We sat down with our co-founder, Mark Ellenberger before a recent Wine Series in the Tasting Room that featured four Pinot Noir’s: a 2017 Kagan Cellars Pinot Noir ‘Lindsey’s Vineyard’, 2017 TePa Pinot Noir ‘Taylor River Vineyard’, 2017 Granville Pinot Noir ‘Holstein Vineyard’ and 2018 Bouchard Aine & Fils Burgundy.
Mark starts off by saying, “You can’t talk about Pinot Noir without talking about the three C’s: which stand for Climate, Clones and whole Cluster (cluster of grapes). Pinot Noir is a thin-skinned grape, so it’s more susceptible to climatic variations than say a Cabernet Sauvignon, which is thicker skinned. Whole cluster pressing is used to enhance the structure of the wine through inclusion of ripe stems that bring additional tannins to the party. While Pinot Noir is not usually blended with any other grapes to make wine, the practice of planting several different clones in the same vineyard provides balance and variability to the final blend.”
Take a few minutes and learn more about his perspective in this video clip. Cheers!