McMinnville, Oregon may be just a stop along your way to the Coast or that town you never quite make it to because you’ve stopped at too many wineries on your way down from Portland.  But to us, McMinnville is a destination we have made our home.  This quirky little town has a lot to offer, providing enough to make it a destination for your next outing.  Here are five things to do in McMinnville, besides visiting Panther Creek Cellars.

1. Visit the Evergreen Aviation and Space Museum. In addition to the spectaculr Spruce Goose and many other flying apparatuses, they also have a great IMAX theater.  And soon its going to get a whole lot better once their new water park is finished where you’ll be able to slide into the water down a Boeing 747.

2. Shop along our lovely Downtown 3rd Street. This little street has come a long way since the time when the old JCPenny used to be the only option for women’s wear and gifts.  Now you can find fun, original stores such as Cupcake Couture, Mes Amies, Bella Casa, Red Berry and more.

3. Dine at one of our locally and worldly inspired restaurants. Nick’s Italian Cafe, Thistle, Bistro Maison, La Rambla, Kame, and Golden Valley Brew Pub are all great choices for top notch cuisine and ambiance.  And if you’re looking for something a little bit more low key, you can alway go down to Alf’s where you can have a burger and homemade ice cream all while hanging out with our town’s favorite monkey, Elvis, who is named so for his long sideburns.  A great breakfast can also ensure you have the stamina to make the day last.  Visit Wildwood Cafe or Crescent Cafe.

4. Take a break from Pinot and drink some beer. Besides raising their own beef for their restaurant, Golden Valley Brew Pub makes a great array of delicious beers.  Heater Allen is a small artisan brewing company that specializes in producing distinctive all-malt lager and other German and Czech style beers.  They are usually around the brewery Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays most weeks and can meet with you per your request.  And when the sun starts sinking West, head to McMenamins and climb up to their Rooftop Bar where you can catch a great view and enjoy their famous ales.

5. Sip some of our wonderful neighbors wines. Lastly on our list, but most importantly, we are honored to be making wine alongside some great winemakers. Places like Eyrie, R. Stuart and Co., Dominio IV/Lumos, Walnut City Wineworks, Twelve, The Willamette Valley Vineyards Wine Center, and many other great producers can all be enjoyed right here in town while others such as Maysara, Coleman Vineyards, Youngberg Hill, and more make great getaways into the countryside.  For a full list of wineries in the McMinnville vicinity visit the McMinnville Downtown Association’s webpage.  

McMinnville is a great destination and if you decide you’d like to stay the night, there is always room at local B&Bs as well as the quirky Hotel Oregon.  So if you’ve never been to McMinnville, or you’ve never given yourself the time to enjoy it, we invite you to come start here, and stay here.  Just don’t stay too long, we like keeping McMinnville quaint.

Last case of 2008 Pinot Gris

This week at the winery, we’re racking the barrels to get ready for bottling and preparing the barrels for the 2010 harvest.  Meanwhile some of our inventory is getting pretty low.  We are down to one lonely case of 2008 Pinot Gris which will no doubt be gone by the end of the day.  We have 6 cases left of our 2008 Elton Vineyard Chardonnay, and only 4 cases left of our 2007 Winemakers Cuvee.  You better speak up if you want the last of our inventory of these great wines.

Don’t worry if you miss out though.  Soon we will release our 2009 Pinot Gris, 2009 Chardonnay and 2008 Winemakers Cuvee.  It’s out with the old and in with the new!

Harvest time is coming soon!  That means we need to bottle up what we’ve got in our barrels in order to make room for the new, incoming wine.  The wine currently in barrel is ready for bottling, it’s just a matter of deciding which wine goes in which bottle.

Michael and Bill have painstakingly been going through each barrel to determine their game plan.  To help in their decision making, they climb around all the barrels to collect samples in order to compose blends from different barrels and compare them against each other.  Even among barrels that all come from the same vineyard, the contents of each barrel are unique since they are comprised of wine from grapes from different blocks within the specific vineyards.  Sometimes different blocks within a vineyard are planted with different clones of pinot noir which affects the character of the wine.  The barrels themselves also contribute to the variances from barrel to barrel since the particular oak and age of each barrel differ from one another.

Bill Hanson takes barrel samples from several different barrels to compose different blends of Pinot Noir from Freedom Hill Vineyard

The wine from some barrels will go into our single vineyard bottlings and some will go into our Winemaker’s Cuvee.  When you’re bringing in grapes from so many vineyards like we do here at Panther Creek Cellars, it takes a lot of thought in how to best organize it all.  They have to make some tough decisions but when it comes down to it, all of the wine is tasting pretty darn good and no matter which bottle it ends up in, all the wine will be worthy of the Panther Creek label.

