Competition Shows Diversity Of Oregon Wine Scene

Get this, a Syrah, not a Pinot Noir, is the Best of Show Red Wine for the 2023 Oregon Wine Competition, results of which were announced over the weekend.

It is the Resistance Wine Company 2018 Rogue Valley Syrah ($35), a muscular, layered and persistent take on the varietal, yet with an accommodating accessibility thanks to its lushness and balance.

For sure, a Pinot Noir was in the running for Best of Show Red Wine, given that Pinot Noir is the varietal wine most responsible for establishing Oregon as fine-wine territory. The close runner-up for the top red honor was the frolicking and peppery Blakeslee Vineyard Estate 2019 Chehalem Mountains Reserve Pinot Noir ($58).

Blakeslee Vineyard Estate, which is just outside Sherwood southwest of Portland, also produced the competition’s Best of Show White Wine – the ripe and sweetly fruity Blakeslee Vineyard Estate 2021 Willamette Valley Vintage Select Infinity Assemblage Chardonnay ($62), which came down richly on the apple end of the Chardonnay spectrum.

The competition’s other top award – Best of Show Specialty Wine – went to the Maison Jussiaume 2019 Rogue Valley Methode Traditionelle Blanc de Blancs ($65), a study in equilibrium and elegance.

The competition, staged last month in Medford, drew a record 371 entries from nearly 100 wineries from throughout Oregon. The Oregon roundup is unusual among wine competitions in that it awards just double-gold, gold and silver medals, in addition to best-of-class and best-of-show awards. No bronze medals are handed out. (Double-gold medals are awarded when all judges of a panel concur that a wine warrants gold.)

That a Syrah should be elected the competition’s top red wine is fitting. When I last judged at the competition in 2015, we evaluated 21 Syrahs, but didn’t give a single gold medal. By and large, the entries that year were over-ripe, awkward, soft and short.

The turnaround for the variety at this year’s competition was nothing short of remarkable, and suggests that Syrah should be ranked alongside Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Pinot Gris in defining the caliber of Oregon wines.

Of the 21 Syrahs we judged last month, all but one won an award, seven of them either a double-gold medal or a gold medal. No other variety in the larger classes did as well, though nearly three-fourths of the Chardonnays, two-thirds of the Pinot Gris and almost two-thirds of the Pinot Noirs were recognized with medals. (And keep an eye on Malbec; nearly two-thirds of the Malbecs in the Oregon competition medaled; also keep an eye on Resistance Wine Company of Ashland, which in addition to its Best of Show Red Wine won Best of Class for its lively and long 2019 Rogue Valley Malbec ($40), which squeezed from the grape all the succulent meatiness it can deliver.)

Other than the Resistance Wine Company Syrah, other takes on the varietal to especially impress me were the robust, spicy and graceful Naumes Suncrest 2018 Rogue Valley Syrah ($45), which won a gold medal; the firm and complex Griffin Creek 2019 Rogue Valley Syrah ($55), a double-gold winner that will benefit by a few more years in the cellar; the athletic Reustle Prayer Rock Vineyards 2021 Umpqua Valley Winemaker’s Reserve Estate Syrah ($45), which won gold; and the Del Rio Vineyard Estate 2021 Rogue Valley Estate Syrah ($35), a gold-medal winner that stood apart from the rest of the field for its saturating fruit, earthiness and suggestions of pork belly.

Though a wine competition simply provides snapshots – of a region, a variety, a vintage, a producer – it also can be instructive, as was the 2023 Oregon gathering. Whether these lessons endure, or fade, as snapshots are wont to do, remains to be seen, but for right now a few immediate impressions:

For one, the Oregon wine scene is more diverse than customarily portrayed. Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Pinot Gris may be the state’s most popular varietal wines, but Oregon is partitioned into 23 American Viticultural Areas, many of them bunched up at the northern reaches of Willamette Valley south of Portland. But with Idaho the state shares the Snake River Valley appellation to the east, and several of Oregon’s winegrowing enclaves are clustered in the southwestern corner just north of California. In any given Oregon appellation, microclimates are apt to abound, offering a wide range of elevations, exposures, temperatures, soils and rain, thus encouraging an equally wide range of grape varieties.

Which region shows the most potential? Not going to go there, though several turned in exceptionally consistent performances during the judging. Of those regions that entered at least 10 wines, Dundee Hills outside Newberg southwest of Portland came away with the highest percentage of awards, 80 percent, with eight of its 10 entries winning medals. Not far behind was the Umpqua Valley with a 75 percent return, the Rogue Valley with 72 percent and the Willamette Valley with 65 percent.

