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Big Table Farm

Clare Carver and Brian Marcy’s winery, which looks much like a large barn, sits on their fully functioning 70-acre farm, which is home to various cows, goats, fowl, bees, pigs (who meet their maker at the end of each growing season) and seasonally planted vegetables. Their home, an airy Craftsman-style house, is on the isolated property outside of Gaston as well, just about a hundred yards away from the winery. Marcy studied fermentation science at the University of California-Davis with an eye to beer-making before embarking on a wine career in 1999 at Turley, which he followed with a tour of Australia and stints at Neyers, Marcassin and Blankiet before setting out for Oregon with Claire, who has a background in wine marketing, in 2005. Their wines emphasize freshness and elegance over richness and are sourced from some of Oregon’s best vineyards. Production has settled, for now, to around 4,000 cases a year, all told, with an emphasis on Pinot Noirs that are made with varying percentages of whole clusters and with a judicious amount of new oak (up to about a third), which Marcy is unafraid of using “if the fruit is up to it.” The 2014s here show surprising vivacity for a warm vintage, but perhaps it’s not completely surprising given Marcy’s attention to harvesting “when the fruit is ripe but before it turns the corner” to super-ripe. As a result, the 2014s here all check in at under 14 percent alcohol, in keeping with the house style. I also tasted through a few barrels of the 2015s here and they show more power and dark fruit than the ‘14s at this early stage. My suspicion is that they’ll be wines to drink before the ‘14s, with more heft but perhaps not the same vivacity as their older siblings.

From Oregon Pinot Noir: The Exceptional 2014s and Often Surprising 2013s (Dec 2016) by Josh Raynolds

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2014 Pinot Noir Earth

Release Price: $100

Color: Red

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