Northern wines heating up
Okanagan Valley wineries improving with age
Canadians are a patriotic bunch, so it’s never been very hard to get them to try local wines. And why not? Our country’s wines have come a long way in the last 10 years. Gone are the sweet "sherries" and hybrid grapes, capable of delivering nothing more than horrible hangovers. Emerging in their place are well-made and exciting wines from top quality grape varieties.
As the power of the loonie melts away in the face of the red-hot American dollar, Albertans are heading east and west, rather than south, for holiday getaways. What they’re finding are Canada’s hottest new tourist attractions – the Niagara Peninsula and, closer to home, the Okanagan Valley.
A seven-hour drive away, the beautiful Okanagan Valley offers more than fresh fruit and mini-golf, it houses a bevy of burgeoning wineries. Some are grand and elaborate, the products of mass-marketing schemes, while others are simple mom-and-pop operations, with nothing more sophisticated than a makeshift winery in an old barn and a few rows of vines nearby. Known locally as farm-gate wineries, these micro-producers attract swarms of visitors each year, selling a good share of their annual production to these faithful followers. Although some of these tiny wineries seem perpetually stuck in the past, producing long forgotten hybrid grapes from poorly farmed vineyards, others are making great stuff – the best of these offer hope that one day, we will have wines which can compete on the international market.
The situation in the Okanagan has never looked brighter, with increasing investment and winemaking talent converging on the scene. Each year growers are banking valuable knowledge about the land they tend, experimenting with varietals, clones, rootstocks, planting densities and trellising systems, which will dictate the potential for quality wines in the future. As a result, challenging grape varieties like Pinot Noir are improving with every year. But it is still the whites that dominate, in both quality and value.
The Alsace varietals seem to be the most consistent, with Pinot Gris, Pinot Blanc, Riesling and Gewürztraminer leading the charge. These grapes have an affinity to the region, ripening consistently and producing aromatic wines of good varietal character. Chardonnay is another winner, but only when the yields are held back and fermentations done carefully. There are still too many diluted and uninspired examples, and just as many over-oaked, flaccid ones. However, the best are delicious, with crisp acidity followed by lingering flavours of mineral and ripe pear.
Reds can also be good, but are less consistent and usually cost more. Pinot Noir, Merlot and even Gamay have shown good results, producing fruit driven wines of moderate complexity. The best strategy when purchasing Okanagan wines is to go by producer, as they tend to be the most reliable guide to quality. It is also particularly important to pay attention to the vintage, as cool years can leave green wines with hard and nasty tannins. The list to choose from is getting longer all the time, but here are some of my favourites:
· Black Hills winery is located on the Black Sage Bench between Oliver and Osoyoos. Their only red wine is a wonderful and stylish Bordeaux style blend called Nota Bene, made from Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc. Veteran winemaker Rusty Figgins, of Leonetti Cellars fame in Washington State, crafts the wine. The current 1999 vintage is good, but the 2000 looks even more promising – this is one winery to watch in the future.
· Blue Mountain continues to produce some of the most exciting wines in B.C. from Pinot Blanc, Pinot Gris, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. This picturesque winery overlooks the 65-acre estate. The soil here is sandy, allowing the vines to be planted on their original French rootstocks, a rarity in vine growing today. This lineup of wines is among the finest in B.C. – great examples of what the Okanagan Valley is capable of.
· Kettle Valley is located on the Naramata Bench on the east side of the Okanagan Lake. The specialty here is Pinot Noir and the wines can be very fine indeed. The current 1998 vintage is ripe and impressive, yet soft and inviting on the palate, with classic Pinot notes of wild raspberries.
·Several others producing great wines: Nichol Vineyards, Tinhorn Creek, Stags Hollow and Burrowing Owl. |
