Pair This: David Hill Riesling and Turkey Avocado Club

It’s that time of year where I get ready for the holidays and winter months by doing a “spring” cleaning of the house, so the majority of my day was spent scrubbing, dusting and organizing. I spent hours locating winter coats, snow boots and gloves, and putting away flip flops and shorts. When it came time to prepare dinner for my family, I was too exhausted to cook a big meal – I decided we would have a sandwich night.

One of my favorite sandwiches is a simple Turkey Avocado Club. On fresh baked ciabatta rolls, I pile good Boar’s Head deli turkey, Romaine, tomato, red onion, avocado, mayo and Dijon mustard. Simple and delicious – especially with a well-deserved glass of Riesling. I love drier-style Rieslings with turkey, and the 2011 David Hill Estate Riesling was an excellent pairing with the sandwich.

David Hill 2011 Estate Riesling: Almost clear in the glass, fantastic honeycrisp apple and pineapple aromas and flavors offer a really well balanced and nicely structured wine. Pleasing minerality with a clean, bright, zesty finish, Oregon’s fruit shines through in this wine. I really enjoyed it.

David Hill Winery is home to Willamette Valley’s oldest Pinot Noir vines, and boasts an interesting history:

“The house that holds our tasting room was built in 1883 by the Reuter family. Adolph Reuter was born in Germany in January of 1841. The Reuter’s produced award winning wines from grapes grown on the property. Photographs dated 1904 on display at the winery depict the residence surrounded by apparently thriving grape vines. Unfortunately, Prohibition had a devastating effect and eventually all or most of the vines were pulled out in favor of potato plantings. In 1965 Charles Coury, along with a few other wine pioneers, came north from California to establish vineyards in the Willamette Valley where they believed they could successfully grow Pinot Noir. Many of the vines still exist. There are approximately 6 acres of old vine Pinot Noir and 2 acres of Riesling. There is also Gewürztraminer, Pinot Blanc, Semillon and Sylvaner that were planted at that time as well.” 

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