2018 and 2019 Bednarik were some of my favorite wines from thor cellar in those vintages. Just lovely wines.
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@Marcus_Goodfellow I’m enjoying one of your Rieslings this evening, and the markings on the cork reminded me that somewhere up thread you mentioned that you were testing out some new non-Diam corks. (Who is the new cork producer again? I can’t recall.)
Would you mind sharing what these trials look like? How many wines are being bottled with the new corks? How do you decide which wines get the new corks? What will it take for the tests to be judged a “success”? If the trials are successful, do you anticipate completely phasing out Diam in favor of this new producer?
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Ryan,
Thanks for the note, and I am really glad that you enjoyed the Tsai bottling. Even in puncheon, the base wine had so much vibrancy and freshness. It has gained texture and depth over the past 6 months since disgorging, but it still really retains is essential, and very charming, nature. I feel like there is a lot to look for in this Blanc de Noirs, but it’s also a wine that is so easy to just relax, enjoy, and not think about it.
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Yes. That’s it. Thanks for the link.
Hi Charles,
I tend to larger trials with things I believe are in the direction we should move. Typically, if I see someone else using a product that is working well, I’ll utilize the new decision as a working part of the process, i.e. for farming a block or vineyard, for the cellar in a fermenter, aging vessel, or a cuvee for bottling choices. Then we try to take a look at the wines many times, to see if we feel like it’s consistently successful or if it’s something that needs refinement.
Bench trials are rarely useful for me (and me alone, I speak no judgement on any other winemaker, their process is their process). Bench trials tend to be looked at far to quickly(IMO), and often struggle to isolate inputs well enough to make the bench trial useful (again IMO). That doesn’t even begin to account for tasting bias and lack of consistency as one tastes through a trial.
Portocork has an excellent repptation, and utilizes the same sanitizing process Diam does. The microspheres are patented but, as I noted in my previous post, we’re really looking to get rid of microplastics. 2023 was a good sized vintage and we have a number of bottlings this year using the Cwine, including the Berserker Cuvee. We used the Cwine 3 for our 2024 Riesling and Field Blend, as well as most of the vineyard designates. I have sample enough wines under Cwine 3 to see that it is a good, viable closure. So we are using the Portocork Cwine 3 for a number of cuvees, in our upcoming bottling of Willamette Valley Pinot Noir, the 2023 Chardonnays, and two small lot block bottlings.
In addition to the lack of micro-plastic spheres, the cmpressability of the Cwine 3 is very good and more similar to natural cork. We’ve seen no TCA as of yet, and while the wines are a bit tighter than some previous Diam closed vintages, I don’t feel that we can ascribe that solely to the closure by any means. Though without microspheres a longer rebound from bottle shock could be a regular thing.
We trialed a natural cork closure (1+1s), the technical closure from Portocork, and the Mytic 10 closure for sparkling wines. The Mytic 10 closures are Diam and while I love Diam the Mytic 10 has some kinks to work out. They are seriously stiff and the corker jaws have a difficult time compressing the cork, it scrapes off a piece of the closure about 3 times in 10 for corking. And the last Durant BdB that I looked at opening took a pair of channell lock pliers to open. I do think that the Mytic 10 will become easier to open as time passes but for now that release is shelved until I can open a bottle with my hands. The less dense Mytic supposedly works well, but given how many of our consumers age our wines, I am undecided on whether to take a swing and the other closure. Especially as the natural closure and the Portocork technical closure both seem to work very well.
Edit: we have three separate bottling dates this year. Not three bottlings that use the Cwine. The third is a week from Monday/Tuesday so my brain is pretty fried right now. Hopfully, this post mostly makes sense.
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I might add that the President & CEO of Portocork is Dustin Mowe who is a fellow WB’er and the owner of MOWE Napa Valley (along with his wife Renee). Great people and they make some great wine as well.
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Thanks for the shout out @Bryan_B
Happy to answer any questions anyone has about the CWINE. And…Thank you Marcus for the positive comments above. I have always said DIAM is a great product but the “secret sauce” so to speak is in the cleansing method and we have had CWINE on the market using that same process since 2012 and it has been incredibly successful.
I cant believe this thread is over 3,000 posts long. Well done @Marcus_Goodfellow great to see the community love for your wines!
