2004 Soter Little Creek Red

Soter Vineyards was started by Tony and Michelle Soter in the late 1990s. For both of them it was a return home. Tony and Michelle were raised in Portland, but the couple spent 20 years in Napa Valley where Tony Soter was a much-admired winemaking consultant for such producers as Araujo, Dalle Valle, Shafter and Viader. He started his own Etude Wines label in 1982 and sold it to Beringer Blass in 2000 to concentrate on his Oregon venture. Soter Vineyards is located at Mineral Spring Ranch in the Yamhill-Carlton appellation. It includes 30 acres of Pinot Noir and two acres of Chardonnay. Wine Advocate wrote that “Tony Soter has been making wine in his native state for long enough now that this iconic figure of California wine history can be said to have achieved a similar status in Oregon.”

Napa Valley AVA is the most famous winemaking region in the United States and one of the most prestigious in the world. With nearly 43,000 acres of vineyards and more than 300 wineries, it is the heart of fine wine production in the United States. Winemaking started in Napa in 1838 when George C. Yount planted grapes and began producing wine commercially. Other winemaking pioneers followed in the late 19th century, including the founders of Charles Krug, Schramsberg, Inglenook and Beaulieu Vineyards. An infestation of phylloxera, an insect that attacks vine roots, and the onset of Prohibition nearly wiped out the nascent Napa wine industry in the early 20th century. But by the late 1950s and early 1960s Robert Mondavi and other visionaries were producing quality wines easily distinguishable from the mass-produced jug wines made in California’s Central Valley. Napa Valley’s AVA was established in 1983, and today there are 16 sub-appellations within the Napa Valley AVA. Many grapes grow well in Napa’s Mediterranean climate, but the region is best known for Cabernet Sauvignon. Chardonnay is also very successfully cultivated, and about 30% of the AVA’s acreage is planted to white grapes, with the majority of those grapes being Chardonnay,