More from our friends at Phelps Creek.....
Our March wine dinner includes not one, but two winemakers. The evenings wines run a broad expanse of styles, with the bookends of old world and new world. Please read on.......
This is a tale of two winemakers.
In the 2007 crush, we were privileged to hire Rich Cushman as our full-time winemaker. Rich is well known in the Oregon wine industry where he has twenty-six Willamette Valley vintages under his belt. But what is less well known, Rich was born and raised in Hood River—his father was the local judge. He never lost his affection for the place and when the local wine industry finally took off, Rich told us “build a winery and I will come.” We furiously went through plans A and B, finally settling on converting an unused fruit-packing house into a very practical winery. We now enjoy the luxury of a spacious facility with three controlled temperature zones.
We met Alexandrine Roy in 2007 just before the International Pinot Noir Celebration in McMinnville when a mutual friend brought her to our vineyard for lunch. Alexandrine Roy is an engaging 28 year-old fourth generation French winemaker from Burgundy, the proprietor with her mother and father of Domaine Marc Roy with holdings in Gevrey-Chambertin and Marsannay. Phelps Creek founder Bob Morus and Alexandrine hit it off immediately, and it wasn’t long before we were inviting her to return in the fall to produce a special cuvée of Pinot Noir with our grapes employing the exact same techniques that she would use in her Burgundy estate. Two winemakers, two styles applied to the same grapes from the same vineyard. Or as Bob likes to say "an old guy from the New World and a young gal from the Old World" Vive la difference!
This is a tale of two winemakers.
In the 2007 crush, we were privileged to hire Rich Cushman as our full-time winemaker. Rich is well known in the Oregon wine industry where he has twenty-six Willamette Valley vintages under his belt. But what is less well known, Rich was born and raised in Hood River—his father was the local judge. He never lost his affection for the place and when the local wine industry finally took off, Rich told us “build a winery and I will come.” We furiously went through plans A and B, finally settling on converting an unused fruit-packing house into a very practical winery. We now enjoy the luxury of a spacious facility with three controlled temperature zones.
We met Alexandrine Roy in 2007 just before the International Pinot Noir Celebration in McMinnville when a mutual friend brought her to our vineyard for lunch. Alexandrine Roy is an engaging 28 year-old fourth generation French winemaker from Burgundy, the proprietor with her mother and father of Domaine Marc Roy with holdings in Gevrey-Chambertin and Marsannay. Phelps Creek founder Bob Morus and Alexandrine hit it off immediately, and it wasn’t long before we were inviting her to return in the fall to produce a special cuvée of Pinot Noir with our grapes employing the exact same techniques that she would use in her Burgundy estate. Two winemakers, two styles applied to the same grapes from the same vineyard. Or as Bob likes to say "an old guy from the New World and a young gal from the Old World" Vive la difference!
posted by Maui Meyer at 11:24 AM
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