Dalla Terra Vineyard

Karl & Carole Dinger craft premium wine from only the finest fruit from Washington State and Eastern Oregon. Dalla Terra Vineyard in Wilsonville, the family Estate vineyard, was planted in 1996 and is fondly called the 'Mother Block" The vineyard sits south facing on Parrett Mountain at 425 foot elevation and is underlain by Jory and Laurelwood soils, over volcanic basalt. It is located at the southern terminous of the Chehalem Mountains AVA. Shallow, quick draining soils, combined with a gentle slope provide a unique terroir for clones of Pinot Noir & Dolcetto. Riesling was planted in 2004 bordering the Estate Allée.

Winemaking

After winning numerous amateur competitions, and inspired by a trip to Italy, Karl introduced the first commercial release of his 2004 vintage. This production of four red wines of exceptional quality earned rave reviews from local and regional critics, and was awarded gold and silver medals at the prestigious Northwest Wine Summit. All of the wines are fruit-forward and delightfully drinkable, food friendly yet have the structure to age nicely if you can manage to put some away. The wines are produced in a very limited supply with a total production in the 2004 vintage of less than 300 cases. For the 2005 vintage, Dalla Vina produced just over 1,000 cases including "Amore" named the "Best Dessert Wine" by the 2007 NW wine Summit. In 2006 the production was up to 1,800 cases including the first Estate grown wine from the families original "Mother Block" aptly named La Famiglia. This beautiful wine was harvested on Carole's mother's 90th birthday by three generations of her Italian family who came to celebrate from across the country. The NW Wine Summit has awarded this extremely limited production wine a Gold Medal. The 2007 Vintage is anxiously awaited by fans across the country who appreciate the fine art of hand crafting wine in the traditional manual methods.