OK, enough with the endless teasers for “D122“. As you may know, it’s the name of the two-lane road that runs through the Grand Cru vineyards in Burgundy’s Côte de Nuits - starting in the village of Gevrey-Chambertin in the north and running south through Morey-St. Denis and into Chambolle-Musigny. It stands for “Départemental 122” - Départemental being the third tier in the French road system, coming after the Autoroute and Route National. It’s sort of equivalent to a state road in the U.S. Most importantly, it is the inspiration for the name of a special micro-bottling of Pinot we made from the 2008 vintage.

Over the years most of our wines have been blends from multiple vineyards, as with the younger vines we most often feel we can make a more complete wine by bringing together different characteristics from two or more of our very different sites. However, when a wine in the barrel tells us that it is complete and special enough to stand on its own - we’re happy to bottle it separately. That is usually the case with our Audrey bottling, which generally comes from a single block of our oldest vines at Maresh vineyard in the Dundee Hills.

From the outstanding 2008 vintage we not only produced the Audrey and La Paulée bottlings, but two additional small-lot wines that we thought were clearly special on their own. The first of which is the 2008 D122 - six of our best barrels from Ribbon Ridge Vineyard. There are only 132 cases of this baby, but oh what a baby!

Ribbon Ridge Vineyard

There’s an intriguing combination of red and black fruits on the nose and palate, with a round, ripe, richness in the mouth and flavors that keep building and building as the finish flows on and on. Come taste for yourself on Saturday from 12-5, for the official release party and your chance to grab a few bottles or twelve before they disappear. The D122 is $35 per bottle (and with our 20% case discount that knocks it down to $28 each by the case). I’m really excited to have you check out this wine, so join us on Saturday if you can.

We’ll also have a bunch of new arrivals from Burgundy for you on Saturday - new vintages from Taupenot-Merme, Jean-Marc Millot, Domaine Ninot, Buisson-Charles, Frédéric Gueguen, Violot-Guillemard, and a brand new addition to the portfolio - Chateau des Rontets in Fuissé (details later in the week).

In the meantime, I’ll leave you with a shot of the hedonistically delicious charcuterie board at Portland’s Metrovino, where we had a rockin’ great meal on Friday night…

First off, I am happy to report that the Clotilde Dusouliers‘ recipe for “melt in your mouth” chocolate cake was a huge success. Pirrie and I worked on it together, and we are thrilled to have discovered what will now be our go-to cake when entertaining at home (or when we have that “I just need a whole chocolate cake” moment…) You can see the results on Martha’s Blog here…

Perhaps even more exciting is the way the English Premiere League race is shaping up. My Arsenal boys have moved within three points of Chelsea, and just a point behind Manchester United - and with ten games left Arsenal seem to have the easiest remaining schedule. Anything can and will happen - it is way too close to call, but I’m predicting a race to the wire that will down to the last day. Squeeky-bum time, as they say in the U.K…

In the cellar with Champagne maestro Clo Chauvet

Martha made the most excellent roast chicken on Sunday night, and we paired it with the Marc Chauvet Millésime 2002 Brut - which reminded me to remind you how wonderful Champagne is with food. Too often pigeon-holed as an apéritif or a celebration beverage, the great bubblies are a fabulous complement to food - you really should try it. We love it with sushi, almost all asian dishes, as well as salmon, chicken, and all sorts of fish and shellfish. I grew up drinking Champers with dinner, so it seems perfectly normal to me. If you haven’t experienced this combo yet, check it out soon, and let me know what you think…

Four days ago….

This morning…

After an unprecedented run of days that hinted at spring, we are of course back to reality. Which around here means cool, rainy, grey, cool, rainy, & grey. But hey, that’s why we’re here - to Pinot Noir this is paradise. Not so much for the pruning crews, however. Many of our neighbors have already pruned (as you can see in the above photo) - but we’ll be making our cuts in March. There seems to be no conclusive evidence of when is best to prune, but we’ve always followed the old Burgundian saying - “Taille tôt, taille tard, rien ne vaut le taille de Mars” - which translates as “Prune early, prune late, nothing’s better than pruning in March”.  Works for me…

Be sure to check out writer Jim Gullo’s new website - OregonWine.com - the writing is excellent and I think we can expect great things ahead. Bravo Jim!

