2014 Icon Wine of the Year

Painted Rock's Red Icon has long been a yearly entrant in the top 5 of our Top 25 Icon Wines of the Year, but for 2014, we had to award this fabulous blend the top spot. Though the tasting score equals previous vintages, there's just something about the 2012 Red Icon that stays with you, even months later and proves it's worthy to be this year's Icon Wine of the Year:

Painted Rock Estate Winery 2012 Red Icon
31% Malbec blended with 28% Merlot, 26% Cabernet Franc and 15% Petit Verdot
$55 - 14.9%
93+pts - Full Review

Congratulations to our runner-ups for this year's Icon Wine of the Year award: the 2011 Château de Beaucastel and the supremely elegant LaStella 2011 Maestoso "Solo" Merlot.



The Wine
Though the components change year-to-year, Painted Rock's Red Icon is an exceptionally consistent, high-end blend that successfully executes its but de vie to deliver complex, New World flavours wrapped in an elegant, Old World structure.

This BC Icon offers a gorgeous, feminine nose of spiced plum, sweet red fruit, light vanilla-mocha and floral aromas. The understated, refined, palate follows with both dark and red fruit flavours creating the perception of sweetness upon entry, supported by silky-smooth tannins, rich savoury notes and effortless acidity through the very long, dry and balanced finish.

The Story
We love this wine for its uniqueness in the world of cookie-cutter big reds. The first vintage (2007) had Petit Verdot as the leading grape in the blend... yeah, Petit Verdot! None of the corporate wineries would ever try that. (And to be fair, I doubt proprietor John Skinner would ever again either... the bane of originality.) These bold risks combined with continual refinement of the winery's detailed vineyard management practices, pruning and harvesting programs have paid off delivering a unique blend from a picture perfect vineyard offering honest vintage variation. 

There's every reason to expect to see future vintages of the Red Icon in our top 5 for years to come as the Painted Rock team have committed to producing a flagship product for the BC wine industry. Lofty goals, but ones the team has thus far been able to deliver.
 - Liam Carrier ©copyright 2014 IconWines.ca

Monthly Picks: December '14 - Happy Holidays

Stock your cellar with red blen-nds. 
Fa-la-la-la-la la la la la.
'Tis the season for great frien-nds. 
Fa-la-la-la-la la la la la. 
Drink us now our Meritage? 
Fa-la-la-la-la la la la la.
BC's Best! (So I allege.) 
Fa-la-la-la-la la la la la. 

Merry Meritage everyone and to everyone a happy new blend!

Calliope Wines 2012 Figure Eight Red - 416
Juicy, friendly and well balanced, the Calliope Figure Eight makes a nice, straight-forward, entry-level, red blend of 54% Merlot, 34% Syrah and 12% Cabernet Sauvignon, delivering ripe plum and sweet tobacco aromas on the aromatic nose and a variety of red fruit flavours on the front-loaded palate.
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La Frenz Winery 2012 Montage - $22
La Frenz's middleweight red blend combines Shiraz, Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Pinot Noir to produce a red fruit and oak'n'spice infused wine ideal for early consumption over the next 1-2 years. Buy it by the case and make it your house red to the delight of all your guests.
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Maverick Estate Winery 2012 Rubicon - $25
This medium-bodied, spicy, herbal wine is a blend of 60% Syrah, 25% Cabernet Franc and 15% Cabernet Sauvignon all sourced from the Golden Mile Bench in the Southern Okanagan Valley. Deep ruby-purple in colour, the Rubicon is a mild-mannered, feminine expression of Syrah with enhanced aromatics from the Cabernet Franc and an easy-going tannic backbone from the Cabernet Sauvignon.
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River Stone Estate Winery 2011 Corner Stone - $29
A blend of 53% Merlot, 20% Cabernet Franc, 16% Cabernet Sauvignon and 11% Malbec which opens with lovely, deep aromas of blueberry, blackberry and cherry fruit with light, smoky, charred-oak notes and hints of dried herbs on the nose.
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Gold Hill Winery 2012 Family Reserve Meritage - $35
A nice entry into the popular 'big-blend' category for the Golden Mile-based winery from the Southern Okanagan. A sweetly scented, feminine nose billows from the glass with engaging, blackberry, cassis, raspberry seeds, pine needles, sweet pipe tobacco, vanilla-mocha and French oak aromas.
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LaStella 2012 Fortissimo - $35
I never like to quote a winery's marketing material, but Fortissimo's tag line "Old world meets the New World" is hard to beat. The wine is equal parts, ripe, BC Meritage and savoury, traditional Chianti. When combined, the result is an Okanagan version of a modern, 'Super-Tuscan'.
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Burrowing Owl Estate Winery 2011 Athene - $38
This lovely Syrah-Cabernet Sauvignon melange (55-45, respectively) successfully combines the classic characteristics of both varieties, producing a nose that pairs pepper with cassis and cherry-cola with dusty sagebrush while warm, toasted oak and light floral aromas add a touch of sweet femininity.
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 - Liam Carrier ©copyright 2014 IconWines.ca

Monthly Picks: November '14 - Australian Shiraz

This month's wine picks are awfully late, due, no small part to the lengthy time spent on planning an upcoming trek to Australia. With some trip planning time devoted to researching the best local wine shops in the cities we'll be visiting, it seems fitting to devote this month's wine picks to the very wines I hope to source new vintages of while on my trip.

Tahbilk 2007 Shiraz - $20
The acid is crisp and the tannins are fine resulting in a wine that offers good balance between its black fruit and oak characters with a full but not gooey mouth feel. The developing bouquet greets you with pleasing green spice, oak, cherry cola, anise and chocolate aromas. The finish is moderate with tart red fruits flavours and some lingering cracked black pepper notes.
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Mitolo Wines 2009 Jester - $25
Aged in 2nd, 3rd and 4th fill French oak for only 9 months, this potent Shiraz seems to get most of its character and tannin bite directly from the sunny, dry McLaren Vale vineyards. This makes for a more approachable wine than many of its high tannin, overly oaked, down-under cousins, though the expected intensity is still present.
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Wolf Blass Wines 2008 Grey Label Shiraz - $30
Intense, dark cherry, dark cocoa, cardamon and peppercorn aromas pounce on your nose when you bring it to within a few inches from the glass. The finish is mouth-watering and oaky with residual cherry puree and anise notes lingering moderately.
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Two Hands Wines 2008 Gnarly Dudes Shiraz - $40

Tart and tannic at times, but oh so tasty. A sublime nose with layers and layers of complex, highly concentrated aromas ranging from sweet eucalyptus to spicy dark chocolate to savory toasted oak. The tart palate explodes with concentrated flavours of dark fruits and Christmas Cake spice.

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Glaetzer Wines 2010 Amon-Ra - $88
This wine is chalk-full of tasting note favourites for intense Shiraz like cherry purée, floral, white pepper, cinnamon, orange zest, fig, mocha, blueberry and vanilla. What sets this wine apart from other highly extracted Aussie Shiraz is its inherent ability to minimize the extraction to the consumer, producing an elegant, cellar-worthy icon.
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Mollydooker Wines 2009 Carnival of Love - $125
When compared to the winery's iconic Velvet Glove, the Carnival of Love shiraz is a bit more attention seeking and blatantly superb. The Avis rental cars of elite level Shiraz - it has to try a little harder. This effort tends to make it, again comparatively, a better bargain than the aforementioned icon wine, delivering most of the refinement and all, if not more, of the concentration and pure expression of fruit.
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 - Liam Carrier ©copyright 2014 IconWines.ca