led me to tasting ELV’s 2008 Willamette valley Pinot Noir. After two sips my moral collapse was complete. In the words of Sen. Everett Dirksen, “I am a man of fixed and unbending principles, the first of which is to be flexible at all times.” Or, perhaps more appropriately, I could turn to Groucho Marx who quipped, “those are my principles, and if you don’t like them… well, I have others.” I don’t know first hand who did what to who in the whole Seven Springs Vineyard saga. Given that nobody involved is a friend or family member, to quote James Carville (or was it Pogo?), “I’ve got no dog in this hunt.” If you feel the Californian consortium needs to be shown a lesson via your personal boycott, well, more power to you and you may want to skip to the latter part of this newsletter. Me? I feel a little guilty still, but given how much I’m enjoying this wine right now, I think I will get over it. And besides, Mark Tarlov is friends with John Waters, having produced and/or directed both Serial Mom and Pecker. How can I hold a grudge against the man who brought us Pecker? The 2008 Evening Land Vineyards Willamette Valley Pinot Noir is a heck of a wine for this price range. It is comprised of 70% Seven Springs Vineyard fruit, with the other 30% coming from barrels selected from a very, very famous “high end” winery in the Dundee Hills. I have been asked not to mention this mystery winery in print so no hints beyond that. The fruit from Seven Springs Vineyard comes from self rooted vines that are now almost 27-years old. How would I best describe the wine? Slippery. Slippery and silky. The dark fruit flavors, from black cherry to blackberry just kind of slip and slide all over your palate. But don’t get the wrong impression. This is no one trick pony fruit bomb. Nope, there is acidity and structure here, more than enough to balance the teeter-totter with that fruit. The LA Times’ restaurant critic, S. Irene Virbila, just happened to single out the Evening Lands for some pretty high praise in today’s edition. She wrote, “consulting French winemaker Dominique Lafon has imbued this Oregon Pinot Noir with an elegant Burgundian character. Medium-bodied, with a silky texture and finespun finish, the 2008 Evening Land Vineyards Pinot tastes of black cherries and wild plums. A lithe acidity and undertone of minerality give this vintage definition. A beautiful expression of Pinot Noir, and at this price, it is a stunning buy.” Stunning buy indeed. How stunning? I am going to get a very hard time from a lot of people I respect for selling this wine. But the wine is just too good and too good a bargain to ignore it any longer. So if you would like to see what all the fuss is about, you may purchase the 2008 Evening Land Vineyards Willamette Valley Pinot Noir for 24.00, which is a fair price given Wine-Searcher indicates the national average price is currently 25.44. However, you may get a six-pack for 132.00. A case of 12 bottles would be 252.00. My principles are thrown in for no charge. Friday Night Wine Tasting, February 19, 6:00-9:00PM: Marcus Goodfellow and Matello Wines. Thanks to a love letter from wine critic Matt Kramer, there has a been a lot of hoopla over Marcus’ 2008 Willamette Valley Pinot Noir. We are sold out and Marcus is sold out. But Marcus was nice enough to hold a bunch of cases for this tasting. So drop on by Friday night for your last shot at a very nice wine. In addition, there will be other 2008 single vineyard wines and a special selection from the Matello wine library. There will be no charge for this tasting. Cheers, Michael Alberty Head Mercenary PS Tooting My Own Horn Storyteller Wine Company just won “Best Wine Store in Portland” in PortlandOregonWine’s first ever reader’s poll. Many thanks to all who voted. To check out the article and actually see a few photos of Storyteller, go to http://www.portlandoregonwine.com/ On top of that, MIX Magazine asked us to recommend a wine to pair with a dish created by Chef Matthew Card. The dish was free-form lasagna with roasted cauliflower, scallops and bagna cauda. My recommendation ended up being the 2008 Domaine Sigalas Santorini Asirtiko/Athiri and the article can be found on page 55 of the February 2010 issue. Thank you to Katherine Cole of the Portland Oregonian for inviting me to take part. And if you have any trouble finding copies on newstands in Portland, call my my mom, she probably bought every issue out there. Visit www.StorytellerWine.com >> 5511-B SW Hood Ave, Portland \| (503) 206-7029 \| 1.800.753.2531

Story Teller Wine Company

I have sacrificed my principles for a great glass of wine. It certainly isn’t the first time this has happened and I’m now zipping head first down that slippery slope everybody is always talking about. But at least my slippery slide to vinous purgatory is lubricated with some mighty fine juice.

2008 Evening Land Vineyards Willamette Valley Pinot Noir 24.00

The Evening Land Vineyards (ELV) project was the brainchild of Hollywood producer Mark Tarlov. Tarlov figured he could buy up or lease great vineyards, get great winemakers to create the wines, then take on some of the most powerful sommeliers and restaurant owners in America as partners. Top quality, high end wines would be made in California and Oregon (and beyond) and they would have a waiting audience in the restaurants of his partners. You can see why this whole concept might rub some Oregonians the wrong way.

But when it was discovered that ELV had taken control of the legendary Seven Springs Vineyard, all heck broke loose. When many of the Oregon wineries that had used this fruit for years found themselves out in the cold, you would have thought Russian soldiers had parachuted into the Willamette Valley a la Red Dawn. Lots of people voiced their strenuous protests on all the usual wine boards and many a harsh word was spoken behind the scenes in the Willamette Valley. When ELV brought in a French winemaker to make their Oregon Pinot Noir, well, you could hear the forehead veins popping all the way up and down the I-5 corridor. I must confess, I was one of those people who expressed a bit of concern. OK, I confess, I thought to myself I would boycott this whole operation.

