2018 Hundred Suns, Gamay Noir, Tualatin Estate, Willamette Valley, Oregon.
Renée Saint Amour and Grant Coulter’s Hundred Suns is one of Oregon’s most exciting micro winery projects and I love everything they are doing here, especially their out of the box Pinots and this Gamay from the Tualatin Estate, a wine that saw 60% whole cluster carbonic fermentation, 40% traditional de-stemmed using small yielding selections of ripe fruit and indigenous yeasts and aged in amphora. Grant who for about decade worked under Mike Etzel at Beaux Freres, working his way up to head winemaker now consults and oversees the winemaking and vineyards for the upcoming Flaneur Winery, as well as these Hundred Sons, a label he started in 2015 getting fruit from top sites, including Etzel’s Sequitur Vineyard and Dick Shea’s famous Yamhill Carlton site. While the attention is rightly on his Pinot Noir bottlings, which are delicious, totally unique and stylish in way few Oregon can match with some carbonic fruit forward expressive flavors and whole bunches crunchiness that remind me of Philippe Pacalet, in Burgundy, Jean Foillard of Morgon fame and Timo Mayer in Australia’s Yarra Valley! Now, the Gamay always sells out fast, don’t let that bum you out, just get on the list for the next vintage and grab some of the Pinot Noirs, the Old Eight Cut Pinot is one of the best values in Oregon and the mentioned Shea and Sequitur single vineyard wines are off the charts! This wildly delicious ruby/garnet Gamay Noir is serious and passionately, in not painstakingly, hand crafted nectar, and while not an easy find with so little of it available, it is really worth the search.
The Hundred Suns 2018 Tualatin Estate Gamay is incredible in the way it has Gamay’s punchiness, but supple textures and remarkable depth, it is pretty lavish and flamboyant with loads of personality and charm showing racy plum, cherry and strawberry fruits along with cinnamon, cool chalk, Asian spices and crushed violets. The name “Tualatin” originates from the native peoples of this part of Oregon and means “gentle and easy flowing,” referring to the Tualatin River that meanders on its way to the confluence with the more famous Willamette River. Tualatin Estate Vineyard, originally established back in 1973 by wine pioneers Bill Fuller and Bill Malkmus, is one of the oldest and most respected vineyard cool climate sites in Oregon’s Willamette Valley near Forest Grove in a rain shadow in the Valley’s far northwest on marine sedimentary soils. This vineyard is mostly planted to Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Riesling, Gewürztraminer, Muscat and Pinot Blanc, with a tiny selection especially for Grant of true Gamay Noir, which all goes into this fascinating wine. The winemaking here is intriguing, the whole-cluster carbonic batch was done in sealed tank then aged in neutral French oak with the de-stemmed traditionally native yeast fermented batch getting its elevage in the terra-cotta Amphora for seven months, with both then being gently racked to blending tank for settling and bottled unfixed and unfiltered. This Gamay opens up with luxurious results and at 14.1% natural alcohol there is tons of palate impact, while still retaining the grape’s energy and enjoys a sexy mouth feel. I am saving a bottle for extended aging, as I am with a few single vineyard Pinots that I think will bring even greater rewards in 5 to 10 years, Hundred Suns should be on your radar, these offerings are stunning singular wines.
($30 Est.) 94 Points, grapelive