Also, i just ran across a really nice piece on traveling in Burgundy from the Bon Vivant blog, which you can read here. I’m in the middle of scheduling all my tasting appointments for my April trip, and looking forward to springtime on the Côte and a nice dinner or two at Ma Cuisine, Chez Guy, Caves Madeleine, la Ciboulette and other faves.

Speaking of good things to eat, I’m a long-time fan of Chocolate & Zucchini - the excellent blog by Parisian foodie Clotilde Dusouliers. A recent posting there has inspired me to bake a chocolate cake this weekend.  It’s a good thing I’m training for the half-marathon…

We just had the most amazing run of beautiful winter days here - Hi’s near 60, bright sunshine - it was a true gift. The views from our Azana vineyard were stunning on Sunday - here’s a shot Martha took of Pirrie in Block 3 -

And now a quick round-up of all sorts of events and activities coming up…

First off, I’ve just booked to do a Burgundy 101 class in Portland next month. We’ll be doing our two-hour “Intro to Burgundy” seminar at Cork Wine Shop on NW Lovejoy in Portland on Wednesday March 10th from 6-8pm - you can contact them directly to book your place. There are only ten seats available, so grab yours while you can…

Then on Saturday March 13th we will unveil “D122” with a special release event at the winery in Carlton. All the details to come, but for now suffice it to say that this is the first of our 2008s to be released and we are way excited. Then that night, it’s our Burgundy Graduate Class - for those who want to get deeper into the often confusing twists, turns, and exceptions to the rules that are in fact the rule in Burgundy. Email Kelly Karr to reserve your spots…

I’ve just finished booking all my travel for my next trip to Burgundy. I’ll be gone the last half of April, visiting all of our producers, spending a lot of time in the vineyards and the cellars, and bottling our first Burgundian wine under our own label - our 2008 Chambolle-Musigny. The plan is to release this wine in June - watch this space for all the info as we get closer…

Speaking of Burgundy, I’m frequently asked if we’ll ever be leading tours over there. I would love to, but my schedule never seems to allow the time. I am very happy, however, to be able to turn you on to two friends in Beaune who are putting on some amazing top-drawer tours this year. Journeys in Wine has two week-long trips/seminars scheduled - one in June and the other in October - email Kim Gagné or call 503-213-3164 for all the details…

I’ll be back from Burg-land in time for the big Oregon Pinot event at E&R Wines on SW MacAdam in Portland - I’ll be pouring there on Sunday afternoon April 25th from 1:30-4. Call 503-246-6101 for all the details. Should be a great day and I hope to see you there…

In the meantime, the Winter Olympics has been the big action around the house lately. Pirrie and I are really enjoying it, though I admit I could do without the endless cross-country, biathalon and luge coverage. Jasmine the cat does not seem terribly excited about any of it, actually…

And don’t forget to check out Martha’s Blog - quickly becoming a must-read for the culinary obsessed!

Again - a quick reminder to join us at the annual Flavors of Carlton event tomorrow night at Ken Wright Cellars (just up the street from us here in beautiful downtown Carlton) - we’re pouring, along with Soter, Belle Pente, Tyrus Evan, Solena, Elk Cove, Torri Mor, Biggio-Hamina and a bunch more. Food is from Farm to Fork, Cuvée, Painted Lady, Tina’s, Nick’s and at least five more, the auction packages are full of great stuff, and it’s only $50 (tix avail. at the door) - and all proceeds go to fund after-school and early-education programs right here in Carlton. Festivities start at 5pm…

Had a stunningly good meal at Farm to Fork in Dundee last night. They’ve got a new tasting bar where the deli case used to be, and chef Paul Bachand blew us away with an array of small plates that simply rocked. Highlights were the basil-fed escargot and trumpet mushrooms over stone-ground polenta, the dungeness crab and black truffle raviolo, and a sublime goat-cheese tart. Paul keeps raising the bar - I may have to go again tonight!

James Beard semi-finalist Gabe Rucker of Le Pigeon

Speaking of great food, huge kudos to some of our favorite Portpand chefs and restos who were just announced as semi-finalists for the James Beard Awards. Gabe Rucker at Le Pigeon, Naomi Pommeroy at Beast, John Gorham at Toro Bravo, Andy Ricker at Pok Pok  and Ping, Matthew Lightner at Castagna, Jenn Louis at Lincoln, Cathy Whims at Nostrana, and Oswaldo Bibiano at Autentica - what a wealth of culinary talent right here! And this crew is is just the tip of the iceberg - there are exciting new eateries and great young chefs popping up around here seemingly every week - we are truly blessed. (Thank god I’m training for a half-marathon - otherwise I think I could easily gain about 20 pounds a week!)