But a few months later I learned ELV was bringing in Dominique Lafon of the world-famous Domaine des Comtes Lafon in Meursault to oversee the making of the Oregon Pinot Noirs. Man, that weakened my resolve just a bit. I have loved Lafon’s wines for a very long time. But still, I stood strong. Mainly because I also heard rumors of how expensive these wines were going to be. Pricey and they have all my local customers and quite a few of my national customers in an uproar. It was still proving easy to ignore ELV.

Then, a few weeks ago, a customer of mine finally made a request to buy some of the ELV wines. Based on my allegiance to Danny Meyer’s principle of “enlightened hospitality,” I promised to check out the wines. By the way, for more information on enlightened hospitality, see the answer to question number six in the FAQ section of the Storyteller website. Oddly enough, Danny Meyer is also one of the partners in ELV. Anyway, that request led me to tasting ELV’s 2008 Willamette valley Pinot Noir. After two sips my moral collapse was complete. In the words of Sen. Everett Dirksen, “I am a man of fixed and unbending principles, the first of which is to be flexible at all times.” Or, perhaps more appropriately, I could turn to Groucho Marx who quipped, “those are my principles, and if you don’t like them… well, I have others.”

I don’t know first hand who did what to who in the whole Seven Springs Vineyard saga. Given that nobody involved is a friend or family member, to quote James Carville (or was it Pogo?), “I’ve got no dog in this hunt.” If you feel the Californian consortium needs to be shown a lesson via your personal boycott, well, more power to you and you may want to skip to the latter part of this newsletter. Me? I feel a little guilty still, but given how much I’m enjoying this wine right now, I think I will get over it. And besides, Mark Tarlov is friends with John Waters, having produced and/or directed both Serial Mom and Pecker. How can I hold a grudge against the man who brought us Pecker?

The 2008 Evening Land Vineyards Willamette Valley Pinot Noir is a heck of a wine for this price range. It is comprised of 70% Seven Springs Vineyard fruit, with the other 30% coming from barrels selected from a very, very famous “high end” winery in the Dundee Hills. I have been asked not to mention this mystery winery in print so no hints beyond that. The fruit from Seven Springs Vineyard comes from self rooted vines that are now almost 27-years old. How would I best describe the wine? Slippery. Slippery and silky. The dark fruit flavors, from black cherry to blackberry just kind of slip and slide all over your palate. But don’t get the wrong impression. This is no one trick pony fruit bomb. Nope, there is acidity and structure here, more than enough to balance the teeter-totter with that fruit.

The LA Times’ restaurant critic, S. Irene Virbila, just happened to single out the Evening Lands for some pretty high praise in today’s edition. She wrote, “consulting French winemaker Dominique Lafon has imbued this Oregon Pinot Noir with an elegant Burgundian character. Medium-bodied, with a silky texture and finespun finish, the 2008 Evening Land Vineyards Pinot tastes of black cherries and wild plums. A lithe acidity and undertone of minerality give this vintage definition. A beautiful expression of Pinot Noir, and at this price, it is a stunning buy.”

Stunning buy indeed. How stunning? I am going to get a very hard time from a lot of people I respect for selling this wine. But the wine is just too good and too good a bargain to ignore it any longer. So if you would like to see what all the fuss is about, you may purchase the 2008 Evening Land Vineyards Willamette Valley Pinot Noir for 24.00, which is a fair price given Wine-Searcher indicates the national average price is currently 25.44. However, you may get a six-pack for 132.00. A case of 12 bottles would be 252.00. My principles are thrown in for no charge.

Friday Night Wine Tasting, February 19, 6:00-9:00PM: Marcus Goodfellow and Matello Wines.

Thanks to a love letter from wine critic Matt Kramer, there has a been a lot of hoopla over Marcus’ 2008 Willamette Valley Pinot Noir. We are sold out and Marcus is sold out. But Marcus was nice enough to hold a bunch of cases for this tasting. So drop on by Friday night for your last shot at a very nice wine. In addition, there will be other 2008 single vineyard wines and a special selection from the Matello wine library. There will be no charge for this tasting.

Cheers,
Michael Alberty
Head Mercenary

PS Tooting My Own Horn

Storyteller Wine Company just won “Best Wine Store in Portland” in PortlandOregonWine’s first ever reader’s poll. Many thanks to all who voted. To check out the article and actually see a few photos of Storyteller, go to http://www.portlandoregonwine.com/

On top of that, MIX Magazine asked us to recommend a wine to pair with a dish created by Chef Matthew Card. The dish was free-form lasagna with roasted cauliflower, scallops and bagna cauda. My recommendation ended up being the 2008 Domaine Sigalas Santorini Asirtiko/Athiri and the article can be found on page 55 of the February 2010 issue. Thank you to Katherine Cole of the Portland Oregonian for inviting me to take part. And if you have any trouble finding copies on newstands in Portland, call my my mom, she probably bought every issue out there.

Visit www.StorytellerWine.com >>
5511-B SW Hood Ave, Portland | (503) 206-7029 | 1.800.753.2531

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