Hip

Is it possible for a winery to leave no carbon footprint? Can you be greener than green? It is if your name is Cooper Mountain Vineyards and your motto is “Where less is more.”

At the heart of Cooper Mountain Vineyards is its founder and visionary, Dr. Robert Gross. Dr. Gross, whose background includes psychiatric, homeopathic, and acupuncturist practices, rejected the use of pesticides and other non-organic methods for growing grapes. He adopted this approach back in the early 1990s, and consequently, Cooper Mountain Vineyards became the second certified organic vineyard in Oregon.

But being certified organic was not enough. Dr. Gross also embraced biodynamic practices developed by Austrian Rudolf Steiner in the early 1900s. One Wikipedia definition of biodynamic farming states, “Biodynamic agriculture is a method of organic farming that has its basis in a spiritual world-view, . . . treats farms as unified and individual organisms, emphasizing balancing the holistic development and interrelationship of the soil, plants, animals as a closed, self-nourishing system. Regarded by some proponents as the first modern ecological farming system, biodynamic farming includes organic agriculture’s emphasis on manures and composts and exclusion of the use of artificial chemicals on soil and plants.”

Phew! This WineTrail trekker only knows that the results taste pretty darned good.

Producing 16,000 cases of estate wine per year is no small task. It takes leadership, deep pockets, and a winemaker with extensive experience. Enter French-born and Bordeaux-trained Gilles de Domingo. Gilles (pronounced “Jeel”) worked his way around the world — New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, to name a few stops — on various wine stints before arriving in Oregon. He chose to work at Cooper Mountain Vineyards in large part because of the opportunity to work with a proven team of viticulturists and to make organic wines that truly express the tastes associated with Cooper Mountain’s terroir.

Nestled in the hills of Beaverton, Cooper Mountain Vineyards is just 30 minutes from downtown Portland. The tasting room provides an inviting sanctuary in which to taste Cooper Mountain’s lineup of pinot gris, chardonnay, and pinot noir. However, it is the patio outside, with its refined deck furniture (of which Martha Stewart would even approve), that holds our attention. Uncorking a bottle of Cooper Mountain Vineyards in this setting gets a nod of approval from Mother Nature herself.