Lisa Neal, owner of Couer de Terre Vineyard in McMinnville, OR, gives her perspective on the 2010 Portland Indie Wine & Food Festival on her blog, Yamhill County Chic.  This is the fifth year Cour de Terre Vineyard has been invited to pour at Indie.  See Lisa’s blog post here.

On Monday, twelve wine professionals descended on downtown Portland.  Their mission: to taste through nearly 170 wines submitted by Oregon’s craft producers all vying for one of the 40 spaces available in the 2010 Portland Indie Wine & Food Festival.

Judges arrived to the Hotel Vintage Plaza at 9 a.m., but the day started at 7:30 a.m. for our incredible group of volunteers, all of whom brought professionalism and industry expertise to the team.  Volunteers were assigned a group of judges – three panels total – and they uncorked, poured, set flights and cleared like there was no tomorrow.  A true team effort!

We organized each judging panel to include one winemaker, writer, chef, sommelier or retailer and moderator to ensure a dynamic conversation about the wines.  We were also excited to host Herb Quady, of Quady North Winery, who came from Southern Oregon to audit judging, something we do every year for transparency.

Judges, see a complete list below, started the day tasting through none other than Oregon’s signature varietal, Pinot noir.  By 12:30 p.m., teeth were sufficiently red and lunch beckoned. Executive chef  John Eisenhart of Pazzo Ristorante prepared a palate cleansing pasta and fish lineup served in the Hotel Vintage Plaza’s Wine Room (sans the wine, of course), and at 1:30 p.m. volunteers and judges were back at it.  Zinfandel, Syrah, Pinot Gris, Rosé, Riesling, Chardonnay – it was quite the line up, but by 3:30 p.m. the three panels of judges successfully completed their task.

The Portland Indie Wine & Food Festival is the signature event of the Indie Wine Foundation, a non-profit devoted to supporting craft winemaking in Oregon.  As apart of the Indie Wine Foundation’s educational programing, we transcribe all the judges notes for each wine, and send them to the respective wineries (Anonymously!).  This professional feedback and critique offers wineries subjective tasting notes from some of the industries leading voices such as Alice Feiring, author and journalist, and Bernard Sun of Jean-Georges Management, LLC.

The forty wineries selected to pour at the 6th annual Portland Indie Wine & Food Festival will be announced April 2.  Please stay tuned.  From what we heard from the judges, it looks like 2010 will be yet another competitive year, with beautiful wines.

We are a completely volunteer run organization led by Lisa Donoughe of Watershed Communications and Catherine Healy of Flint Design Co.  It takes a village, and we couldn’t do this without the passionate people who volunteer their time.

Thank you volunteers and judges!

2010 Judges:

Michael Davies, winemaker, A to Z Wineworks

Alice Feiring, journalist and author

John Grochau, winemaker, GC Wines

Tim Kennedy, winemaker/president, Don Carlo Vineyard

Toni Ketrenos, wine buyer, New Seasons Market

Ted Loos, freelance wine writer, Town & Country and Sherman’s Travel

Claud Mann, chef of TBS’ Dinner & A Movie

Naomi Pomeroy, chef/owner, Beast

Jason Smith, director of wine, Bellagio, Las Vegas

Bernard “Bernie” Sun, corporate beverage director, Jean-Georges Management

Cathy Whims, chef/owner, Nostrana

Summer Wolff, wine broker, Sokolin, America’s Premier Fine Wine Merchant

San Francisco based freelance writer Laura Fraser looked to Watershed for culinary and wine country recommendations when assigned a story on Portland for Frontier Airline’s Wild Blue Yonder magazine. Watershed worked with Laura to craft a story on Portland’s spectacular restaurant scene and Oregon’s beautiful wine country.

Laura uncovers the gems of Portland and Oregon’s wine country in her feature story “Portland in its Prime,” published in the September issue of Wild Blue Yonder.

You can also read this story on Wild Blue Yonder’s website – http://www.gowildblueyonder.com/

KGW’s PDXposed visited the 2009 Portland Indie Wine Festival’s Grand Tasting on May 2nd and aired the segment on May 23rd. Check out Host Jon Olson’s interview with PIWF Founder Lisa Donoughe, and if you didn’t make it to the festival this year check out the new venue!

Click here to view the segment!

Check out this fantastic article by Kerry Newberry in the May issue of the Oregon Wine Press titled “What Is Indie, Anyway” featuring the Portland Indie Wine Festival.  This same issue also featured an article on the relaunch and redesign of Hotel Vintage Plaza – Portland’s wine themed hotel.

Less than a week until the 2009 Portland Indie Wine Festival!
This Saturday, May 2nd, 40 of Oregon’s top artisanal wineries and some of Portland’s most celebrated chefs and restaurants will invade the Portland Wine Project for the 5th annual Portland Indie Wine Festival. Get your tickets today at https://www.indiewinefestival.com/tickets/

For more info on the festival and the 2009 participating wineries and restaurants click here.

PIWF/LAD team member Katie Burnett at the Oregon Wine Symposium Indie Wine Festival booth

The Portland Indie Wine Festival made an appearance in the April 2009 issue of Horizon Air Magazine!  This year’s festival includes a Producers Dinner at Ten 01 that should excite those interested in mingling with small Oregon wine producers, while enjoying great food and tasting hard-to-find Oregon Indie wines.

To learn more about the festival, the Producers Dinner and some of the restaurants involved check out the Horizon Air article below and visit www.indiewinefestival.com.

SAVE THE DATE!
May 1-2, 2009

The Portland Indie Wine Festival was listed in the “Future File” in the March/April issue of Northwest Palate.

Click here to learn more about the 2009 Portland Indie Wine Festival!

It’s that time of year again, yes, it’s Indie time!  For those of you who don’t know, Lisa founded the Portland Indie Wine Festival back in 2005, and it’s been LAD’s signature event and passion project ever since.  

We’ve altered the format a bit this year, but trust us, it’s for the better.  One day with all 40 wineries, new location and hours, VIP tickets, gourmet bites from Portland’s best chefs and restaurants, a wallet-friendly wine warehouse sale and a Friday night fundraising dinner for the Indie Wine Foundation, a 501(c)3 non-profit dedicated to preserving and sustaining the art of craft winemaking. 

For more info go to: www.indiewinefestival.com or click here to read our Indie blog where we’ll keep you up to date with what’s going on in the PIWF world.  You can also follow us on twitter and Facebook.

Buy your tickets online here. 

Hope to see you there! Oh yes, and if you’re interested in volunteering this year, email info{at}indiewinefestival.com.