Sokol Blosser Winery Willamette Valley Pinot Noir - 3 Pack
$54.99 + $5 shipping
CONDITION: Red
PRODUCT: 3 Delinea 300 2009 Pinot Noir, Willamette Valley Oregon
CT link above

Winery website

Twitter
Facebook
Yelp

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=1162349

Doesn't look too encouraging ...

I purchased the Dundee Hills Sokol Blosser just a few weeks ago, but haven't cracked into it yet. I know it got great marks though. Has anyone been able to taste this bottling?

This appears to be the winery's 2nd label, and -- according to this site -- was created for the export market (I don't know what that means for us):

http://www.eatmagazine.ca/sokol-blosser-delinea-300-pinot-noir-2008/

aafflyer wrote:https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=1162349

Doesn't look too encouraging ...

Holy cow! those are far and away the worst notes i've ever seen for a wine.woot.

i loves me some PN, but this is an easy pass.

aranio wrote:Holy cow! those are far and away the worst notes i've ever seen for a wine.woot.

i loves me some PN, but this is an easy pass.

Well 2 of the 5 bottles were rated poorly and three were ok. The bad ratings did not provide much info, so it's hard to weight them heavily. I love Dundee Hills PN but apparently this wine is from other parts of the Valley.

Wish we had labrats on this.

I don't even prefer pinot noir, but 3 of 4 of the Dundee Hills were delicious (the fourth was given away as a gift).

The bad notes are scaring me away! Pass...with prejudice.

aafflyer wrote:https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=1162349

Doesn't look too encouraging ...

How does a bottle go from 65pts to 80pts in 16 days?

stanolshefski wrote:This appears to be the winery's 2nd label, and -- according to this site -- was created for the export market (I don't know what that means for us):

http://www.eatmagazine.ca/sokol-blosser-delinea-300-pinot-noir-2008/

Usually that means it's destined for China

They sell us cheap c rap and in return we sell them c rappy wine (not saying this wine is c rappy as I've not tried it, it may well be terrific, and besides woot typically does a great job getting us good juice )

stanolshefski wrote:This appears to be the winery's 2nd label, and -- according to this site -- was created for the export market (I don't know what that means for us):

http://www.eatmagazine.ca/sokol-blosser-delinea-300-pinot-noir-2008/

from that review: "a bright and fruity, easy-drinking red. Fresh raspberry, cranberry and perfumed bing cherry on the nose and palate, with faint earthy notes and a fairly light and elegant body. Juicy and alluring, if a little ingenuous, this would make a fine accompaniment to salmon or seared tuna, and is a lovely bridge red for people that prefer whites."

Pretty damning review IMO, reading between the lines. These magazines write puff pieces for the foodie industries and some want to keep the free wine coming, so they rarely say anything bad overtly, and this is a neatly-worded dismissal.
For $15 retail, if I need a bottle for friends who are afraid of good wine, maybe. For $30 retail, no chance. Therefore, given the quality we're used to, with woot discount, $10 max. IF, of course, we believe his review, and the cellar tracker ones.

Can the winery please share the pH of this wine?

probably got a corked bottle

aranio wrote:Holy cow! those are far and away the worst notes i've ever seen for a wine.woot.

i loves me some PN, but this is an easy pass.

+1

zaqnewman wrote:How does a bottle go from 65pts to 80pts in 16 days?

two separate bottles

The top stores shown on CT are: Systembolaget and Kungsbacka. Both are retail stores in Sweden which supports the comment these wines were made for the export market. I have no comment on the wine quality.

Sub-$20 pinot, especially <$20 Oregon pinot, is generally undrinkable swill. I go to Willamette for graceful wines, not bargain ones.
That being said, I am a huge fan of Sokol Blosser, and while I have not had this bottle, I would trust them to find elegance - even at this price point.

They've participated on the forums in the past, I'm hoping that they'll chime in again today.

Good morning, everyone! I will see what I can do to help provide a little more information.

I can vouch that chaz257 isn't from the winery because, um...it's 6:30am on the West Coast and I just got up so I can jump into the discussion. Working in my pajamas this morning...

Anyway! Yes, as people noted, we did launch this in our export market recently. Why? Because our flagship wine (featured here last month, the Dundee Hills Pinot Noir) would become ridiculously expensive once sold outside of the US because of taxes and exchange rates. So we began experimenting with developing an entry-level Pinot Noir. It's primarily being sold in Canada, the UK, and as noted a few countries in Scandinavia. The response has been really positive so we're testing a few domestic channels (wine club, Woot!) to see whether we can go live with this at some point soon nationally as lots of wineries are developing these kinds of wines to be able to offer more economical bottle options in their portfolios.