Several brands with high profiles on the Oregon wine scene affirmed their standing by winning awards for virtually every wine they entered, including Archery Summit (four silvers, one double-gold for its five wines), Brandborg Vineyard & Winery (one double-gold, one gold and three silvers for its five wines), Domaine Serene (three wines, three golds), Foris Vineyard Winery (one double-gold and two golds for its three wines, and Quady North (two golds and three silvers for its five wines)

Largely unfamiliar brands to me that did well included Cougars Mark Vineyard, whose five Pinot Noirs got either gold or silver; Plaisance Ranch, whose five entries also won either gold or silver, and Shumaker Vineyards, whose three wines won either gold or silver.

A few grape varieties that I hadn’t previously associated closely with Oregon were exhilarating during the judging. One was Chenin Blanc. The two to win gold medals were the unusually rich Circadian Cellars 2021 Rogue Valley Varner-Trawl Vineyard Estate Chenin Blanc ($28) and the exceptionally fragrant and refreshing Trium Wines 2022 Rogue Valley St. Morand Vineyard Chenin Blanc ($33).

Semillon was another, with the Croft Vineyards 2017 Willamette Valley Mt. Pisgah Estate Reserve Semillon ($38) winning one of our few double-gold medals on the strength of its bold and lingering suggestions of all things fig – fruit, leaves, branches.

Other memorable outriders were the inky, savory and loping Abacela 2020 Umpqua Valley Touriga Nacional ($34); the viscous, seamless and long Sarver 2021 Willamette Valley Elhanan Vineyard Gewurztraminer ($29); the Cória Estates 2022 Willamette Valley Riesling ($30), a tall wedge of peach pie topped with a sprig of lavender; the animated and satiny Ryan Rose Wine 2020 Rogue Valley Mourvedre ($50); and the lean and spicy King Estate 2021 Willamette Valley Havlin Vineyard Gruner Veltliner ($24).

As the King Estate Gruner Veltliner demonstrated, high value in fine wine still can be found in Oregon. Other exceptional buys include the angular, citric and tense Cascadia Vineyards & Winery 2021 Applegate Valley Chardonnay ($34), the sweet and persistent Harry & David Vineyards 2021 Oregon Pinot Noir ($25), and the Del Rio Vineyard Estate 2022 Rogue Valley Estate Grenache Rosé ($18), Best of Class among the pink wines in the competition.

At the other end of the price spectrum, one of the pricier wines in the competition, if not the priciest, the Domaine Serene 2019 Dundee Hills Aspect Pinot Noir ($130), won gold for its focus, pure fruit, lean yet reliable structure, and striding confidence as it strutted across the palate, in effect shouting “this is why Oregon is so highly regarded for Pinot Noir.”

Oregon vintners are at the forefront of efforts to conceive daring and even novel blends. My favorite was the fragrant and lithe Los Rocosos Vineyards 2020 The Rock District of Milton Freewater Areanas Suaves Estate Blend ($44), a steely mix of 67 percent Grenache and 33 percent Sangiovese, which won a gold medal.

Our panel judged 36 of the 71 Pinot Noirs in the competition. We awarded half a dozen of them either gold or double-gold medals, a respectable proportion, but going in I would have guessed it would be higher. The vintages ranged from 2017 to 2021. Several were from 2020, when smoke from wildland fires settled on vineyards about Oregon, raising the specter of off aromas and flavors in the resulting wines. Any trace of smoke taint in the 2020 entries was rare, however, and so faint it didn’t obscure the customary brightness of the fruit. A few of the 2020s, however, seemed to have been somewhat stripped of typical character, perhaps a result of efforts to clean the wines of suspected smoke influence or of picking grapes too early to avoid any impact from lingering smoke. Overall, wines from the 2021 vintage were more spirited, layered and representative of the aromas and flavors cast by Pinot Noir at its best.

The most disappointing class was Cabernet Sauvignon. Only one of the 10 we tasted warranted a gold medal. The rest, by and large, fell short of proclaiming themselves Cabernet Sauvignon. Only partly in jest did I suggest that Oregon vintners declare the state a Cabernet Sauvignon-free zone. That would at least help draw attention to the many other grape varieties that do do well in Oregon.

That said, the one entry that we did give gold was a cheery, balanced and sweetly fruity take on the variety, the fruit being mainly plump, perfectly ripe cherries. It was the Cathedral Ridge Winery 2019 Columbia Valley Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon ($52). There’s the rub, you might think, given that the Columbia Valley American Viticultural Area is mostly in Washington state. True, but a portion dips into Oregon, and the competition’s rules specify that any entry from an appellation that includes another state must be made with at least 50 percent of its grapes from Oregon.

And I won’t write off entirely Oregon’s prospects with Bordeaux varieties. There was that Best of Class Malbec from Resistance Wine Company of Ashland. And another highlight for me was the RoxyAnn 2019 Rogue Valley Claret ($30), a pungent, snappy, long and cinnamon-accented blend of 35 percent Merlot, 35 percent Cabernet Sauvignon, 15 percent Cabernet Franc and 15 percent Malbec. For its richness and drive, it also is one heck of a bargain.