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According to recent data, wine now generates $3.5 billion annually and accounts for 17,000 jobs in wine and related businesses in Oregon. Now, that’s impact. And it seems to be growing. Consider our (fairly) recent history: Continue reading
Oregon’s best wine? Seems a silly question, at first. Pinot noir? Pinot gris? Nah. One very wine-savvy professional is ready to offer a rather shocking response: chardonnay. Say what? If it’s even partly true that chardonnay rates as one of Oregon’s best wines, the phenomenon could be called a renaissance, a revival, even a re-birth, because Oregon chardonnay had effectively died in the ’80s. And it wasn’t a pretty demise. Continue reading
Many a romantic notion is attached to wine, like zooming past the city limits, wind in your hair and finding a sunny patio nestled into the rolling hills of a country winery where you can sip vino and take in the vistas. Continue reading
I’m no oenephile. Don’t get me wrong, I like wine, but its niceties are lost on me, perhaps because in my college years my idea of “good wine” was strawberry Boones Farm, preferably after it had sat in the freezer long enough to give it a certain Slurpee-like texture. I’m still that chick who, when asked what I’d like to drink at an elegant restaurant, responds, “Give me your cheap red.” Continue reading
A logo with two salmon on your wine bottle doesn’t mean the wine pairs well with salmon — it means the wine came from a vineyard certified salmon-safe. Vineyards in the Willamette Valley can have an impact on the water quality of nearby streams, but salmon-safe vineyards go through an extensive certification process that ensures winemakers preserve riparian areas, protect water quality and prevent erosion. Continue reading