We are excited to once again be a part of the annual Flavors of Carlton event coming up this Saturday. It’s a fundraiser for local charities right here in our little community, raising $$$ for several vital programs whose budgets were wiped out by the latest round of governmental cost slashing at the state and federal level.

Tickets are only $50, which is a massive deal in this era of $250+ charity dinner price tabs. A bunch of great wineries are pouring new releases, several top local restaurants are offering up delicious bites, and there’s a live auction offering all sorts of packages - including coast and wine country getaways, and our package of a private guided tasting for 8 at the winery, including a mixed 6-pack of some of our best Pinots and Burgundies. Tickets are available online through the link above - we hope to see you in Carlton Saturday night. (The event is hosted by our friends and neighbors at Ken Wright Cellars.)

I was blown away by the response to our special Lucien Le Moine tasting on Saturday - what a turnout! Thanks for joining us. Those wines are generally never open for tasting anywhere - in fact it was a treat for us to check out all of those amazing Grand Crus side by side. I thought the Charmes Chambertin and the Clos de la Roche were showing the best on the day, both with really lovely silky fruit and amazing length. The Chambolle-Musigny les Charmes was the best of the 1er Crus we opened - it was just plain delicious, creamy, and endlessly elegant - everything I love about Chambolle. We were so slammed with guests that we ran out of wines to pour and sell by about 3:30 - I apologize to everyone who came later only to find the wines all gone. We poured and sold every bottle that wasn’t nailed down - or so we thought. Turns out there are three bottles of the ‘07 Charmes Chambertin Grand Cru still available - if you’re interested email Kelly Karr and we will honor the special pricing from Saturday (the Charmes is $168.25, down from $225.)

Thanks to Ben Dyer and his team at Simpatica and Laurelhurst Market - we had a great winemaker dinner for the Morrison Child Services Cooking for Kids series on Thursday night. Ben was inspired by the Saints Superbowl win and Mardi Gras season - so they cooked up some great cajun and creole classics, including a rockin’ good andouille and chicken gumbo…

In the meantime - next month marks the arrival of D122 in Oregon. Details to come…

As often is the case, things somehow balanced themselves out. My sadness and depression after the Arsenal loss on Sunday morning was more than erased when the Saints crushed the Colts in the Super Bowl on Sunday afternoon. Martha & I literally had tears in our eyes as we celebrated (with a bottle of Marc Chauvet ‘99 Special Club Champagne, of course!) It was so much more than a football game. This one was a victory for the city of New Orleans and its culture and battle-scarred residents - who have risen phoenix-like from the ashes to their biggest day of glory. I can only imagine the intense buzz of joy and celebration that is running through the town, as they now roll into Mardi Gras festivities, with the Super Bowl trophy in hand and a great new mayor to boot. Who Dat say dey gonna beat dem Saints!

One by one we are revealing the line-up for our amazing Lucien Le Moine ‘07 tasting this Saturday from 12-5 in Carlton. Yesterday we announced the Puligny-Montrachet les Folatières 1er Cru, today we’re adding the Chambolle-Musigny les Charmes 1er Cru to the flight. Watch this space and our Facebook & Twitter pages for the next three additions. These wines are made in miniscule quantities - only 1 or 2 barrels each in most cases, and they are among the highest-scoring and most sought-after Burgundies on the planet.
As Martha pointed out - they are rarer than diamonds, and a lot less expensive! So bring your Valentine on Saturday for an extremely rare shot to taste these beauties. And they’ll be 25% off on Saturday as well…

We’ll also have some killer grower Champagne on hand, including that ‘99 Special Club bottling from Marc Chauvet, a really special bottle for your celebrations, and a great deal at $55. (Most Special Club Champagne starts at $75 and up.) If you love clean, crisp, citrus-y and brioche-y bubbles - this is the real deal. Only four 6-packs remain in the U.S….

I’m really looking forward to our winemaker dinner Thursday night with the Simpatica-Laurelhurst Market crew. If you’ve got your seats booked - we’ll see you there (it is SOLD-OUT - thanks for supporting Morrison Child & Family Services!)

Please send your good vibes for the Arsenal-Liverpool game tomorrow night, while I wish a Happy Birthday today to my lovely and loving wife Martha, who has tolerated my insanity for almost 17 years now, and keeps on getting better in spite of it all!

