Tag Archives: Patricia Green

Wine review: Patricia Green Dollar Bills Only Pinot Noir 2020

Patricia Green Cellars Pinot Noir "Dollar Bills Only" bottle
Patricia Green Cellars Dollar Bills Only Pinot Noir 2020/$17-$20

Bring on the smoke taint paranoia – even when there isn’t any smoke taint

Smoke taint is one of the least understood phenomena in the wine business. Little research was done previous to the West Coast fires of the past several years, and the most important work was done in Australia. Which, given how different Australia’s terroir is from the rest of the world, might mean those results don’t necessarily apply elsewhere.

Nevertheless, certain American wine consumers know all – like the Patricia Green Dollar Bills Only Pinot Noir 2020 ($19, purchased, 12.9%) is tainted to the hilt.

Sigh. Would these people do their own plumbing or electricity the way they pass judgment on wine?

First, Patricia Green is a top producer, and it’s accusing the winery of a great malfeasance to say it’s selling smoke-tainted wine. Second, the wine tasted as it should to me, as well as to the others I tasted it with. And I like to think I’ve picked up a few things in more than two decades of tasting wine professionally.

The wine didn’t taste of smoke. It tasted like Patricia Green pinot noir. That is, a stunning Oregon pinot noir from a top producer that is heads and shoulders above almost everything else at that price. It’s berryish and sort of herbal and funky, while the tannins do exactly what they should in a pinot noir.

So why all the hoopla? Two reasons, I think. First, it costs less than $20, and we all know that great pinor noir has to cost much more than that. Second, it’s not big, it’s not sweet, it’s not smooth, and it’s not dark and rich. Which, as we all know, is what point noir is supposed to taste like these days.

So nuts to the wine geeks. Highly recommended, and just the thing for the holidays.

Expensive wine 126: Patricia Green Pinot Noir Reserve 2017

The Patricia Green PiPatricia Green Pinot Noir Reservenot Noir Reserve offers value and quality just in time for Thanksgiving

Oregon pinot noir has long enjoyed a reputation for value and quality, and little has changed about that despite all of the other changes in wine since the end of the recession. Case in point: the Patricia Green Pinot Noir Reserve.

The Patricia Green Pinot Noir Reserve ($24, purchased, 13.7%) is one of the best values in wine today – a top-notch red made with quality fruit that speaks to the region’s terroir and the pinot noir grape. In this, it offers a standard that others need to pay attention to (and probably explains why the Wine Spectator likes it as much as I do).

The best part about this wine may well be that it’s still young, and will need a couple of years to show off its best qualities. Because there are plenty of those. It’s a subtle wine, much closer to Burgundy than California, but still very Oregon in style. That means earth and the tannins found only in quality pinot noir. There is brambly black fruit, but it’s more zesty and less pronounced than elsewhere in the state.

Highly recommended, and just the wine for Thanksgiving. Or, frankly, when you want to enjoy quality at an unbelievable price.

Expensive wine 44: Patricia Green Yamhill County Pinot Noir 2010

In a couple of weeks, many of us will drink pinot noir with Thanksgiving dinner, since pinot is traditionally the red wine recommended for Thanksgiving. The catch, of course, is that much of the pinot noir we ?ll be drinking won ?t be especially pinot-like, thanks to one of the biggest changes in the wine business over the past five years.

Those of us who do want to drink pinot that is varietally correct and want to spend a little extra would do well to look for the Patricia Green ($36, sample), long one of my favorite Oregon pinot noirs and not a bad value given pinot noir prices.

In the old days, when winemakers paid more attention to these things, there were three kinds of pinot ? red Burgundy from France, which could be earthy and almost mushroomy; California pinot, which was focused on fruit but remained true to the Burgundian concept of elegance; and Oregon pinot, which fit somewhere between the two.

The Patricia Green has remained true to that ideal, and is made as it should be, without any foolishness like over extraction, extra oak, and 15 percent alcohol. There is berry fruit, but also herbs and earthiness; in this, it is what one critic has called a benchmark for Oregon pinot noir — clean and well-crafted, where the grapes and not the winemaker determine what the wine tastes like. Highly recommended.