Celebrity Wine Vinterlude #2: Pursued by Bear Wines by Kyle Maclachlan

(Posted January 17, 2024)

“Wine cheers the sad, revives the old, inspires the young, makes weariness forget his toil.” – Lord Byron

OK this was another gratuitous photo to get your attention, but not entirely out of context. Now that we are through reviewing many of the wines mentioned in Adventures on the Wine Route by Kermit Lynch, we’re going to keep moving forward by reviewing some “celebrity” wines that have come to our attention lately. This post will cover wines created by one of my favorite actors, Kyle MacLachlan, with his Pursued by Bear wines. (Sorry for the long lag between posts, kids. A lot going on the past few months – leaving Maui early because of the fires, finishing a book on urban planning, making wine at home, holidays, sinus infections, blah blah blah. But the wine still calls….)

You may know Kyle MacLachlan from his movie and TV roles. He first rose to prominence in the mid-80s as the star of David Lynch’s version of Dune, but hit it big a couple of years later in Lynch’s Blue Velvet. But my favorite role of his was his turn as FBI Agent Dale Cooper in TV’s Twin Peaks, also directed by Lynch, absolutely a ground-breaker in the early 90s for its weirdness, dark humor, and sinister story lines. For a few weeks, the question “Who killed Laura Palmer?” was as pervasive as the earlier “Who Killed J.R.?” from the TV series Dallas. We grew to love coffee and pie as much as he did…

But perhaps nothing exemplifies its weirdness more than this scene with the dancing guy, the tall guy,  and the red curtains….

Kyle had roles in the 2000s in Sex and the City and Desperate Housewives, and he had a goofy turn on Portlandia as Portland’s earnest but clueless mayor….

And he is an accomplished musician. I discovered that when I watched a late-Saturday-night special on ABC in the early 90s during the height of the Twin Peaks craze that featured videos of pop covers of Cole Porter songs, recorded on the album “Red Hot + Blue,” a fundraiser for AIDS victims. (If you’ve never heard of this album, I would strongly encourage you to get it – absolutely wonderful versions of classic Porter songs.)

A native of Yakima, Washington, Kyle returned to his home state in the early 2000s to begin a winemaking career and started making Pursued by Bear wines. (The name apparently comes from a stage direction in Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale: “Exit, pursued by a bear.” As noted in Food & Wine, “The character Antigonus, it is later revealed, is eaten by said bear. It’s unclear whether the bear has any wine with the meal.”)

From his website (which, by the way, is beautifully and entertainingly done in an old English sort of way):

“The more Kyle traveled to perform, the more he missed his family and the natural beauty of the Pacific Northwest. So he began making trips home to visit his dad, Kent. The two got in the habit of touring Eastern Washington’s back roads together, visiting farmsteads, antique stores, and winery tasting rooms. A fateful father-and-son visit to Dunham Cellars in Walla Walla led to the debut, in 2005, of Kyle’s secondary creative pursuit, a very fine wine called Pursued by Bear.” Dunham was his primary winemaker until Eric Dunham died in 2014, after which time a Dunham winemaker, Daniel Wampfler, became his primary collaborator. Both moved to a partnership with Abeja Winery in 2016.

A story in Oregon Live in April 2023 noted that “Kyle Maclachlan is not just another celebrity with a vanity wine project. He takes his Pursued by Bear wines as seriously as any character as he’s portrayed, which is why after 18 years, his brand is still around.”

In 2023, Pursued by Bear opened a tasting room in downtown Walla Walla. As written in Food & Wine:

“There’s only so much I can do online,” MacLachlan explains. “We have a really nice following and presence, but you really need a space where people can come to get a sense of what the wines are about, and what the story’s about.” Keeping the tasting room in downtown Walla Walla was especially significant for the actor, who calls it “the mecca of Washington wine.” Growing up in Yakima, Washington, MacLachlan cites farming as “in his blood,” and wine as an important pastime through which to spend time with his father…. Ultimately, a former Walla Walla hair salon –– which also had a previous life as a bicycle shop –– would become the perfect space for Pursued By Bear’s inaugural tasting room. At the request of the landlord, the exterior of the 100-year old building remains bright pink, which MacLachlan feels will be especially tempting to visitors come rosé season. Located nearly four and a half hours from Seattle, the tasting room bears (no pun intended!) unmistakably MacLachlan-esque touches, like a mural featuring a misty, lush landscape in the vein of Twin Peaks (commissioned from local artist Brad Rude), as well as a six-foot tall standing bronze sculpture of a bear. “He’s there to greet customers,” MacLachlan says, matter-of-factly. 