Martha in Meursault

I am gearing up for what looks to be a major few days of massive action, excitement, celebration, great wines, and hopefully victory! We’re kicking it off with a killer free tasting at Storyteller Wines in Portland on Friday night from 6-8. Here’s the lineup for the evening:

• Crémant de Bourgogne - Huber-Verdereau
• Mâcon-Prissé - Domaine Thibert
• Bourgogne Passetoutgrains - Taupenot-Merme
• Chambolle-Musigny - Anne & Hervé Sigaut
• Pommard Platiéres 1er Cru - Thierry Violot Guillemard
• La Paulée Pinot Noir - Scott Paul Wines

And more goodies are rumored to be on hand, including some Lucien Le Moine. Wear your Arsenal gear, so we can show those Chelsea-loving Storyteller people what the beautiful game is all about!

The Premiere League season for my beloved Arsenal all comes down to the match on Sunday morning against arch-rivals Chelsea. If we lose, our shot at the title is over. If we win, it’s game on. So please send any juju you have Arsenal’s way on Sunday morning. My mental health may also be at stake.

Speaking of juju - we are fired up for the Superbowl around here. I’m a big Saints fan, having lived in New Orleans for five years, and I’m married to one of the Crescent City’s all-time loveliest natives. Martha, Pirrie and I did a wacky victory dance all over the house after they beat the beat the Packers two weeks back - I can only imagine the eruption if they win it all. GEAUX SAINTS! (Interesting tidbit - Martha went the the same high school in N.O. as Peyton Manning, and her brother was the QB at the school before Peyton!)

Martha’s birthday is next Tuesday. As is the custom, she prefers a week-long celebration, so we’ll kick it off Friday night with some friends at home, then move it out to the winery on Saturday -where we will be in the tasting room and looking forward to seeing you from 1-5. Then it’s back to Portland to continue the party and root for Arsenal and them Saints.

Then we roll into the b-day itself, then our sold-out winemaker dinner with Laurelhurst Market on Thursday, and then into our amazing Lucien Le Moine tasting here in Carlton on Saturday the 13th (and then a sold-out Burgundy class that evening!) And then Valentine’s day. Other than that, it’s pretty mellow!

See you tomorrow night at Storyteller - come on by if you can!

It’s one of the four major days of the year for those of us whose lives revolve around Burgundy & Pinot Noir - the release of the new issue of Burghound, Allen Meadows’ quarterly journal reviewing thousands of wines and hundreds of producers.

Allen Meadows, the Burghound hard at work...

The 1st quarter issue, which always covers the reds of the Côte de Nuits, arrived on Sunday. In addition to the detailed reviews, it also offers the first look at Allen’s in-depth take on the vintage. Fascinating reading as always - specifically in his analysis of the 2008 vintage in Burgundy. The cumulative effect of multiple unusual factors resulted in the ‘08 Burgs finishing their malos very very late, thus making them difficult to judge with the usual accuracy 14 months after harvest. I was in Burgundy last fall at the same time as Allen, and I can attest that many of the wines were still not through malo, or had just finished, making it quite hard to get a real read.

That said, I agree with Allen that the vintage as a whole is a bit more interesting than 2007, but it is even more variable. The highs are higher, the lows are a bit lower, and there are perhaps more misses in ‘08 than ‘07. Overall, the good wines from ‘08 are indeed “Classic Burgundy” - the best of which are pure, fresh, elegant and very refined - a style I happen to enjoy greatly.

It will be a vintage to be very selective. That of course is my job, to select the best and bring them in for the U.S. market. Thus, it is heartening to see that Burghound has selected a number of our producers and their wines for special distiction. Domaine J-J Confuron once again received stellar scores, and had wines singled out in all three of Allen’s “best of the vintage” categories - “Top Value”, “Sweet Spot”, and “Don’t Miss”. Kudos to Alain & Sophie Meunier, the proprietors/vignerons at Confuron, for hitting the Burghound trifecta, as it were!

Also great to see that Anne & Hervé Sigaut, Jean-Marc Millot, and Taupenot-Merme all received scores as good or better than their lovely 2007s. It won’t be until late this year or early next before the 08s start to arrive here, but we are in for some nice treats then, to be sure. And Allen’s take on the hugely-buzzing 2009s? “Potentially Great”. But those are a long way off…

In the cellar at Buisson-Charles

Burghound also covered 2007 Oregon Pinot in this report, which he deemed “The good, the not-so-good, and the ugly.” I’d say he’s right-on. The better 2007s are indeed elegant, refined and delicious. The rest are varying degrees of not so refined and delicious. We were among the lucky ones in ‘07, as the vintage favored our style over bigger, more heavily-extracted wines. The bottom line is - taste the wines! There will be plenty of Oregon ’07s for you to love, you’ve just got to taste ‘em for yourself.

