APPELLATION
100% Yamhill-Carlton
BLEND COMPOSITION
100% Pinot Noir
CLONES
Pommard, Wadenswil, 114, 115, 777
AGE OF VINES
Planted in 1999-2001
BOTTLED
September 2022
BRIX AT HARVEST
24-24.5º
ALCOHOL BY VOLUME
14%
PROPER CELLAR LIFESPAN
10 -15 Years
PRODUCTION
748 Cases
VINTAGE HIGHLIGHTS
2021 was the 2nd warmest growing season we have ever seen since 2015. We also got to add a new term to the dictionary: “Heat Dome”. Three straight days of triple digit temperatures in late June breaking heat records for the Willamette Valley! Bud break started like usual in the middle of April. We had the driest March through May that the Valley has seen through 128 years of record keeping! Bloom, or flowering, also appeared on time in early/mid June. While late June brought the “Heat Dome”, our grapes made it through thanks to bloom being finished at all our sites and there still being soil moisture, so they grew like crazy over those three days of hellish temperatures. While July and August turned out to be exceedingly hot and dry, September arrived with with a few mild rain events that allowed us to fully ripen the grapes. The hot and dry summer made for fruit that was extremely clean, resulting in for excellent fermentations. All in all, mother nature gave us something to be grateful for on our 50th anniversary.
WINEMAKING
The fruit was hand harvested from Kalita Vineyard on September 25th and brought back to our Estate winery were 85% was destemmed and the rest left whole-cluster. Over a 12-day period the wine went through an ambient fermentation in 3 ton stainless steel tanks with punch-downs for cap management. The wine was aged for 10 months in French oak barrels with 10% new oak. This is our first vintage from the newly acquired Kalita Vineyard and it is also our first purchase of Yamhill-Carlton AVA vineyard land so it is very exciting. This is very different, dark fruited and rich Pinot Noir verses our delicate bright red fruited Dundee Hills we are accustom to be working with.
WINE PROFILE
Our 2021 Kalita Vineyard Pinot Noir bursts with classic Yamhill-Carton dark fruit notes: black cherry, cranberries and blackberries. The fruit is met by warm spices, espresso, and a woodsy forest floor followed by grippy tannins.
PAIRINGS
Serve with rich pairings such as roasted quail or duck, salmon on a cedar board, veal stew, grilled mushrooms, or a piece of dark chocolate.
THE STORY
Kalita EstateVineyard is located in the heart of the Yamhill-Carlton AVA in the Willamette Valley. This stunning, bowl-shaped vineyard is planted with Pinot Noir on hillsides facing South, Southwest and Southeast with elevations ranging from 525 to 750 feet. The site was planted in 2000 by Arthur and Sherry Kalita; it is currently LIVE certified and we are transitioning the vineyard to organic certification. We are thrilled to continue the two-decade legacy of creating superb, world-class Pinot Noir from the beautiful Kalita Estate Vineyard.
APPELLATION
Willamette Valley
BLEND COMPOSITION
100% Pinot Noir
BOTTLED
December 2022
BRIX AT HARVEST
~21.5°
RESIDUAL SUGAR
3.3g/L
ALCOHOL BY VOLUME
12.5%
PROPER CELLAR LIFESPAN
~3 years
PRODUCTION
2,756 Cases
VINTAGE HIGHLIGHTS
What started as a dry winter turned into a deluge of rain in the springtime. We had the wettest and coldest April/May/June in recorded (130 years) history. Freezing temperatures on the morning of April 14th and 15th knocked back the fragile new growth, in fact, until crop estimates were done in late August, we thought our crop yields would be down across the board by 50-60%. The lesson learned is don’t second guess a grapevine. In over 51 years of growing grapes here in the Dundee Hills we have never seen a freezing event during the growing season, so we had no idea what was going to happen. The primary buds froze and died, but the secondary buds came on, produced fewer but larger clusters, and the vines made a miraculous comeback. The coldest and wettest spring turned into the 2nd warmest and driest summer on record, and then we got to October. Everything depended on good
ripening conditions (dry and warm) in the month of October since bloom was much later. Fortunately we got the warmest October in Oregon history, we were able to let the grapes hang, and the rains stayed put until all our Estate fruit was in on Thursday, October 27th. The fruit got nice and ripe, and we are thrilled with the wine produced from this vintage!