OK what about the wines? Pursued by Bear currently sells five vintages, each with distinctive and entertaining label art:

• The 2022 Twin Bear Chardonnay – the reviewer from Wine Enthusiast, Michael Alberty, says, perhaps a little too enthusiastically, “This new Chardonnay is my favorite bear pair since Yogi and Boo-Boo. The tangy wine offers pear and apple aromas that are flanked by bits of spearmint and mango. A silky mouthfeel is joined by bright acidity and flavors like peach melba, pistachios and a trace of grapefruit. Stick a bottle in your next ‘pick-a-nick’ basket and head to Jellystone Park.” (Kids if you don’t know 60s era Hanna-Barbera cartoons, you won’t get it!) It runs about $40.
• The 2020 Pursued by Bear Cabernet – The Thief Fine Wine & Beer notes that it has “layers of complex, deep red fruits with exceptional concentration [that] combine with flavors of dark chocolate and hints of mint and vanilla. A luscious mouthfeel enhanced by supple, integrated tannins… harmonize elegantly with the exceptional fruit sourced from the best vineyards in Washington’s Columbia Valley.” It costs about $70.
• The 2019 Twin Bear Cabernet Sauvigonon – Wine Folly says that its nose has “bramble berries, vanilla, and a hint of black pepper,” while the palate notes “flavorful black cherry, fresh plum, current, and a hint of crushed stone. Showing polished tannins that are at once restrained and balanced, this is a wine of refined elegance and grace, immensely enjoyable now but with the structure to grow even more lovely in the years to come.” It runs about $80.

And two wines that we tried:

• The 2020 Bear Cub Red Blend – This one is 57% Cabernet and 43% Merlot and is aged 20 months in 100% French oak. DePanneur Wines wrote that it is “Bold, full bodied, impeccable balance, rich and deep with dark fruit, boysenberry, toasty spice, cocoa nibs [!], espresso grounds, finely knit tannins, nice acidity to provide lift.” [Note: the red blend we tried was the 2018 vintage, and I firmly agree with the comments.] It’s available in 3-packs from the website at $105, or $35 a bottle (and you can find single bottles on wine distributor websites). Highly recommended.

•  The 2022 Blushing Bear Rosé – Wine.com notes that this one is “Inspired by the classic Bandol rosés of southern France” and “is a beautiful salmon pink color, offering fragrant aromas of honeysuckle, wild strawberries, and grapefruit. Refreshing and flavorful with a soft, lush entry and bright notes of Bartlett pear, guava, and crisp apple.” We found it to have similar characteristics (more amber, less pink), with hints of pear and apple and a light, floral finish. Similarly (before reading this review, I swear!), we thought it was very comparable to the best Provence rosés. It is a blend of 73% Grenache and 27% Mourvèdre. It’s available in a 3-pack on the website for $84 (or $28 a bottle), and you can also find it in individual bottles on wine distributor websites. Excellent!

Book recommendation: This year’s Christmas gift was The World in a Wineglass by the executive wine editor for Food & Wine, Ray Isle. It’s … um… a little bulky, but very entertaining and educational. Isle focuses on artisanal, sustainable wines from all the major wine regions of the world. He tells us that “Our experience of wine… is inescapably contextual. Who we’re with, where we are, what sort of mood we’re in, whether the sun is shining, whether a nitwit just backed into our car in the parking lot, whether we’re in love, out of love, hungry, tired, graced with optimism or feeling like life is perfect crap, all of that plays into how a wine tastes to us.” And since we spent quite a bit of time in the reviews above highlighting aromas and flavors, Isle says, “It’s pretty clear to me that wine writing of what could be called the American pseudoscientific taxonomy school – or the fruit-salad school – just doesn’t do all that much for anyone who’s actually drinking a glass of wine.” In other words, we like wine because … well, we just like it. The impressions – aromas and flavors – are secondary. Food (or wine) for thought.

Wine-focused TV/movie recommendation: This may be a no-brainer, but since Paul Giamatti is in the public consciousness these days because of his excellent work in Billions and The Holdovers, I’m going to ask you to check out (or revisit if you’ve already seen it) the movie Sideways. It’s a buddy movie, it’s a wine movie, it’s a raucous comedy, it’s a (somewhat) rom-com, but overall it’s completely enjoyable, including one of Sandra Oh’s early movie highlights. It also (according to many) started the Pinot Noir craze in the US (confirmed by a wine guide in France), for good reasons. And you may not want Merlot ever again!

Wine Playlist: As mentioned in earlier posts, I like to create fun and funky playlists based on some of my interests, so I’ve created a wine playlist – songs with titles or lyrics that include wine. You can find it on Spotify at https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5rAwgh9Thiary4zUplUsaN

This post’s song is “Barcelona” by Ed Sheeran. “Oh, get up, up on the dancefloor tonight/
I’ve got two left feet and a bottle of red wine.” Fast and intoxicating, just like drinking Sangria on Las Ramblas!