Wine Maker: Torii Mor

Vintage: 2013

Wine Name/Vineyard: Olalla Vineyard

Wine Category: Pinot Noir

Grape blend: 100% Pinot Noir

Bottle size: 750 ml

Region: Willamette Valley

State or country: Oregon

Price: $30.00

ABV: 13.3%

Cases produced: N/A

The Barrel Cellar Score:  91 points

Review date: February 19, 2021

About the Winemaker: Torii Mor’s tasting room sits in a beautiful Japanese style garden in the Willamette Valley. The tasting room is also inspired by Japanese style. It is a beautiful, unique, and relaxing place to enjoy a glass of wine. The winery’s name roughly translates to terroir and earth. Ollalla Vineyard, where the grapes for the wine I’m reviewing today were sourced from sits further south in southern Oregon. It is a 4.5-acre vineyard which was planted with clone 115 and Pommard Pinot Noir Clones in 1973. Winemaker Jacques Tardy blended grapes from both clones and aged the wine for 19 months in French oak.

Color:  Persian Plum

Nose: Perfectly ripened cherry and honeysuckle.

Taste: Cherry, red delicious apple, oak and earth. Finish: Mineral notes and hints of oak.

Assessment: Olalla Vinyard Pinot Noir is quite reserved, even by the standards of a French inspired Pinot Noir. It’s light bodied and defined predominantly by various mineral notes. The common thread from wines produced in this region are bold flavors of volcanic earth. In this case, the earthy tasting notes are replaced with minerality. The wine is impressive in how the reserved, yet plentiful flavor notes dance around the base mineral aspects of the wine and provide a refreshing yet complex bottle of wine.

Drink now through 2023.

2013 Olalla Vineyard pinot Nori from Torii Mor Winery is a very good wine. 91 points.

Pairing recommendation: Aged Italian cheese, pork and scallion dumplings. or French inspired veal medallions.