When Tim and Jen Armstrong were newlyweds, they shared a love of Bordeaux wine, a journey that started with stocking the cellar of their Chicago bungalow after getting married. Their infatuation with winemaking and vineyards led to online distance courses through UC Davis’ wine program. In 2009, Tim discovered a bottle of Merlot from Walla Walla at his local wine shop that turned their eye toward Washington State.
“Chicago wasn’t a likely place for us to build a winemaking business, so we spent years researching how and where to begin,” says Jen. “The answer became clear after we had that bottle of Walla Walla Merlot which reminded us of the Bordeaux wines we had come to love.” Tim jumped on an opportunity to transfer to his company’s headquarters in Redmond, Wash. He made his first commercial wine in 2011 (while volunteering at a Woodinville winery) and the Armstrongs opened their Woodinville tasting room in 2013.
But the winery end was only half the equation for Tim and Jen. “From the beginning our interest has been not just in the cellar, but also in the vineyards,” Jen says. Through a fortunate stroke of serendipity, a farm and vineyard in Walla Walla they had fallen in love with years earlier came up for sale; they wasted no time in buying it. The Armstrongs recently opened a tasting room in downtown Walla Walla that features a slower-paced seated format and first-class customer experience.
Armstrong Family Winery is a story worthy of investigating with your own palate. But this writer will go on record to state they are one of those not-so-common boutiques crafting premium wines at a caliber equal to or above some of the avant-garde crowd that charge considerably more. In short, don’t wait until the word spreads too far or you may miss out on this opportunity while the winery is still young.
Visit the tasting rooms in either Woodinville or Walla Walla at: 14 W Main St., Walla Walla; 19151 144th Ave NE, Suite I, Woodinville, or find them online at www.armstrongwinery.com
Armstrong Family Winery 2014 Four Birds, $32
Editor’s Choice – Outstanding (91-94 pts.)
Supple, smooth and well crafted, this Bordeaux varietal blend offers expressive aromas of red fruit and tobacco that co-mingle with vivid flavors of strawberry, blackberry and plum neatly layered with accents of tea, cocoa and clove. Sweet tannins resonate on the complex finish.
Armstrong Family Winery 2015 Wild Angels, $18
Editor’s Choice – Outstanding (91-94 pts.)
This creamy blend of Chardonnay and Viognier is a unity of dazzling minerality and structure, layered with angelic flavors of honey, pear, apple, apricot and candied ginger with pronounced lemon notes on the crisp, refreshing finish.