Bethel Heights Casteel Pinot Noir 2021
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Robert
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Jeb
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James
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Product Details
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Somm Note
Winemaker Notes
The Casteel Pinot Noir is always intended to be the best expression of the Bethel Height estate in each vintage. Throughout the Willamette Valley, 2021 was generous in terms of yields, ripeness, and quality and health of the fruit.
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2021 Pinot Noir Casteel comes from vines on the western side of the property, planted in 1992, 1996 and 1997. It's expressive and dynamic, offering surprising depth of flavor for its elegant frame. Medium ruby, it has layered scents of pomegranate, rhubarb and red cherry with accents of garrigue, aniseed, mossy bark and tea leaves. The medium-bodied palate is highly concentrated, its deep well of fruit streaked with touches of iron-like mineral character. It has powerful yet finely grained tannins and bursts of mouthwatering acidity that call you in again for another sip on the very long finish. This thrilling Pinot Noir offers just about everything you could want from this grape: alluring perfume, complex layers of spice and earth, harmonious structure and fantastic length.
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Jeb Dunnuck
A more woodsy and layered profile emerges from the 2021 Pinot Noir Casteel, with forest herbs, black cherry liqueur, pine oils, white pepper, and fresh lavender. Medium to full-bodied, with fine tannins and a silky texture, it has a lot of focus, is very well-balanced, and lasts for ages on the palate. Although the entire lineup from Bethel Heights was highly consistent, this takes the slight edge as my favorite.
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Wine Spectator
Capturing the essence of Eola-Amity, this Pinot is deeply structured yet supple and generous, with raspberry and blueberry flavors accented by wet stone, clove and other dusky spices. Finishes with broad-shouldered yet polished tannins.
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James Suckling
Attractive aromas of red plums and raspberries with pine bark, crushed rosemary, dark licorice and moist earth. Medium- to full-bodied, toned and persistent on the palate with firm tannins and bright acidity cutting through. Lively mix of red berries with cocoa and spicy herbs. Long and chocolaty. Drink or hold.
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Wine Enthusiast
This infant shows impressive potential. Its briary red-fruit aromas are shy, but they suggest a refreshing raspberry lime Rickey and dried cherries. Cherries mix with citra hops on the chalky textured palate as muscular tannins and bright acidity hold court.
Other Vintages
2022-
James
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Wine &
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James
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Robert
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Robert
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Spectator
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James
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Enthusiast -
James
Suckling -
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Spectator
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Wine
Enthusiast -
Wine
Spectator
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Wine &
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United by our interest in wine, in 1977 Ted Casteel, Pat Dudley, Terry Casteel, and Marilyn Webb abandoned the academic life and, together with Pat’s sister Barbara Dudley, bought 75 promising-looking acres northwest of Salem, with 14 acres of newly planted cuttings in the ground. We moved to the vineyard in 1978 (except Barbara, who was in California working as a lawyer for farmworkers with the Agricultural Labor Relations Board) and started a new life. In 1979 we cleared and planted 36 more acres. In 1981 we harvested our first crop and started home winemaking in Terry’s basement. In 1984 we produced our first commercial vintage of 3000 cases: Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Chenin Blanc and Gewurztraminer, all Estate Grown.
For the first thirty years Ted was responsible for managing the vineyards and Terry made the wine. Pat and Marilyn shared responsibilities for marketing and business management. Over thirty years we grew our wine production to 10,000 cases, and made common cause with our fellow pioneers to establish the Willamette Valley as the home of New World Pinot Noir.
Meanwhile, five cousins grew up knowing the tidy rows and wild hidden places of Bethel Heights as their backyard playground, science lab and adventure park. Now they have taken their places as co-owners, co-workers, and stewards of this place.
In 2005 Ben Casteel (son of Terry and Marilyn) took over from his father as Winemaker at Bethel Heights. In 2007 Jon Casteel (second son of Terry and Marilyn) launched Casteel Custom Bottling, a mobile bottling company that serves wineries throughout Oregon, including Bethel Heights of course. Mimi Casteel (daughter of Ted and Pat) worked with the family at Bethel Heights until 2017 when she started farming her own vineyard at Hope Well, and launched her Hope Well Wine project. Jessie Casteel grew up among the vines at Bethel Heights, but now lives in Chicago. Jessie brings a creative outlier perspective to the direction of the family business, and serves as our ambassador in Chicago and points east.
Now there is a new generation of cousins – ten so far – who all come home to Bethel Heights for family occasions, to eat the blackberries and taste the grapes and pat the goats and walk through the ravine to Mr. Hatcher’s haunted house. This place is now for them too.
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
Running north to south, adjacent to the Willamette River, the Eola-Amity Hills AVA has shallow and well-drained soils created from ancient lava flows (called Jory), marine sediments, rocks and alluvial deposits. These soils force vine roots to dig deep, producing small grapes with great concentration.
Like in the McMinnville sub-AVA, cold Pacific air streams in via the Van Duzer Corridor and assists the maintenance of higher acidity in its grapes. This great concentration, combined with marked acidity, give the Eola-Amity Hills wines—namely Pinot noir—their distinct character. While the region covers 40,000 acres, no more than 1,400 acres are covered in vine.