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2000 Pinot Noir Bethel Heights Wadenswil Clone

(updated 3/14/03)

2000 (Rex Hill North Block)
2000 (Bethel Heights Wadenswil Clone)
2000 (Stoller Vineyards Clone 115)
1999 | 1998 (Ridgecrest Vineyards 7 Acre Pommard)
1999 | 1998 (Bethel Heights Southeast Block)
1999 | 1998 (Jacob-Hart Vineyard)

Chehalem 2000 Bethel Heights Wadenswil Clone Pinot Noir

The Wine

This wine is very limited and is a result of ongoing experimentation between Chehalem and two close friends at Bethel Heights and Rex Hill. Since 1998 the three wineries have exchanged fruit from key vineyard blocks, making wines that, when assembled into a 3 by 3 tasting array, give insight to the relative influences of terroir, winemaking style and, replicated over several years, vintage. The concept is that vineyard distinctions are important determinants in wine quality, but that winemaking style can often mask nuance site differences. With three different approaches, even the same vineyard can reflect differently. This is the third of three consecutive vintages in which we deviated from our Estate Bottled-Only philosophy in order to learn more.

The Vineyard

The vineyard block selection in 2000 focused on optimizing winemaking for blocks that had, for one reason or another, presented problems in the past. The thought was that other winemaking hands might treat the fruit in a novel way that worked better than the owners'. The Bethel Heights contribution was their Wadesnswil block of Pinot noir, sometimes separately bottled by them and carrying a darkness and structure atypical of others' Wadenswil clone blocks.

The Vintage

Vintage 2000 was our third great vintage in-a-row, providing full ripeness and excellent weather throughout the growing season and through harvest. The average to one week early harvest, September 29-October 26, saw only 1.09 inches of rain. Fruit quantities were bountiful, permitting crop thinning to obtain ideal croploads of 2.50 tons/acre for Pinot gris, 2.55 for Chardonnay and 2.31 for Pinot noir. White wine characteristics are between 1998's round fleshiness and 1999's crisply structured ageability. Red wines benefit from less extreme extraction at Ridgecrest than the prior two vintages, thanks to normal croploads of 2.49 tons/acre and improved and excellent quality from the other vineyards. The overall quality in the Pinot noir cellar exceeds the average of 1999 and is similar to 1998.

Stats

Harvest Data:

Harvested 10/12/2000, from the Bethel Heights Wadesnswil block, harvested @23.0 brix, 6.3 g/L acid, 2.40 malic and 3.23 pH

Fermentation:

Fermented with native yeasts in fermentation of 20 days total skin contact, with 11 days of that pre-maceration, 9 active fermentation with a slowed and almost stopped fermentation (5 days <2brix), requiring inoculation with K-1 yeast; not acidulated; no pectolytic enzyme used; 40 ppm SO2, yeast food and DAP used;.2ppm Cu++ added; 95F max temp

Cooperage/Aging:

Aged for 11 months with one racking in 33% each new, 1 use and 3 use French oak

Clonal Selection:

Wadenswil clones

Bottling:

Bottled 9/25/2001 with no filtration

Bottling Analyses:

not available

Cases Produced:

Suggested Retail:

$39

Release Date:

February, 2003

Winemakers' Comments

A pretty, elegant and balanced pinot, with supple, black fruit; toasty wood is integrated and weight is sizable; not apparently tannic or imbalanced in acid; great length and breadth.