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 fruit was hand harvested from Kalita Vineyard on October 17th and brought back to our Estate winery where 40% was destemmed and the rest left whole-cluster. The wine went through fermentation with both ambient and native Sokol A yeasts. We used three ton stainless steel tanks with punch-downs for cap management on the destemmed fruit and pump overs on the whole cluster. The wine was aged for 11 months in French oak barrels with 23% new oak. The whole cluster and destemmed fruit was kept separate the entire time and only blended after aging. This is the first year we have created this Trillium, it comes entirely from block 15 which is lower in the bowl of Kalita. We like the richness that the whole cluster brings to the wine and gives it a unique, spicy character, as well as being a single clone blend which we rarely produce.

WINE PROFILE
On the nose has notes of raspberry and black cherry with a hint of earthy mushroom. On the palate rich, black cherries meet bright acidity with red currant and raspberry, with just a hint of spice on the finish.

PAIRINGS
Pair with grilled salmon with saffron, a roast chicken or creamy brie.

THE STORY
Kalita Estate Vineyard is located in the heart of the Yamhill-Carlton AVA in the Willamette Valley. This stunning, bowl-shaped vineyard was planted in 2000 by Arthur and Sherry Kalita; it is currently LIVE certified and we are transitioning the vineyard to organic certification.