Wine Situation Final Five

The Wine Situation hosts everyone from winemakers to writers to find out what a person’s situation is…with wine. At the end of each episode, host Ellen Clifford phones a friend to ask them The Final Five. This time it’s Kate Ayres, the winemaker at Penner-Ash in Oregon! Check out the full episode here QUESTION ONE Ellen: Question one, whatcha drinking? What are you into these days? Kate: Well in all honestly, we drink bourbon. Elijah Craig is often on the shelf. But it’s funny, when I think about the wine we’re drinking, we’ve really recently moved to different whites, like Riesling or Gewurztraminer . We did a big Chenin Blanc tasting recently…and now that we’re in Oregon and not in Napa Valley, when we think about opening a special bottle, more often than not it’s like ‘let’s open pull of the Cabernets out we’ve been aging for ten years.’ And when we were in Napa, it was like ‘Gosh, I really want some Oregon Pinot Noir right now.’ QUESTION TWO Ellen: Question number two, do you have a favorite or unusual pairing you enjoy? Kate: For Pinot-specific, I think what is frustrating when you’re out in the world is that people think Pinot can only be with lighter food. Noooo, if you want to pair it with a duck or steak or lamb or fish…it’s so versatile. It doesn’t matter. There are so many variations and styles of Pinot Noir, and it can fit whatever you need it to fit into. QUESTION THREE Ellen: Question number three, non-alcoholic beverage…do you have a preference? Kate: I drink an absurd amount of water. But we have an espresso machine here at work, and I always have an espresso in the morning. And after lunch, we all make our espressos. I panic if I can’t have my post-lunch espresso. QUESTION FOUR Ellen: Question number four-favorite food? Kate: I really, really love a flank steak with some chimichurri and a really nice fresh green salad. And some fresh tomatoes from the garden with burrata and a little olive oil and yummy balsamic. QUESTION FIVE Ellen: The last question is just, what’s bringing you joy these days? Kate: We just started tasting through all our 2022 wines. We’re really sitting down and seeing what all those long hours and long days—what came to fruition. I always love this time of year. We get into the creative aspect of things in a really big way. It always reinvigorates me for the next growing season. *** Find Kate’s wines at pennerash.com and @pennerashpinot on Instagram, and go visit the winery in Willamette Valley! Check out the previous Wine Situation podcast with Kristen Barnhisel here .