WINEMAKING
The grapes were harvested September 25th and 29th using our Pellenc machine harvester which destemmed the grapes as it picked. The fruit was sent directly to the press and gently pressed to minimize extraction of tannins from the skins, with the juice receiving around 4-6 hours of skin contact. We maintained an extended, slow, cool fermentation of around 2 weeks in strictly stainless steel tanks to preserve the lively fruitiness and delicate floral aromas. The wine did not spend any time aging as our intention is to create a clean, brightly fruited and delicate Rosé. By fermenting and bottling in a short time, we were able to capture the purity of fruit presented at the time of fermentation. Our 2022 Rosé is a delicate wine that balances red fruit and bright acid with a clean long finish.
WINE PROFILE
Our 2022 Rosé of Pinot Noir bursts with notes of strawberry, cranberry, kiwi, guava, and hints of rose petals. Lovely balance between the bright red fruit notes and mouth-watering acidity.
PAIRINGS
This wine will pair beautifully with bright dishes such as a stone fruit salad with burrata, pesto pasta, lamb gyro with tzatzik, as well as cheeses like brie and goat cheese.
SCORES
2021 – (91) Savor NW
2020 – (92) VinePair, (91) James Suckling
APPELLATION
100% Eola-Amity Hills
BLEND COMPOSITION
100% Pinot Noir
BOTTLED
Tiraged April 2018, Disgorged July 2021
AGING
base aged for 6 months | 90% neutral
oak, 5% once used oak, 5% new oak
EN TIRAGE
39 months
ALCOHOL BY VOLUME
11.5%
DOSAGE
7 g/L (Brut)
PROPER CELLAR LIFESPAN
~5 Years
PRODUCTION
418 Cases
VINTAGE HIGHLIGHTS
It was a dark and stormy night…and that was just the first day of 2017! Yes, 2017 started out like a number of Oregon vintages have started out: cold, wet and rainy. In fact, to start out 2017 we had snow. Snow shut down the winery for a number of days in January and this cold weather foretold the following cool spring. Bud break was late in relation to the past 5 years (late April instead of early April), but more normal when you look at our 40+ growing seasons. The cool, wet weather was not to last, and the heat volcano erupted in mid-June to the tune of 95°F! Thanks to the wonderful deluge of wet weather in the winter and spring of 2017, our vines were able to handle the scorching hot summer. Our underground barrel cellar reached temps we have never seen before (in the 70s) and the expanding wine pushed some bungs out. The cool spring helped push out harvest, but the hot summer helped make sure the grapes were ready to go with little delay. We picked over a six week time period, which is a week or so longer than normal due to the rain events. The crop was huge — one of the largest we have seen since 2014. The fruit was ripe and very clean, boding well for quality.
WINEMAKING
After more than 50 years in the Oregon wine industry, Sokol Blosser Winery has started to establish a growing sparkling wine program made with 100% Willamette Valley grown grapes. This program follows the Méthode Traditionnelle process to make a truly special representation of the Pinot Noir grape. The Pinot Noir grapes in our Sparkling Rosé were all hand-harvested and whole cluster pressed. The juice was fermented to dryness in both stainless steel and oak barrels. It was then aged for about 6 months in 100% French oak, with 5% new, 5% once used, and the rest neutral oak. After this brief barrel aging period, the wine was blended, re-inoculated with yeast and sugar, and bottled (or put into tirage). Following the second fermentation in the bottle the wine was left to age sur-lie for 39 months. The wine is tasted at various points during aging to determine the best time to disgorge. The winemaking team is looking to capture a balance in the purity of fruit with the subtle complexities contributed from yeast lees and time.
WINE PROFILE
On the nose, our Sparkling Rosé displays floral notes of jasmine, matched with meyer lemon, strawberry, and a slight hint of brioche. On the palate, the strawberry becomes underripe, and is joined by fresh lemon juice and rhubarb.
PAIRINGS
This wine will pair beautifully with anything from kimchee fried rice to chicken schnitzel to
shrimp cocktail.
THE STORY
The Sokol Blosser family has selected a site comprised of volcanic soils and influenced by cooling marine winds located in the Eola-Amity Hills, called Blossom Ridge Vineyard. Starting in 2014 Sokol Blosser began the transition of Blossom Ridge to an organic vineyard site, carrying the farming values of “good to the earth” forward.
