Walter Scott

In the decade since their first bottling, this husband and wife team has created a reputation for producing some of Oregon’s most exciting wines. They are hard to come by, produced in tiny quantities, and beloved by critics. We would go so far as to say these are some of the most immediately impressive Chardonnays we’ve come across from the new world and so we were delighted when they offered us a direct allocation, putting these on British soils for the very first time.

With decades of experience in the Oregon wine scene, including a stint at Evening Land working alongside Dominque Lafon, the Pahlows started their own project in 2008 armed with their life savings and a with a bulging address book of local contacts. Hard working, down to earth and passionate advocates of site and place, it wasn’t long before they’d carved out an enviable roster of top vineyards from which to source fruit. Today, with the reputation they’ve built, they are one of the very few who can buy fruit from the iconic Seven Springs vineyard. Other local land owners are only too happy to have the likes Justice, Temperance Hill or X-Novo appear on a Walter Scott label.

In a region dominated by Pinot Noir, the focus here is split evenly between Pinot and Chardonnay and it is with the latter that Ken and Erica are most pushing the boundaries of what people thought Oregon could produce. Cote d’Or inspired, taut, mineral and focussed Chardonnays are the order of the day at Walter Scott. Harvest dates tend to err on the slightly earlier side and once in the winery intervention is minimal. Reds can include up to 30% whole bunch, depending on the vintage. In general new oak usage is low and relies on 300-500L barrels. The Chardonnays are put to barrel with the majority of their lees and spend a full year in wood, with very minimal battonage and careful topping up, before spending 4 months in steel to firm up before bottling. The wines that emerge are illuminating examples of Chardonnay, bright fruit overlaid with complex smoky mineral aromas. They are hugely impressive. The Pinot’s cut no less of a dash, Neal Martin describing them as “killer Pinot Noir with purity, intensity and personality” going on to say that they are “the kind of wines that I would take home to drink following a hard day's tasting.”

The Chardonnay and Pinot Noir La Combe Verte bottlings (651 and 1526 cases produced respectively) pay homage to Patricia Green, at whose cellars Ken was working when he set up Walter Scott. They are produced with exactly the same care and attention as their single vineyard bottlings, following the adage that a great domaine is marked out by quality of its entry level wines. Simply put they speak to all that is good about the Willamette Valley and the Walter Scott ethos. For those looking further up the scale, the Cuvee Ruth Pinot Noir (336 cases produced) is a special barrel selection from three top sites, Soujourner, Seven Springs and Temperance hill. This Eola-Amity Hills cuvee represents much of the mineral presence and intensity these sites are famed for, with the polish and overall elegance that one can achieve from blending sites.

2017 Vintage

When visiting in early 2018 we tasted the 2016s in bottle and some very promising 2017s in barrel. This is a vintage beloved by many of Oregon’s winemakers, certainly the sort who make the wines we like to drink. It marks the return to a more classically styled Willamette Valley growing season, ending with a September that was marked by cool days and cold nights. At Walter Scott the ensuing 2017s represent much that is great about Oregon Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, with lithe structures and bright profiles that offer a magical window into the diversity of Willamette Valley’s varied vineyard sites.

2018 Vintage

The growing season was a pretty classic Willamette valley vintage, though very dry through the summer and with the occasional heat spike. September was cool, allowing for a measured ripening curve as harvest approached. The wines have freshness yet drive and a multi-layered character with delicate planes of flavour and nuance that take a little time to unwind. The iconic Seven Springs vineyard, Walter Scott being one of the very few wineries to be granted access to its fruit, has produced an extremely elegant, translucent Pinot Noir, all flowers and red fruits, and a Chardonnay of wonderful tension and poise that shows off flinty, roasted nut and lemon oil flavours in a very pure and refined package. X-Novo Chardonnay, planted to a dizzyingly diverse clonal selection is extremely complex, athletic and multi-layered, with a finish that goes on and on, while Sojourner Pinot Noir, from a cool, high site, is a wine of volcanic stones, tea, black plums and complex spice that shows off a combination of depth and drive that is highly alluring.

2019 Vintage

Oregon’s Willamette Valley experienced a cool and rather classical season in 2019, poles apart from the spate of recent warmer years. The summer never really got into gear; fog, mist and the threat of mildew prevailed, and come harvest it was as case of dodging the rains and working around the downpours. Key to the success of the vintage, and it is some success here, was this team’s newfound practice of limiting yields right at the start of the season: bad news for allocations but good news for quality.

Amazingly, many of the analyses look remarkably similar in 2019 to the much hotter 2018 – despite harvest dates diverging by as much as three weeks. The long season and (relatively) delayed harvest of the most recent vintage allowed for excellent flavour development in the grapes with very little loss of acidity or increase in sugar. The wines have wonderfully vivid fruit profiles with crystalline acidities and tons of great minerality. The whites pit a generally reductive style of wine making with real fruit intensity – a more finely integrated display of winemaking prowess than ever before – while the reds are beautifully balanced and moreish with exceptional site definition and great clarity of expression.

2020 Vintage

When the 2020 vintage came around, a fabulous vintage was on the cards until devastating wildfires hit the region. Much of what they’d grown had to be sold off in bulk for fear of smoke taint. What remained was of such scant quantities that single vineyard releases were, for the most part, simply not viable.

Enter Bois Moi - an aptly named, one-off composite bottling composed of 6 top vineyard sites including the highly sought-after trio of X-Novo, Seven Springs and Freedom Hill. Released at the same price as the Combe Verte bottlings this is a sensationally good value Oregon Chardonnay offering up notes of flinty volcanic minerality, fine citrus fruit, and a good deal of depth and mouthfeel. It invigorates the palate but also screams “Drink me”. With a lofty 94/100 from robertparker.com, this is a highly rated, delicious American white guaranteed to appeal to European palates.

2021 Vintage

2021 is a classic vintage at Walter Scott, where husband and wife team Ken and Erica continue to turn the dial in their efforts to produce great Oregon Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. “With the exception of the heat dome that hit right around flowering time, this was a vintage that was dry and warm and relatively straightforward” Ken explained. “We started picking on August 21st and continued for 5 weeks. September was stress free, we could harvest at our leisure, plus there was no wine from the 2020s, so you had all the time you wanted AND all the space you needed in winery. Some cuvees were barrelled down before others were picked”.

The wines, as a result, have a measure of precision we’ve perhaps not seen before, with crunchy ripe fruit, fresh acids and plenty of succulence. They bear none of the hallmarks of a warm vintage, and all of the nuance and drive we’ve come to expect from this excellent outfit.

Tweaks in the winery saw all whites being crushed prior to pressing, no sulphur in the press pans, and more solids than ever before taken to tank to enhance the texture and grip of the Chardonnays.

The reds are bittersweet, perfumed and high definition, largely red fruited, with complex mineral undertones and plenty of torque and detail.