Welcome to binNotes Terroirist Tuesday: Meet the Winemaker
Today’s Exclusive: Jacques Tardy - Torii Mor Winery
18323 NE Fairview Dr, Dundee, OR 97115
(503) 554-0105
by L.M. Archer, FWS
Jacques Tardy, ‘Chef de Cave’ at Torii Mor Winery in Willamette Valley, grew up in Burgundy, home of the world’s most prestigious pinot noir.
Torii Mor Winery, specializing in pinot noir, expands from Willamette Valley to Woodinville, WA.
Torii Mor Winery’s new digs in Woodinville, WA. | Image: L.M. Archer (c) 2014
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binNotes recently talked terroir with Burgundy native and Torii Mor winemaker Jacques Tardy in anticipation of Torii Mor’s upcoming new Woodinville, WA. tasting room.
History
In 1993, owner and CEO Dr. Donald Olson founded Torii Mor in Dundee to honor his late son Leif Olson. The winery name reflects a blending of east and west: Torii, theJapanese word for ‘gate’, and Mor, the Scandinavian word for ‘earth.’ Today, Torii Mor produces over 10,000 cases, and is the official wine of Portland’s Japanese Garden.
In 2004, Dr. Olson hired Jacques Tardy as Torii Mor’s winemaker. A native of Nuits Saint-Georges in Burgundy’s Cote d’Or, Jacques hails from five generations of vignerons.
Terroir
Torii Mor serves as not just a ‘gate to earth’, but as a fulcrum between Old and New World wine traditions. Jacques Tardy shares with binNotes how terroir, as well as these traditions, inform his winemaking.
Your are a native of Burgundy. You’ve been in the US since 1982. Do you ever go back to Burgundy to visit?
“I go back every 3 years or so, I am going back in August this year, mostly to visit my family.”
If yes, do you see any current trends in Burgundian wine making, good or bad, that break from the traditions you learned?
“The return to less chemicals in the vineyard will be good for everyone, the workers, the wines, the consumers… for example, I brought in herbicides to my fathers vineyards in the beginning of the seventies, when most were already doing it, it was a big change that my father wasn’t comfortable with but it allowed all who used them to work more acreage. We now know that it wasn’t a good thing, at least the way we were using the herbicides since we were covering 100% of the ground. It eventually started to sterilize the soil which didn’t help the quality of the wines. Today’s vignerons have learned from those mistakes and are working smarter, still using herbicides but in a more targeted fashion, or they have gone back to tilling without herbicides. I don’t know if anything has changed in the cellars, possibly less filtration or better filters, I know evaporators and reverse osmosis have moved in as everywhere else in the world…”
How does your Burgundian training inform the wines you make today the Willamette Valley?
” It is a lot easier to make wine in the West coast than Burgundy, the fruit is a lot healthier to start with and we usualy have a longer growing season that allows us to pick when we like instead of Burgundy, where botrytis is present every year and forces the hand of the vignerons many times. When I started making Pinot Noir in the Willamette Valley I used a lot of stems in the fermenters, which I have gotten away from since the wines don’t have time to age in the producer cellars as they do in Burgundy. The wines are more approachable earlier to satisfy the US consumers and the 3 tier system.”
How involved are you in the vineyard, or is your primary focus as ‘chef de cave?’ For example, Torii Mor employs a double guyot training system and organic farming methods.
“My first love was the vineyard, so I do manage the estate vineyard at Torii Mor, but most of my time is in the cellar even though I enjoy visiting often the vineyards we buy fruit from. Our estate Olson Vineyard is LIVE certified, so is the winery which allowed us to use the Oregon Certified Sustainable logo on our bottlings. As a Burgundy trained winemaker, I need to see and understand the vineyard to be able to make the best wines I know how, picking decisions are made in the vineyard not the lab.”
Do you see a difference in Torii Mor’s wine quality due to organic vineyard practices?
“Oregon vineyards are only less than 50 years old, the soils here are so rich in life and minerals that I don’t think it makes a difference yet, but it will in the future. Right now it is mostly a marketing matter because nobody has abused their vineyards yet, everybody in the business today is in it for the love of wine, the way of life and not just for profit… we are just recently seeing the second generation take over from their parents, still for the love of it. This is what was the biggest eye opener when I came to the US, people changing career just to be in this business, in Burgundy I only knew of one British gentleman who settled in Nuits St Georges to make wine… there may have been others but very few I am sure (everybody else had been in the business for many generations)… here it is almost everybody.”
Burgundy’s climats and lieux dits create an elaborate patchwork of micro-climats that reveal the elegance, refinement and complexity of pinot noir, the most expressive of varietals. Your wines reveal a similar ‘typicity of place.’ Perhaps you can speak to how the Willamette Valley’s terroir influences your wine making?
“You might be surprise but I almost do the same winemaking to all the Pinot Noir, sure I do a few different things to a few because of disease or desiccation or low sugars… but most of the decisions I make are applied across the board. So the difference you taste in the blends come from the terroir, the clones, and the way I put the blends together. Every clone, block, vineyard is vinified separately and kept separate until I work on the blend in June following harvest, so I have a wide pallet of aroma, flavor, oak, tannin levels, acidities to work with…to craft the best blend I think I can do. The 2013 Olson Vineyard wine has 7 lots, and each lot has new, 1&2 year and older oak all this out of only 8 acres of Pinot Noir… and I do the same to the other 9 vineyards I have Pinot Noir from.”
What would you say differentiates Torii Mor from other wines made in the Willamette Valley? Why do people drink your wines?
“I definitely have a Burgundian style, the wines tend to have flavors other than fruit in them, they show complexity with earthy, meaty notes. They have elegance and balance from not pulling too much one way or the other, new oak is always understated, I want the grape and the terroir to show. I tend to harvest earlier than most, retaining a little more acidity, making more refreshing-lively wines. I enjoy Pinot Noir because they are more intellectual, they provoke emotions but you need to be patient and pay attention to them, if you are not completely focused you may miss the show… Our club members enjoy Torii Mor wines because they are different of other Oregon or West coast producers, they probably also enjoy the more delicate Syrahs and cabs out there.”
As a wine maker, what are your greatest challenges at Torii Mor?
“Getting fruit from high end-well managed vineyards. With the sale of many large vineyards by a few large wineries, I am worried that I will be priced out of some vineyards I am buying from today because of short supplies and high demand…”
Anything else you care to share?
” I am often asked if I miss Burgundy and my response is no, I have enjoyed the Willamette Valley, the people, the food, the sights, its diversity… that I have no time to regret anything. And now I can even talk and see my family (my mother in particular) though Facetime, no need to sit 12 hours in a plane to do that…”
One final question: “If wine making in the Willamette Valley has taught me anything,it’s taught me…”
” That life is good and I am enjoying it as much as I need.”
Indeed. For information about the new Woodinville tasting room currently under renovation at 14525 148th Ave NE, Woodinville, WA 98072, contact [email protected].
Santé!
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Thank you:
Monique Bailey, Director of Sales & Marketing – Torii Mor Winery
Jacques Tardy, Winemaker – Torii Mor Winery
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