10 CapitalPress.com
September 9, 2016
Oregon winery features
unique Albariño grapes
By MARGARETT WATERBURY
For the Capital Press
Tad Seestedt, founder of Ran-
som Wine and Spirits, has been
working in the Willamette Valley
wine industry for more than 20
years. Yet until a few years ago, he
didn’t have a vineyard to call his
own.
“When I irst got here,” says
Seestedt, “I was pretty naive.
In upstate New York, I could
buy land for ive or 10 thou-
sand dollars an acre. I thought
it would be the same here.
And then I got slapped with
reality.”
Today, Ransom Wine and
Spirits sits on a 40-acre parcel
between Sheridan and Willa-
mina, just before the foothills
of the Coast Range. Ransom is
the only winery in Oregon that
also operates a full distillery,
where Seestedt and his team
make whiskey, vodka, grappa,
vermouth and two kinds of gin.
The property where Ransom
is currently located was purchased
in 2008. Between 2010 and
2012, Seestedt planted 1.2 acres
of Albariño grapes on the site,
and the irst harvest took place in
2015.
Margarett Waterbury/For the Capital Press
Ransom’s Albariño vines are planted in front of a larger ield of barley,
which is used to make Ransom’s whiskey. A whole-cluster, barrel-fer-
mented, partial skin contact Albariño release is currently in the works.
Although Seestedt has been
making and selling wine under
the Ransom label since 1999,
and making wine professionally
since 1993, the Albariño plant-
ings are Ransom’s irst estate
fruit.
At irst, Seestedt thought
they were the irst plantings of
Albariño in the valley. Not un-
til after the vines were in the
ground did he discover that My-
ron Redford, Willamette Val-
ley wine pioneer and longtime
friend and mentor to Seestedt,
had also planted Albariño
grapes at Amity Vineyard in
2007.
Last year, Ransom and Amity
joined forces to release a 100 per-
cent Albariño wine made from
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grapes from both plantings.
Becoming a grape grow-
er was the next chapter for
Seestedt. “The transition has
been really rewarding. It helps
as a winemaker to be out in the
vineyard. You have a much bet-
ter grasp of what’s happening,”
he explains.
While more plantings might
be in Ransom’s future, Seestedt
isn’t sure when that will hap-
pen. “I don’t want to rush. We’ll
start getting an idea of how this
acre performs, and then go from
there.”
Although Pinot noir and
Chardonnay command the best
prices, as an estate winemaker,
Seestedt is much more inter-
ested in exploring less popular
varietals.
“Wine in modern Oregon
hasn’t even scratched the sur-
face as far as varietals are con-
cerned,” says Seestedt. “It took
the Europeans millennia to ig-
ure out what grew best where
— we’re just getting started.
Really our climate is not very
similar to Germany or France.
We have very low humidity
in the summer. I think our cli-
mate is more like the Iberian
Peninsula.”
When asked what other vari-
etals spark his interest, Seestedt
sticks with Spain. “If I could
get my hands on some Basque
varieties, I’d love to plant those.
They’re hard to ind in this coun-
try, though. I like the idea of be-
ing a suitcase renegade, but a lot
of bad things have happened as
a result of that attitude.”