Delinea is Willmette Valley appellated and comes from a mix of our younger vines on the estate with some fruit from the same growers that we source from for the Dundee Hills. As the one magazine piece noted, this is a great bridge red for white lovers, but I would say that about most true-to-varietal Pinot Noir.

I will get pH and any other specs when I make it to the winery later today...

beefytaco wrote:Sub-$20 pinot, especially <$20 Oregon pinot, is generally undrinkable swill. I go to Willamette for graceful wines, not bargain ones.
That being said, I am a huge fan of Sokol Blosser, and while I have not had this bottle, I would trust them to find elegance - even at this price point.

They've participated on the forums in the past, I'm hoping that they'll chime in again today.

Thanks for the nice comment, but I would defend Oregon vintners to say that the times have changed. Lots of wineries are realizing we can't survive an economy like this with $40+ bottles of Pinot alone. We're actually really late to the new wave of Oregon Pinot Noir that is sub-$20 and still really drinkable. Will it be as good as the $40 bottle? No...but that's good otherwise there'd be no point to buy the more quality/more expensive offering.
That said, we're a bunch of wine drinkers here. We're aware of what good QPR is in a wine and wouldn't put this out there if we didn't drink it at home in our off-time.
We did a great blind tasting of sub-$20 Pinots at work before we launched Delinea in these few domestic offerings and we were really impressed that we all felt it was the best of that mix (of very well-known Oregon labels at that price) even though we all tasted it blind.

spdrcr05 wrote:Can the winery please share the pH of this wine?

Is ph really tastable or discernable? Who cares what the ph is as long as the wine is balanced and exhibits traits enjoyed in that sort of wine. I'm not picking on you but someone chimes in on each offering wanting specs. I've drank wine for over 35 years and while the winemakers watch all the chemistry and it's fun to be a geek, I never have used ph, alcohol, RS or any other spec as a defining point to buy or not to buy a wine. I've had very acidic wines that were enjoyable and low acid wines that were, too. The craft of the wine maker is to make a wine that tastes good, not to have a ph of 3 point something.

subinsignia wrote:Is ph really tastable or discernable?

Yes, to some extent. A pH 3.3 wine is 4 times more acidic than a pH 3.9 wine. Wines can be mouthwatering because of your mouth buffering the acidity. Low pH tends to be more juicy and mouthwatering. Plus low pH is better for aging wines.

I have enjoyed wines with sub-3 pH and wines approaching a pH of 4. But they have different flavor profiles and sensations. TA may actually be more important in terms of flavor profile. But pH gives indication of flavor profile. Whether it is good wine at that acidity level comes down to producer.

Since I'm not tasting the wine first, I would like to have some sense of style to decide about pairing it with food.

If I were to compare and contrast the Delinea 300 with the Dundee Hills I would say that the principal difference is in the complexity. The Delinea 300 is a straight forward expression of Jory soils and Missula Flood Soils that converge (or Delineate from one and other) on our property at 300 feet elevation. It sees little wood aging and combines the fruit forward nature of the lower elevation Flood soil with hints of the minerality that is expressed in the volcanic Jory. The Dundee Hills Pinot Noir on the other hand is farmed in all Jory soil and sees 16 months in 45% new French oak. Pinot Noir is not usually the "new wine drinkers" varietal but we think that Delinea 300 could be the gateway.

Igannon wrote:I purchased the Dundee Hills Sokol Blosser just a few weeks ago, but haven't cracked into it yet. I know it got great marks though. Has anyone been able to taste this bottling?

subinsignia wrote:...I never have used ph, alcohol, RS or any other spec as a defining point to buy or not to buy a wine.

Not to pick on you, but these specs do impact the characteristics of the wine and provide a good indication of what one might expect. As an example, many here would never purchase a "parker like" high brix/high alchohol wine. Ignore these things if you want, but if you were to pay attention to them I suspect you would be surprised to start noticing certain wine characterstics that appeal to you and correlate with some of these stats.

No worries, friends! We are also into the specifics here (it's our job!) and we're happy to provide extra stats for those who are interested.

While this wine is essentially 100% Dundee Hills fruit, we opted to call it Willamette Valley, so there can’t be any confusion with our Dundee Hills PN (featured about a month ago here). It is actually 100% estate fruit and 100% made with organic grapes (our entire estate is certified organic by the Oregon Dept. of Agriculture).

As far as blocks within our estate, it’s roughly 50% Concert Middle, 30% Concert South, 13% Walnut, 5% Stater, and 2% dribs and drabs of a few other blocks. Average brix at harvest was 23.6. 3% new barrels. Our winemaker isn't in yet; when he's in we'll get stats on pH and anything else folks are interested in knowing.

