The only good thing I can say about the recession is the effect it's had on the price of Oregon Pinot Noir lately. It's true that growers and vintners need to be compensated and encouraged to do what they do (and to do is so well).

But still, I love Oregon Pinot and it's pretty easy to go broke drinking the stuff. That's why it's so exciting to find so many really good low-end Pinots these days. And by "low-end", I mean inexpensive. And by inexpensive, I mean between $14 and $20.

While I don't have individual reviews for them all, I recently tried the following:

• Grochau Cellars ("gc") Commuter Cuvee, 2008 ($16)
• Dollar Bills Only (Patrictia Green), 2008 ($17)
• McKinlay, 2007 ($15)
• Spinnaker, 2007 ($17)

These are very good and worth the money. I recommend them all. With the possible exception of the Dollar Bills Only, all of these are on the light-side of Oregon Pinot. In fact, if I drank them blind I probably would have thought most of them to be Burgundy. No, these are not jammy. Light and mainly cherry -- all with nuance. Yet each one had it's pluses and minuses. Regardless, all are worth every penny.



The Commuter Cuvee opened with a pronounced sharpness that was completely muted the next day -- it was really nice at that point. So decant this one if you're drinking it in 2009. I reviewed the 2007 vintage of this and loved it. I went back and bought all I could find. This one is equally striking for how good it is for the money.



The Dollar Bills Only had more body than the others. However, the downside of this one was a pronounced yeast smell. Denise was put off by it, while it bothered me a lot less. We tasted it the next day too. And by then, the yeast aroma was nearly entirely gone, and we were left with a really smooth and nice Pinot at a shocking price for the quality. So, decant this one. Or better yet, hold on to these bottles for a little while longer is my advice.



The Spinnaker was also really nice (see the review here). I really liked this one a lot. Cherry, cranberry, and a little earth. Light. Balanced. Really nice. For Denise, she gets tired of all the Pinot I get, so Pinots really have to be distinctive for her to take note (me, I'm a sucker for Pinot). But with this one, she perked up right away. I thought it might be too thin for her. But instead, she surprised me by comparing it to Beaux Freres!



Finally there's the McKinlay (see review here). This was very light, cherry and really well balanced. This was Denise's favorite. Before I told Denise anything about it, I asked her how much she thought this bottle cost. She said $25. Nope: just $14.99. Crazy.

But do be warned about this round-up: if you like big jammy Oregon Pinots (Ken Wright for example), then these wines may not be your cup of tea. But I found them to be really fabulous.