Trip Report: Willamette Valley

Couple weeks behind on this. This was my first time in Oregon. Nice little weekend getaway for my birthday. We stayed 2 nights at the Setting Inn. Thoroughly pleased with our stay there.

Day 1
Shiba Wichern
If you get a chance to taste here. Do it. This was a gem. Akiko was generous with her time, easy to talk to, and informative. Thanks to Christian for setting it up.

I picked up my BD purchase and combined a tasting. We tasted: sparkling, auxerrois and four single vineyard current release PN’s (Havlin, Nuestro Sueno, Bellevue Cross, and Momtazi). My significant other enjoys wines that are a bit more full and her pick was the Momtazi (we bought some). I enjoyed the '18 Nuestro Sueno: black plums, blueberry, some roasted notes, clove. I thought it showed a nice balance between being delicate/powerful and with fruit/secondary notes. I opened up the library ’16 Nuestro with family shortly after our return and everyone was really impressed. All of the PN’s were great though. Kind of disappointed this was our first stop. I was trying to being conscientious with my purchases and would have bought more if this was later in our tastings.

Lunch – Rosmarino Osteria Italiano. This was the shining star of our culinary visits. Proudly authentic. Dario, the chef/owner, is eccentric and a nice guy. Wild boar Pappardelle was out of this world.

Patricia Green Cellars
Tasted through 6 wines. A Chard and Various PN’s. Some of the wine started to run together a bit in the middle of the tasting. One wine I enjoyed that did not run together was the ’19 Marine Sedimentary which was like straight seashell and mineral. Freedom Hill Coury Clone stuck out as well. Although we had an enjoyable visit, we ended up just paying our tasting fee here. Setting was nice and our host was enjoyable. I’d return here.

Flaneur
This was just a drop in tasting by the recommendation from our host at Patricia Green. The tasting room was in a renovated grain elevator in Carlton. It was a cool setting to inside and sip a glass. Cool experience, nice people, but the PN style wasn’t for me…heavy fruit and a lot of baking spices.

Dinner– Recipe Neighborhood Kitchen. Highly recommended. Smaller menu and they do everything right. The Wagyu Coulotte was nice, great wine list. At one point the proprietor/chef jumped behind the bar to whip up my Martini while we were waiting for our seat. If that gives you a feel for the kind of place it is.

Day 2
Vidon
I booked this place because it was close to our lodging and I knew my S/O would enjoy the view. I didn’t have high expectations and actually enjoyed it. 5 wines: chard, 2 PN’s, Tempranillo, and a Syrah. I love Syrah and Tempranillo so it was a nice change of pace from the normal Willamette varietals. I think it was 3 bottles to offset a tasting, which we picked up Syrah. The Syrah was restrained with a relatively short finish: black pepper, coffee, herbs, cherry. Thinner than what I’m used to but decent none the less.

Lunch– Trellis. I was bit disappointed here. Service was average. Food was just decent. It could just be that I had high expectations from the previous places.

Vincent Wine Company
Another BD purchase and tasting combo. Out of all our tastings, I thought Vincent’s tasting lineup was the most solid from a consistency standpoint. Every wine from start to finish was pleasing. We tasted through the '17, ’18, & ’19 Ribbon Ridge PN. The difference in vintages was very apparent. Then I started to realize how big the variances can be in Oregon wine can get when you factor in vintages, clones, soil, winemaking style, etc. even with vineyards/blocks that are extremely close in proximity. Vincent was fun to taste with and hearing his philosophies and stories was enjoyable. I was bummed we only got to spend an hour with him. Oh, don’t sleep on the Gamay. It’s

Bethel Heights
Great views. I think it was hard for me to get past the price points after just drinking subjectively better wines at half the price not 20 minutes prior. They asked us two different times if we were legal to drink lol. At that point just ask to see the ID. Didn’t make any purchases here, but it was nice to relax and enjoy the view without engaging in thought provoking conversation.

Dinner
Good Cheese Company - This is a cool little spot with what seems like +50 different cheeses. We asked the cheesemonger to surprise us with a cheese board. They also have a little market and we picked up some gifts for our return (Mama Lils Peppers, local chocolate/honey, Goodfellow Chard, etc). Grabbed some pizza at Forage to enjoy outside with some Bocce Ball at our Inn.


I can’t wait to return to Willamette. This wasn’t the originally desired lineup as a few places weren’t able to accommodate us for our specific dates unfortunately (Goodfellow and Kelley Fox being a few). Sorry I didn’t take very specific tasting notes during our visits. I found myself either enjoying conversation with the winemaker or decompressing with a good view. Next time!

sounds like a great trip! Im curious what wines you tasted at Bethel heights? my wife loves their wines and I love the OG block bottlings, plus the Casteels are great.

It was a nice trip! No Casteels. I believe it was Rose, PN Justice Vineyard, PN Cauldron and Chard Justice. In that order. Which I remember it being odd tasting the Chardonnay last. I’ll have to give them another look with a fresh palate.

Many wineries in the Willamette Valley present their Chardonnays after their Pinot Noirs.

This is often the custom in Burgundy as well.

The rationale is that Chardonnays produced in a high acid style could undermine how the Pinot Noirs present themselves were the order reversed.

Very nice. You hit a completely different set of wineries than I did last September. I really wish I knew about Vincent back then. I did not buy any Shiba Wichern on BD. Will look out for them now.

For your next trip, outside the normal heavy hitters, we enjoyed Domaine Divio and Dusky Goose. The view from Dusky Goose is really nice but not quite as expansive a view as next door at Domaine Roy & Fils which has a bit more of a view of the valley.

We stayed down the road from Domaine Divio in a VRBO and it was nice being out in the middle of the fields just the two couples. Divio was a drop in on the way by and glad we stopped, became the Thanksgiving wine - the Passetoutgrain (Gamay/Pinot Noir blend).

Sean, thanks for this trip report. Very helpful, as my wife and I are planning to head back out to the WV this August.

Agree with you about Flaneur’s setting and their pinots, although I did really enjoy one or two of their chards.

Vincent was already on my potential visit list after a BD purchase this year. Sounds like Shiba Wichern is another good option.

Shiba Wichern’s wines had a sense of intentionality to each one of them, especially the single vineyards. Or at least that was my perspective.

Vincent and Shiba are a very 1 on 1, tasting next to their barrels type experience. I wasn’t so sure my S/O was going enjoy them, as we’ve only done traditional tastings with tastings rooms and she’s more of a casual wine drinker. But she really enjoyed them.

Thanks for the recommendations Glenn! I have a small running list for our next trip.

We looked at Airbnb’s/VRBO but we got a smoking deal at the Setting Inn during black friday. It was an awesome place to stay, luckily felt like we had the place to ourselves. Worth checking out.

We love Willamette and have been going every year (at least once) for the past several years. We’ve tried a lot of wineries based on recommendations from this group, and really prefer the smaller ones because of the personal experience with winemakers or their spouses. We normally stay for a week and spend a few nights in McMinnville and a few nights in Newberg so we can walk to restaurants. We tried some “new to us” wineries last year and had fantastic experiences at Antica Terra and Kelley Fox. Other suggestions for you to try next time are Hundred Suns, Walter Scott, Suzor, SchoneTal, SunBreak, Longplay. Just look at the “Teeny Tiny Wineries of Oregon” spreadsheet!