It is also worth noting that David Schildknecht, who covers Burgundy for Robert Parker’s The Wine Advocate, has just released his reviews of Burgundy’s ‘07 whites and ‘06 reds. He lavished praise on the Buisson-Charles ’07s from Meursault (90 for the Meursault VV, and 93 for both the Goutte d’Or and Bouches-Chères 1er Crus - all of which are arriving here at the end of the month, btw.) On the red side he had great things to say about the Anne & Hervé Sigaut ’06s as well as the wines from Huber-Verdereau. Looking forward to his ‘07 red coverage soon…

It’s always been my nature to just keep moving forward - I’ve never been one to look back from whence I came, nor to slow down and reflect. Occasionally in moments of clarity I realize that these avenues are not mutually exclusive - that I can in fact slow down, look back, and keep moving (though preferably not all at the same time…)

I talk very little about my 30 years in the music and radio business. I had several lifetimes’-worth of amazing times over those years, and absolutely loved it. I have so mentally moved on from those days that it seems like another lifetime altogether, but much of it remains close to the surface - or at least bubbles up from time to time. One of the great opportunities that came my way was the privilege to work with Michael Jackson.

It has taken a few months since his death, and last week’s DVD release of the amazing “This Is It” rehearsal footage, for it all to sink in. Only Elvis and The Beatles were ever at his level in terms of worldwide superstardom and cultural impact (and  of course Michael was obsessed with Elvis and The Beatles.) We are not likely to ever again see the complete entertainer that Michael was. At age 50, and not in shall we say robust health, he still looked the most captivating and compelling live performer one could ever imagine seeing. He was a genius on so many levels, and at the same time a strange, very very different human being. I, and I imagine history, will ultimately focus on the genius and his legacy of great songs and performances. Like nobody else on the planet, the guy just knew how to put on a show!

For a time I was the Sr. Director of National Promotion for Michael’s record company, Epic Records, and being part of the incredible world of Michael Jackson was nothing like anything I’ve ever experienced before or since. Just the pride and passion that we all took in knowing that we were working with the biggest artist in the world - it was an amazing feeling, and it permeated everything we did and drove us on to do more than we’d ever done before. It was just understood that Michael deserved, and in fact demanded it. It was an atmosphere of extreme pressure at times. It was never spoken, but we just knew that anything less than the best that had ever been achieved would be a failure. Pressure? What pressure…

I remember in excruciating detail the launch of Michael’s single “Black or White” in 1991. Never before in recorded history had every single major Top 40 radio station in America added the same record to each of their playlists in the same week. So, that became our goal. Somehow, we pulled it off. I will never forget getting the confirmation that the 214th out of 214 stations had indeed added the record on that Tuesday (for some bizarre reason, Tuesdays have always been the day radio stations report their new playlist additions for the week.) At any rate, it’s a record that still stands, as far as I know. The single went straight to #1 and stayed there for seven weeks. Though we didn’t know it at the time, this was probably the beginning of the end of his commercial peak.

I remember video (excuse me - “short films”) shoots where we did endless take after take after take - he was a total perfectionist, and always knew exactly what he wanted. He would never quit until he got exactly what he had in his mind. Sometimes it took a while for everyone else to understand exactly what that was - but no one ever seemed to get exasperated or impatient with him.

When I was the afternoon DJ on New York’s top-rated  WHTZ/Z-100 in the mid-1980s - “Thriller” was at its peak and Michael-mania ruled the world. He was in New York, staying at the Helmsley Palace - and I remember his manager Frank DiLeo calling us and offering us the sheets off of Michael’s bed to give away in a contest. Michael signed the sheets with a Sharpie, and Frank brought them over to the station. This drew perhaps the biggest reaction to a radio contest I’ve ever seen - it got more action than giving away $25,000 cash! What exactly did the winner do with the sheets, I have always wondered…

Ultimately, we are left with an amazing body of music that has touched millions of lives. In the end, he was and is an inspiration. The stirring tribute to Michael on last night’s Grammy Awards telecast inspired me once again, and led me to sit down and share a few memories. I am blessed to have been a tiny part of that world.