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Just had glasses of the 2021 and 2014 Richard’s Chardonnay. Both drinking very well, although they are different stylistically. I seem to recall Marcus posting once that he preferred to drink his Chardonnay at around 5-7 years of age, and the 2014 vintage may be an outlier in that regard, but it is still quite appealing at 10+ years of age, and doesn’t really show any signs at this point that it is in any imminent danger of decline.
The 2021 is just a young glass of Chardonnay deliciousness, and reminds me how much I have missed this wine. I can’t wait for the Fall offer of the '23!
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@D_B_i_r_d and I had the 2015 Goodfellow Pinot Noir Heritage No. 4 yesterday. Took a couple hours to start opening up, but really enjoyed the well integrated black cherry, tea leaves, and spice notes on the nose and palate. I saved some to check in over the next couple days.
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We had that Heritage No. 4 in a tasting with Megan a couple of weeks ago and it was probably my favorite. I thought that I had some at home but was disappointed to find that I don’t.
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Studying up for our Willamette trip in a couple weeks:
2021 Goodfellow Richard’s
Still fairly coiled but nonetheless very enjoyable to drink. On the nose lots of flinty/steely/sesame reduction but it is integrating and becoming a layer among many alongside bright lemon peel, white pepper, honeysuckle, and some underripe stone fruit. Not much perceptible oak on the nose?
On the palate the wine is medium bodied with fairly high acidity for Chardonnay; there’s a lot of chalky grip—lovely texture. Flavor is similar to the nose with citrus and citrus peel, toasted sesame, flint, unripe peach. Moderately long finish. Not a crime to open it now if you’ve got a few bottles, though it drinks like it’s got a million years in the tank.
2015 Goodfellow Bishop Creek PN franc de pied
On the nose woodsy, angostura bitters, orange peel, roses, loamy dirt, macerated strawberries, salty leather.
On the palate the wine is squarely medium bodied (so on the fuller side for the house) and has moderate plus acidity, and is spice and dark red fruit driven with a mid-long finish. The alcohol from the warm vintage is there but it isn’t a problem. Good, and definitely still Goodfellow just in a very slightly more generously fruited style given the vintage.
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Sometimes we define wine not by what it is, but by what it is not.
While this is “not pinot” it certainly is delicious.
A note from Marcus & Megan: “That is a Loire style blend of Cabernet Franc (Whistling Ridge) and Pinot Noir (Durant) that we made in 2017. The blend is mostly Cab Franc with the Pinot Noir blended in about 4 months before we bottled the wine.”
If you have this, it is drinking beautifully right now.
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Richard’s Cuvee Chardonnay - While I found the 2016 at peak a few weeks ago, the 2018 has “arrived.” Neither tightly coiled nor aggressively reductive, it is now in its moment of shining glory. Decanted in the fridge for one hour before drinking.
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Checked in on 23 Berserker PN.
It’s gonna be hard to stay out of them.
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Yes it is, but I’m doing my best.
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The 14 is an outlier but I am also leaning a little later into the curve these days (and I have always enjoyed the wines in the early going as welll). But the 2014 is perhaps the best Richard’s prior to 2019…maybe 2017 (and maybe better than both).
The 2023 is going live tomorrow for the Vindependence Sale btw…
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Brian, did you decant that Heritage wine?
Marcus, is there an email going out regarding this, or will it only be posted on the website? Inquiring minds want to know.
It’s on the Berserker Board today. Like a mini-Berserker Day but in July.
@ToddFrench is putting his money where his mouth is, again (thank you Todd), for the small wineries on the board. Vindependence day, and to make sure that we are keepinng things exciting(hopefully), we’re pre-offering the 2023 Chardonnays. It’s a vintage where they’ll want some time (for most people) to find some cello to go along with the violins, if that makes sense.
Just go to the Vindependence Day thread when it opens, or just email me.
And in the category of GOATing (greatest of all time conversations have become so ubiquitous that my kids use GOATing as a verb), without doubt the 2014 vintage is the most surprising vintage of my career. It looked like a big mess of meh when we were processing the fruit. Warm vintahe that cooled off a couple of weeks before we picked in early September. Clean fruit for sure, LOTS of fruit for sure, big berries, and good but no spectacular flavors in the grapes. I really remember being happy that it was so clean because every grower came in heavier than anticipated and the volumes were intense for our very small team. Megan was at Beaux Freres in 2014 for harvest but came over to help me with press loads, which is how she got sucked into the winery. But at this point, across the board the wines are above average and the whites are exceptional, especially the Richard’s and the Pinot Gris wines.
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