Now, after all of that - there is something to be said for throwing stats to the wind and sitting down to enjoy a wine just 'cuz. Delinea 300 is a quality, every-night-of-the-week, varietal true Pinot noir that our staff drinks at home because we genuinely enjoy it. We hope you enjoy it too.

Did you forget to have Wyoming on this list of states that can get wine? Or is there a reason we're not longer included?

So far this is actually looking interesting enough that I'd like to try it, but it's kind of expensive for just "let's see what we've got here".

donsiler wrote:Did you forget to have Wyoming on this list of states that can get wine? Or is there a reason we're not longer included?

Yes, that is a total bummer. Our direct shipping license with the state of Wyoming says that we are limited to selling 90L of wine (=10 cases) per calendar year into the state. We reached our limit earlier this fall, but will be able to open things up for sales to Wyoming in January.

Our goal is to always be in compliance with state laws, no matter how much we balk at them or think that they limit consumer choice. We encourage you to write to your state lawmakers and visit www.freethegrapes.org to learn more. Until January, our friend...

No Virginia and I would have ordered this for Christmas dinner. Also, did the lab rats take a hike???

dianefreda wrote:No Virginia and I would have ordered this for Christmas dinner. Also, did the lab rats take a hike???

No Virginia... there is no Santa Claus.

subinsignia wrote:Is ph really tastable or discernable? Who cares what the ph is as long as the wine is balanced and exhibits traits enjoyed in that sort of wine. I'm not picking on you but someone chimes in on each offering wanting specs. I've drank wine for over 35 years and while the winemakers watch all the chemistry and it's fun to be a geek, I never have used ph, alcohol, RS or any other spec as a defining point to buy or not to buy a wine. I've had very acidic wines that were enjoyable and low acid wines that were, too. The craft of the wine maker is to make a wine that tastes good, not to have a ph of 3 point something.

I prefer aged wine and the bulk of my purchases sit for a minimum of a year and the age worthy ones longer (sometimes MUCH longer). When some one says "old world style" the are implying a lower alcohol, higher (lower pH) acid, more tannic wine that has the structure to age and still be drinkable years down the road.

I'm not knocking wines that don't fit that profile ... but I save most of my "drink now" purchases for when I eat out

dianefreda wrote:No Virginia and I would have ordered this for Christmas dinner. Also, did the lab rats take a hike???

Haven't seen a rat in months!

imcooliswear wrote:Haven't seen a rat in months!

I've smelled a couple here and there.

ind you, in this case I'd be willing to hold actual judgement until we've finished talking to the (very friendly) winemaker. low-ish Brix at harvest, and the possibility that CT users wre expecting heft Central coast PN rather than tighter oregon cooler-weather stuff means we'll have to see what more we can learn about it.

ind you, in this case I'd be willing to hold actual judgement until we've finished talking to the (very friendly) winemaker.[/quote]

Really? Last one i saw was on oct 1st.

Read all the comments - ordered this because of the reputation of Sokol Blosser. Very familiar with Wilamette Valley wines as my wife's family lives in the area and I have visited many of the wineries and sampled many of the wines. My thoughts, based on now having tried a bottle: 1) this offer was very deceptive because it did not make clear that this was not the wine this winery is known for but a second label Pinot made for export. 2) the wine is really unimpressive, even at this price. It strikes me as a "dumbed down" Pinot without complexity. I don't want a red wine for people who only like white, as the winery describes it. There are also many other value priced Pinots out there that are far superior - A to Z being a great example. Even at the Woot price I found this wine to be very disappointing - certainly drinkable but I am looking for more than that.

gsteuer wrote:Read all the comments - ordered this because of the reputation of Sokol Blosser. Very familiar with Wilamette Valley wines as my wife's family lives in the area and I have visited many of the wineries and sampled many of the wines. My thoughts, based on now having tried a bottle: 1) this offer was very deceptive because it did not make clear that this was not the wine this winery is known for but a second label Pinot made for export. 2) the wine is really unimpressive, even at this price. It strikes me as a "dumbed down" Pinot without complexity. I don't want a red wine for people who only like white, as the winery describes it. There are also many other value priced Pinots out there that are far superior - A to Z being a great example. Even at the Woot price I found this wine to be very disappointing - certainly drinkable but I am looking for more than that.

I bought this Sokol Blosser Winery Willamette Valley Pinot Noir - 3 Pack. I brought to my brother-in-laws house. My brother-in-law is an avid red wine drinker and my sister prefers white wine. They both loved this. Thanks!

this was my first purchase on wine woot--was so excited about seeing PN from Oregon on that it was a no brainer for me...unfortunately it was a great first purchase. very bland and fruity--just down right flat. Even made sure I tried it with a good curry and still nothing...busted it out on Christmas eve as well--no rave reviews around the tree...sorry Delinea...should have read the other reviews...