LESLIE MEAD ANSWERS TEN QUESTIONS
TEN QUESTIONS WITH LESLIE MEAD
In just a few weeks Pinot Noir will take center stage
when the World of Pinot Noir (www.wopn.com)
celebrates its Tenth Anniversary. Leslie Mead,
winemaker at Talley Vineyards, is the Chair of WOPN
this year and she answers Ten Questions with Lynn
Diehl.
As a child in a military family and then over the
course of your career, you’ve lived in some great
places –including Honolulu, Sonoma County and
Virginia – how does Arroyo Grande and the
Central Coast stack up against them?
I will have to say that I have led a somewhat nomadic
existence. I have even had family members joke that I
must be in the witness protection program because I
move so often! I feel that I have finally found the place
that I want to settle in for the long haul. The Central
Coast is a beautiful place to live. The weather is impos-
sible to beat!
The Central Coast has world-class wines and world-
class winemakers and vineyard managers. The wine-
making community in this area is incredibly inclusive
and welcoming, and I don’t see the competitiveness I
have found in other regions. An added bonus that the
Central Coast most definitely has over other places that
I have lived is the lack of traffic! I love that!!!
I can’t help myself – I have to ask about your back-
ground in resource management and your job
hooting for spotted owls in the forests around
Mount Hood. Did you have to learn to hoot?
Yes, I did have to learn how to hoot. It was either that
or lug around a very large PA system through the
woods in the middle of the night. It’s funny how many
people, including Brian Talley, try very hard to get me
to hoot for them. Hooting for owls is not really a grow-
ing occupation. I’d say there were maybe 20 people in
the State of Oregon that were actually earning a pay-
check this way. We do have owls in the vineyard, but
they are a different species and so their call is different.
Resource management is a science job and so is
winemaking, but how did you “connect the dots”
to become a winemaker?
My educational background is in aquatic resource man-
agement, which involved lots of chemistry.
Unfortunately, there were not a lot of jobs to be had in
this field upon graduation. Many of the same analyses
used in aquatic chemistry are also used in wine produc-
tion. It was because of this that I applied to be a lab
technician at Ironstone Vineyards in 1999.
You are the Chair of this year’s World of Pinot Noir
(March 5 and 6), what are your duties? Luckily for me,
our Event Coordinator, Felicia Montemayor, does a fan-
tastic job of putting everything together, and gives the
appearance to the outside world that I am doing a great
job chairing the event! My duties mostly involve site
visits and working with Felicia and the Board to come
up with ideas for seminars, and then following through
to secure participants.
What was your first WOPN experience like? Did it
change or expand your winemaking thought
process or approach in any way?
My first experience with WOPN was in attending the
winemaker’s technical symposium, and I was hooked!
Roughly 65 winemakers, enologists, and vineyard
managers sit down to blind taste and critique each
other’s wines for the two days preceding WOPN. It is
both a highly educational and a humbling experience.
It has made me constantly evaluate the way that we
make pinot noir. The collective wisdom regarding
pinot noir production in that room full of winemakers
is unparalled.
How will the event mark the 10th Anniversary?
We always try to make the seminars very distinct and
educational. One completely new seminar that we will
have this year is the 10 year Williams Selyem retrospec-
tive. We have focused on specific vineyards in the past,
but never just one winery. Bob Cabral from Williams
Selyem is very excited about the seminar and will be
pulling corks from some fantastic wines! Williams
Selyem also just received the first 100 point score for
Pinot Noir from Wine Enthusiast for their 2007 Litton
Estate.
The Vintage Burgundy tasting is sold out – what
will those without a ticket be missing?
Unfortunately, I, too, am one of those without a ticket!
We will be missing an opportunity to be with sever-
al Master Sommeliers in a very intimate setting tast-
ing rare vintage burgundy. The wines are hand
selected by Fred Dame, MS and will be paired with
lunch by Chef Evan Treadwell of Lido at Dolphin
Bay. There were only 40 seats available for this tast-
ing, and needless to say, they sold out in mere min-
utes!
The Paulee Dinner dictates that each person
bring a special bottle of wine to share – is that
stressful? It’s a pretty impressive crowd, how do
you choose what to bring?
It was a bit daunting during my first Paulee, but I
have learned since then that there is more Pinot Noir
at the event than you could ever possibly taste!
People are constantly walking around with bottles to
share, plus there are magnums lined up on commu-
nal tables. Don’t worry about what to bring. Better
to just be excited about all of the amazing pinot noir
you’ll be able to taste!
Where is Pinot Noir production heading? Is the
“sense of place” staying in place?
I think there is even more focus on the sense of place
than there has been in the past. Producers seem to be
focusing more on vineyards selections and less on
larger appellation blends. As producers are becom-
ing better acquainted with what makes their wine
distinct, they are trying to preserve it and share it
with their customers.
People come from all over the world to WOPN,
what do you hope they take away about the
Central Coast and its wines and winemakers and
growers?
They are guaranteed to take away from WOPN an
appreciation for the incredibly high quality of pinot
noir being made in the Central Coast and also an
appreciation for the diversity of wine in the area. I
hope that they were able to spend some quality time
with people that live in the Central Coast so that they
are able to take home a sense of the camaraderie that
can be found here.
Lynn Diehl is the owner
and host of Wine Region
News Weekend TV and WineRegionNews.com
The print version of “Ten Questions”
may be edited for space con-
siderations.