We’ve cut back prices on our delicious Pinot Noirs. Visit our winery or click on the image above to visit our website to take advantage of our Summer sale.  If browsing our website, remember that wines are discounted in your cart at checkout.

We had a great time at IPNC 2010 Thanks everyone for all the hard work! What a wonderful celebration of an amazing grape, the amazing places it comes from, and the amazing people who make it! (And drink it too!)

Assistant winemaker, Bill Hanson, chats with guest at the IPNC Grand Dinner Pinot and Pork during IPNC Grand DinnerSalmon BakeGuest dine and sip in the Oak Grove for the Salmon Bake

Pinot and Pork during IPNC Grand Dinner

Salmon Bake

Guest dine and sip in the Oak Grove for the Salmon Bake

We’re all familiar with the Shea name. Some of you have been drinking Panther Creek wine from this vineyard for years.  We’ve come to love and have high expectations for the magic bottles that carry this name.  Always recognizable, always distinct, Pinot Noir from Shea Vineyard gets to the heart of the unique and authentic quality of Oregon Pinot Noir.

Here’s a quick look at where these grapes come from before they arrive at Panther Creek’s crushpad.

Shea Vineyard was first planted to wine grapes in the late 1980s by Dick and Deirdre Shea and sits on sedimentary soil over fractured sandstone. Vine spacing is 5×7 yielding 1,245 plants per acre.   The vineyard is planted with Pommard, Wäidenswil, Dijon 114, 115, 777 clones and sits right in the Yamhill Carlton American Viticultural Area.  Grapes from Shea Vineyard are used to make some of Oregon’s best wines and we are honored to have a longstanding tradition of carrying the Shea name alongside our label.  If you are not familiar with wine from Shea Vineyard its time to get acquainted.

Dick Shea, Liz Chambers, Bill Hanson meet up for lunch in downtown McMinnville.

Here is a message from the people at Shea Vineyard on their approach to to farming:

“Our approach to growing wine grapes that express their terroir and our approach to being responsible stewards of the land are rooted in science. We use the results of scientific analysis as our guiding light. We have not concluded that all synthetic materials are by definition harmful. In this outlook we are joined by the USDA and sustainable farming organizations such as LIVE and Salmon Safe. This is in contrast to some well publicized approaches to growing that seem to us to be rooted in romanticism and nostalgia for farming in an earlier era.

We are pleased that we have recently been recognized for our efforts. Recently the US Department of Agriculture created the Conservation Security Program to recognize and support outstanding stewardship of agricultural lands. CSP identifies those “farmers and ranchers who are meeting the highest standards of conservation and environmental management”. In our Yamhill River basin over 500 farms pursued the program. 104 were accepted based on past and current practices. 32 of those were recognized as having practices at the highest level of stewardship. Shea Vineyard was one of the 32.”

Check out this furniture made by Joe! They are constructed from retired French oak wine barrels. The oak is seasoned for 30 months, made into a barrel and shipped to Oregon where it is used for 3-7 years to make Pinot Noir. On the back of the chairs you will find the year it was first put into wine making production and the coopers name.

The deep tones you see are those imparted by the pigment from the wine all other markings on the wood come from the hoops and daily life of the barrel around the winery.  Come by the winery to see these beautiful pieces in person! You can also visit http://www.barrelfurniturebyjoe.com for more info!

Join us on Twitter, Thursday, July 15th for a Twitter showdown. This online event is a celebration of the world’s most expressive yet persnickety wine grape combined with a COMPETITION between YOUR FAVORITE Pinot-producing regions!  If you’re not already using Twitter, sign up and tweet with us.  Use and follow #PinotNoir to join the fun and don’t forget to help promote your favorite Pinot Noir region, #WV – Willamette Valley, Oregon! For more information about this Twitter event visit http://pinotnoir.eventbrite.com/

Oprah Winfrey’s new television network (OWN), is seeking shows in various categories to air when the network goes live.  We’re very excited that one of the members of Oregon’s wine community is in the running in the cooking show category, and we need your support to help it get selected by the producers!

Northwest Bounty is Andrew Turner’s television project, and it’s a wine and food paring show focusing on Northwest wines and the products of our region.  Every episode showcases a different winery, followed by a trip to a local farmer’s market where Andrew gathers ingredients to create a dish around a featured wine. He then heads to the kitchen to cook the dish, where he explains why and how the flavors will show the wine in the best light. It’s truly a unique show that shines a spotlight on the beautiful region that we all call home. You can help make this vision a reality by clicking the link below and casting your vote for Northwest Bounty!

http://myown.oprah.com/audition/index.html?request=video_details&response_id=10656&promo_id=1

Good luck Andrew!