APPELLATION
100% Dundee Hills AVA
BLEND COMPOSITION
100% Pinot Noir | 100% Estate Grown
CLONES
Pommard UCD4
AGE OF VINES
Replanted in 1998
BOTTLED
March 2020
BRIX AT HARVEST
23.3°
ALCOHOL BY VOLUME
13.5%
PROPER CELLAR LIFESPAN
10 -15 Years
PRODUCTION
423 Cases
CERTIFICATIONS
Made with 100% certified organic grapes
VINTAGE HIGHLIGHTS
The spring of 2018 was warmer than the average over the previous 10 years, and fairly dry. Bud break happened in mid-April and Bloom in early June, which can be a treacherous undertaking as the spring weather can mess up a healthy flowering. A giant hail storm descended on the Dundee Hills in early June, but luckily none of our Sokol Blosser Estate crop was ruined. The summer started like one giant furnace; July was a hot month and we had a lot of above 90 degree days. Just when it seemed like the hot weather would not stop, August came and more moderate weather with it. This helped slow the ripening down, and even cooler weather in September allowed us to let the grapes hang longer, resulting in riper fruit without additional sugar accumulation. The 2018 vintage is our coolest growing season since 2012, and we believe it will be our best vintage since then.
WINEMAKING
The grapes from this block were carefully hand harvested on September 19th. The clusters were then sorted by hand to remove any flawed bunches and 100% de-stemmed directly into their fermentation vessels, 1/3 going in to an oak upright fermenter and the other 2/3 in 3 ton stainless steel fermenters. The wine was inoculated with our house native yeast and spent 24 days on the skins with cap management done by a combination of pump overs and punch downs. After being pressed at dryness the wine was aged entirely in French oak barrels for 18 months with with 17% new oak. 2018 had such luscious fruit it was important that it really shined through, which is why we used less new oak. We use primarily one cooper of barrels to age this wine in and their highest end barrel. 18 barrels were hand selected for this blend.
WINE PROFILE
Our 2018 Goosepen Block Estate Pinot Noir exhibits fragrances of black cherry, licorice and leather, with more cherry and licorice on the palate followed by a dash of clove.
PAIRINGS
This wine pairs really well with anything off the grill, from rib eye cap to portobello mushrooms.
THE STORY
When Alex Sokol Blosser (our winemaker) was growing up, this block was not planted to pinot noir, but to riesling. During this time Bill and Susan Sokol Blosser tried their infamous and failed experiment of fencing it in and releasing a flock of geese to consume the grass. Since then, the Sokol Blosser’s have always called it “Goosepen.” When we had to re-plant the block due to Phylloxera, it was decided that the highest and best use of that site was for pinot noir and not for riesling. This was not a failed experiment. To this day, Goosepen is Alex’s favorite of our single vineyard blocks. It does not have the rich tannins of its northern neighbor, Big Tree, nor the finesse of the Orchard Block. It has fruit. A lot of rich fruit that can be heavy some years (2014) and complex in other years (2012 and 2015). Drinking a glass of Goosepen always reminds Alex that experimenting is a two edge sword; sometimes you get the goose, and sometimes the goose gets you!
APPELLATION
100% Dundee Hills AVA
BLEND COMPOSITION
100% Pinot Noir | 100% Estate Grown
CLONES
Wädenswil 1A & 2A, Pommard and
Pinot Droit
AGE OF VINES
Replanted in 2007 & 2009
BOTTLED
March 2020
BRIX AT HARVEST
21.8-232.°
ALCOHOL BY VOLUME
13.5%
PROPER CELLAR LIFESPAN
10 -15 Years
PRODUCTION
496 Cases
VINTAGE HIGHLIGHTS
It was clear something was different with the 2019 harvest when fruit flies were spotted at Thistle Vineyard over Labor Day Weekend. The second sign was the dramatic shift in the weather forecast. At the end of August, we believed we would have a “warmer and drier” than average September/October. Sounds good huh?!?!? Then, at the end of September we got 2.7” of rain… which is double the average, and we had one of the coolest Septembers on record. We remembered and applied the key learnings from prior similar vintages in our approach to the 2019 harvest – get the grapes as ripe as possible with as little fruit degradation as possible. Even with a longer hang time this year the grapes had less sugar, high pHs and high acids. Consequently, we based our picking decision more on the taste of the juice and looking at the weather. We had 5 distinct rain events from when we started harvest on September 3 to when we ended picking on October 10th, and these individual rain events sometimes lasted multiple
days. In the end, we got as much ripeness as possible and are very happy about what we put into barrel.
