"At the beginning of September 2020, the vintage looked to be an almost perfect growing season with very small open clusters and a lot of excitement about the quality of the upcoming harvest.  Then, the fires began in the Santiam Canyon west of Salem on 9/5/20. They were unusual in intensity, size, and devastation. Located 20-35 miles from our vineyard sites, the actual fires were not close to vineyards, like in Sonoma and Australia. However, a significant amount of smoke blew east from the Santiam Canyon into the Willamette Valley, especially for the first 4-5 days. Then, the winds resumed their normal pattern of blowing off the Pacific Ocean from the west. This largely cleared the Valley of smoke by the 10th.

 

At that time, there was little research about how to test for smoke taint, and only general advice on treatment if you knew you had a smoke problem in the wine. The problem was: did we? We did know that treatments for smoke taint essentially stripped the wine of most of its character. Because only a shadow of the original wine was left, treated wines would be declassified with a price reduction.

 

As we did not detect smoke in the grapes or the fermenters, I picked the grapes, made the wines, and observed for signs of smoke taint. We found none, even after a year in barrel, so after 17 months of aging, we decided to bottle the wines as vineyard designates." -Mark Vlossak, Winemaker

 

The St. Innocent Pinot Noir Freedom Hill Vineyard 2020 is a rich wine and pairs nicely with hearty pasta dishes or steak.