My Latest in Oregon Wine Press:
Perle of the Willamette Valley
Comparing Oregon’s Dundee Hills to Burgundy’s Vosne-Romanée
by L.M. Archer
Russell and Delphine Gladhart of Winter’s Hill Estate. Photo by Andrea Johnson. 
Veronique Boss-Drouhin of Domaine Drouhin Oregon. Photo by Andrea Johnson.
For Pinot lovers, Burgundy rides high, a lodestar around which all other wine regions orbit. Within that constellation, Vosne-Romanée shines among the brightest. Deemed the “central pearl in Bourgogne’s necklace” by 19th century French wine author Gaston Roupnel, the village of Vosne-Romanée glints with some of Burgundy’s most celebrated Grand Crus, including Romanée-Conti, La Tâche and Richebourg.
Since the influx of Burgundian vignerons to Oregon, starting with Domaine Drouhin in the late 1980s, comparisons between these two wine regions occur with increasing regularity. And while such correlations exasperate some, most agree that Oregon, like Burgundy, contains certain sites where terroir gleams greatest. To many, the Dundee Hills AVA (American Viticultural Area) earns its place as Oregon’s own “pearl of the Willamette Valley.”
Terroir
“It is always difficult for me to compare our vineyards in Oregon and Burgundy because I spend so much time thinking about what makes them different and how to reveal those differences,” says Véronique Drouhin-Boss of Domaine Drouhin. “I wouldn’t say there is a stylistic connection between the Dundee Hills and Vosne-Romanée, but they are both prestigious in their own way.”
Dundee Hills, like Vosne-Romanée, includes its own iconic producers, such as Domaine Drouhin, Domaine Serene and Maison Louis Jadot. Hailed as the first region to establish vines in the Willamette Valley, the Dundee Hills lie south of the Chehalem Mountains and Ribbon Ridge, east of Yamhill-Carlton and north of Eola-Amity Hills. Unlike limestone-rich Vosne-Romanée, Dundee Hills features primarily basaltic reddish soils. Rising between 200 to 1,067 feet above sea level, more than 100 vineyards shoulder one another across nearly 2,200 acres of vines. READ FULL ARTICLE HERE.
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