WINEMAKING
The grapes were hand harvested on September 23rd and October 1st in this founding section of the Sokol Blosser Estate. They were then sorted by hand to remove any flawed bunches and 100% de-stemmed directly into 3-ton stainless steel fermenters. The Pommard and Wadenswil (making up 50% of the grapes), were inoculated with a native yeast while remaining half, composed entirely of Pinot Droit, was inoculated with a commercial yeast. Cap management was done via gentile punch downs up to 2 times per day. Fermentation was long and cool, with the Pommad-Wadenswil lot taking 14 days and the Pinot Droit taking 21 days. This wine was aged in 100% French oak barrels, with 20% new oak for 16 months with minimal SO2 levels.
WINE PROFILE
On the nose, this wine shines with black cherry, boysenberry, complemented by vanilla, clove, tar and mushroom. The palate continues the fruits and mushrooms, but they are joined by clove and flint.
PAIRINGS
This wine will pair beautifully with lamb burgers, pork with cranberry relish, and fried
maitake mushrooms.
THE STORY
The Old Vineyard Block Pinot Noir comes from fruit harvested off of the initial section of the vineyard planted by founders Bill and Susan Sokol Blosser in the early 70s. Although replanted in 2007/2009 on rootstock, cuttings from fruiting vines were taken from the original plantings and grafted onto rootstock for the replant. In honor of our 50th anniversary, we have recreated our original label and have chosen this vineyard block to celebrate the occasion.
SCORES
2018 – (92) James Suckling
2017 – (93) James Suckling, (91) Wine Spectator
APPELLATION
100% Dundee Hills
BLEND COMPOSITION
100% Chardonnay
BOTTLED
December 2021
BRIX AT HARVEST
21-21.5°
ALCOHOL BY VOLUME
12.5%
PROPER CELLAR LIFESPAN
~8 – 10 Years
PRODUCTION
724 Cases
VINTAGE HIGHLIGHTS
2020 will always be remembered as a year of epic challenges. For the grapes, a cold wet spring hindered fruit development during bloom and thus gave us the smallest crop since 1998. An exceptionally light crop level historically leads to exceptionally good quality. Loose clusters with big and small berries “hens and chicks,” as we call them, often leads to dark color and richer and more intense flavors. We began harvest on September 3rd and had a good week of bringing in most of our grapes for sparkling wine and all our Pinot Noir for our Rosé program. Then, the winds changed and the fires started. For around seven days a thick fog of smoke hung over Sokol Blosser and the Willamette Valley. During that time the sun was covered, all photosynthesis stopped and the grapes’ development stalled. The smoke event ended in an amazing fury of lightening, thunder, and 1” of rain on the night of September 17th. We then waited for the grapes’ development to progress, taking samples and doing micro-ferments to test for smoke effect. Proceeding slowly and carefully once full maturation had been achieved, we harvested the remainder of our Estate fruit feeling incredibly lucky and optimistic.
WINEMAKING
The grapes were hand picked from Durant, Anderson Family, and Two Barns vineyards over the course of four weeks, starting on September 9th and ending on October 3rd. They were pressed as whole clusters to reduce skin contact and then fermented 25% in our concrete egg and the rest in French oak, with 35% new oak. The entire batch went through malolactic fermentation in neutral or once used oak barrels. After fermentation, the wine was aged for 10 months in neutral oak barrels, then moved to a stainless steel tank for three months to harmonize prior to bottling.
WINE PROFILE
On the nose, our 2020 Estate Chardonnay is warm with vanilla bean, lemon curd and golden apple, accented with honeysuckle. The lemon curd and vanilla bean are joined on the palate by baked yellow apple.
PAIRINGS
This wine will pair beautifully with baked halibut, Dungeness crab cakes with a fresh, lemon aioli, or a classic crispy pork schnitzel.
SCORES
93 points – James Suckling (2019 – 2016 vintages)
