Producer profile: Trothe, plus seven wines tasted

In the 1940s, Jeff Andrews’ great-grandfather arrived in the area where the Andrews Family Vineyards stand. Today, aside from row after row of grapevines, only a few buildings break the horizon line. There are a couple of farmsteads and the family’s wine production facilities. It remains a very uninhabited part of eastern Washington, rising between the Yakima and Columbia rivers.

It was all sagebrush and arid desert back in those days. Shortly after Andrews’ great-grandfather George Smith had broken the ground and planted dry-land wheat, the US military seized his land. It was soon after America had entered into the Second World War. His farm and most of the area in the high, rolling hills above the Yakima river were used as a bombing range by the US Navy throughout the war.

Scroll down to see seven Trothe wines to try

Where Cabernet is king

Today, much of the former bombing range is known as the Horse Heaven Hills AVA, one of Washington state’s most significant wine-growing regions. These hot, windswept hills produce much of the state’s most outstanding Cabernet Sauvignon, often including fruit from Andrews Family Vineyards.

Ray McKee has made wine for almost 30 vintages in Washington state. He knows Washington’s vineyards and AVAs as well as anyone making wine here. His decision to partner with Jeff Andrews’ vision for Trothe was an easy one. ‘Having made wine at Chateau Ste Michelle for nearly 10 years, I’ve known for a long time that the quality of fruit produced by the Andrews family is at the highest levels in the state. It’s about the Horse Heaven Hills, certainly, but it’s this site. It’s what they’ve got going on here specifically.’

While they grow 26 varieties, a select group of Washington winemakers have come to the Andrews family year after year for their Cabernet. So Andrews and McKee decided that instead of selling off all their choicest blocks of fruit, they would keep much of it for the Trothe wines.

Jeff Andrews’ decision to launch the Trothe brand was based on faith in his family’s work over the decades and what the evidence was showing him. Many of Washington’s top-scoring wines have been Cabernets, made from grapes which many of those wineries purchased from his family’s vineyard. It wasn’t simply a case of hubris – Andrews knew they had something special.

Trothe at a glance

Established: Andrews Family Vineyards established in 1994 with the planting of 8ha of Cabernet Sauvignon; the Trothe brand launched with the 2018 vintage by Jeff Andrews to highlight the quality of his family’s vineyard

Area planted: 526ha

Winemaker: Ray McKee

Trothe Cabernet annual production: 2018 1,752 bottles; 2019 2,460 bottles; 2020 3,000 bottles

Origins: 1941: George Smith (Jeff’s great-grandfather) purchases the land that would become Andrews Family Vineyards for dry-wheat farming.

1942-1945: US Navy commandeers the family’s land as a bombing range through much of the Second World War.

1978: Mike Andrews (Jeff’s father) raises Hereford cattle on the land that would become Andrews Family Vineyards.

1994: Mike plants his first 8ha of Cabernet Sauvignon.

A special place

Washington state wines are not new any more. As they’ve been discovered a time or two by now, they’ve begun developing their reputations and hallmarks. A number of wines from Washington have scored 100 points in different American wine publications or made the annual top 100 wine lists of those same publications. For many, Washington wines have drawn comparisons to a middle ground. It’s a wine somewhere between the fruit-driven nature of Napa wines and the textured, mineral-laden wines of Bordeaux.

That texture comes from tannin, a consistent signature of Washington wine – the wines from Washington all have it, but it is especially notable in the Horse Heaven Hills. This is owed in large part to the AVA’s nearly constant wind. ‘The skin tannin is developing in the spring, and we have 30% more wind than the rest of the state’s growing regions do,’ says Trothe vineyard manager Todd Chapman. ‘So, as the skins develop, we’re getting a constant 8-25kph wind every day.’

‘Across all varieties in the Horse Heaven Hills, you have tannin,’ McKee explains. ‘I like to make Cabernet with plenty of it, and here we are gifted with such fine, elegant tannins. I build layers of that tannin on top of each other to create richness through maceration. So the texture goes all the way around and envelops the wine so that it is elegant. But elegant like a fine, expensive, 1,400 thread-count sheet: elegant but weighty and full.’

A special selection

The Trothe Cabernet is a product of some of the most select blocks in the vineyard – three in particular, each numbered for the year they were planted. Block 98 sits atop a rise in the vineyard.

While the oldest estate Cabernet was planted in 1994, those vines have since been removed, making 98 the estate’s old-vine block. This block sits at an elevation where the ice-age floods that carved Washington state up crested – resulting in a rocky soil deposit that gives this block a unique terroir. It is the backbone of these exceptional Cabernet wines.

‘Block 98 gives these wines a tremendous amount of structure,’ McKee tells me. ‘The berries are small, and it’s an older vine, so it doesn’t ripen to super-high sugars. I can get a lot of hang time without the ripeness getting out of hand.’ Each vintage of Cabernet has featured these old vines as the predominant source of the final blend, and McKee emphasises that the older vines give the wine both complexity and structure.

The remainder of the Trothe Cabernet blend has come from Block 03. ‘Block 03 adds nuances of sage, cherry fruit and currants – more typical of Cabernet grown in cool sites,’ says McKee, ‘all with an elegant tannin profile and acidity that energises the Trothe blend and balances the power of Block 98.’

As the Trothe Cabernet program develops, winemaker McKee is excited to integrate some of the vineyard’s youngest sites.

In addition to the old-vine Cabernet, the Trothe Cabernet will incorporate one of the youngest Cabernet blocks on the estate, coming from site 16 (planted in 2016). This block is at the highest elevation on the Andrews estate, planted at 442m.

McKee is excited about its potential to continue to shape the Trothe Cabernet program. ‘Block 16 reminds me of mountain Cabernet, with finely packed and dense tannins, lively acidity and deep colour. This block will become more prominent in the Trothe blend over the next 10-15 years as the vines grow up and settle into their terroir.’

Rugged beauty

Many parts of Washington’s wine country can be surprising for the uninitiated. The area around the Yakima Valley, including the Horse Heaven Hills just to its south, is a desert. Something in the region of 22cm a year of rain falls here. Rough, rocky canyons, sagebrush and tumbleweeds mark the land. And yes, they actually tumble.

Jeff Andrews, though, sees the beauty of the region he calls home. ‘The Horse Heaven Hills is vast, rugged and incredibly remote, but its wines can be exceptionally harmonious and elegant,’ he says. ‘Since the region lacks the infrastructure to support tourism, many will never have the opportunity to visit in person. Part of crafting a wine like Trothe is a hope to transport people, if even for a moment, to the sagebrush-covered canyons and windswept ridges of the wide-open Horse Heaven Hills.’

‘Trothe is part of our family’s continuing farming and wine-growing evolution,’ Andrews continues. ‘We’ve invested 80 years and four generations in nurturing our corner of the Horse Heaven Hills. With Trothe, we are laying down a marker to let wine lovers know that the Horse Heaven Hills deserves a place on the world stage among the most renowned wine-growing regions.’

Trothe revealed: seven from Horse Heaven Hills

Availability of Trothe wines is limited: for membership and allocation details, go to trothe.com/allocations

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