Pink Wines for Canada Day

You may have have envisioned a day of sprinkler dodging and outdoor grazing but there's no guarantee the crisp, white, patio sippers you're hoping to pair with a smokin' hot deck or backyard will meet their match on Canada's birthday. In Vancouver, especially, the weather forecast for Canada Day has rarely been reliably hot and sunny. So why not plan on serving the most versatile category of wine available with your flexible festivities? "Think Pink", as JoieFarm likes to remind us, and try one of the following blush wines on July 1st:

Chateau Des Charmes 2015 Cuvée D'Andrée Rosé - $16
A fruity and fresh rosé with lifted, red berry aromas and a touch of cooling minerality on the nose. Medium bodied with a touch of residual sugar mid-palate that finishes dry thanks to a refreshing wave of cranberry-rhubarb acidity and flavours. Grapefruit rind and light, dried herbs linger on the moderate finish.
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Fort Berens Estate Winery 2015 Pinot Noir Rosé - $18
An orangy-pink rosé with a lovely combination of delicate, sweet berry fruit and warm, sage and dried herbs aromas on the appealing nose and the off-dry, approachable palate. Cool, steely-mineral notes and cranberry acidity balance the residual sugar nicely and linger on the finish.
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Quails' Gate Estate Winery 2015 Rosé - $18
A consistent blend, from the 2014 vintage, of 80% Gamy Noir, 10% Pinot Noir and 10% Pinot Gris offering a pleasant, delicate, nose of Spring flowers, strawberry, watermelon, citrus peel and white pepper. Followed by a fruity, slightly off-dry and slightly boozy, effervescent palate of ripe citrus, strawberry, cranberry, minerals, wild herbs and watermelon rind flavours. A delicious taste of Spring. 
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Bench 1775 Winery 2015 Glow Rosé - $20
A truly lovely rosé to experience via its delicate, candied fruit and floral-herb nose and superbly balanced, slightly off-dry, mouth-watering, berry and citrus-infused palate. Salmon-hued and subtly textured, produced with minimal skin contact and aged in stainless steel tanks. Finishes long with lingering herb, melon and tangy, tropical fruit notes.
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Tinhorn Creek Vineyards 2015 Oldfield Series Rosé - $20
2015 was another stellar vintage for this Provence styled, salmon-pink rosé made from 100% Cabernet Franc grapes sourced from the winery's Diamondback Vineyard along the Black Sage Bench in the Southern Okanagan Valley. Its balance of sweet and savoury characters on the joyful nose and on the off-dry, mouth-watering palate is spot on.
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River Stone Estate Winery 2015 Malbec Rosé - $20
Though muted on the nose, with a youthful bouquet of strawberry, raspberry and mineral aromas, this rosé is as bright and cheerful as its cherry-coral colour suggests. Made from 100%, estate-grown Malbec grapes this blush's raison d'être is its delightful, juicy'n'crisp, off-dry palate of plump, strawberry-kiwi and citrus-pomegranate flavours.
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LaStella 2015 LaStellina Rosato - $20
Produced in the saignée method which "bleeds" juice from newly crushed red grapes imparting a pale strawberry colour and just a touch of tannin texture, the LaStellina is a blend of 62.6% Cabernet Franc, 29.9% Merlot and 7.6% Sangiovese with a fruity, joyful flavour profile of strawberry, rhubarb, cherry and mouth-watering tropical fruit. The balance between the sweet fruit and the acidic elements leans towards off-dry, but not fully.
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JoieFarm 2015 Rosé - $21
A very consistent wine, year-to-year, with a distinct colour and profile offering juicy, red fruit and light, dried herbs on the expressive nose and the slightly, off-dry, textured palate where the residual sugar is balanced beautifully by tart cranberry acidity, light tannins and tangy citrus notes. Your go-to, feel-good rosé. 
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 - Liam Carrier ©copyright 2016 IconWines.ca

Chardon'Eh!

There are so many great new BC Chardonnay releases making their way to market from the excellent 2014 and 2015 vintages. Too many for one post, so here are a few of my favourites to seek-out at your earliest convenience.

SpierHead Winery 2014 Chardonnay - $22
A partially oaked (20%) Chardonnay with a focus on clean, crisp fruit and cool mineral characters, using grapes sourced from the winery's East Kelowna vineyard. A masculine, yet, generous wine with loads of apricot, nectarine and citrus aromas and flavours all wrapped in the firm, supportive embrace of river stone and steel notes.
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Upper Bench Estate Winery 2014 Chardonnay - $25
A consistently well produced Chardonnay that is full-bodied and loaded with juicy orchard fruit flavours and tangy citrus acidity which invigorate the palate and begs, no, demands to be paired with smoky Gouda cheese. Finish is long and mineral-y with rich, leesy brioche notes and some lingering spice.
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Black Hills Estate Winery 2014 Chardonnay - $26 + taxes
The palate is vibrant and alive with Chardonnay's naturally high acidity suggesting the wine saw little-to-no malolactic fermentation. Good consistency carries the aroma profile of the nose through as flavours on the palate, with citrus fruit playing a more prominent role. Intensity of the finish fades quickly, though, a vein of mineral and spice notes linger patiently until the next sip.
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Maverick Estate Winery 2014 Chardonnay - $26.50
A delicious, single-vineyard Chardonnay with excellent balance on the perfumed, feminine nose and the expressive, orchard'n'citrus infused palate. Sourced from the winery's Golden Mile property, the juice was fermented in French oak and then spent a further 6 months in barrel, on lees, which helped impart some body and texture to the palate and contributed warm, nutty-baked good notes to the nose.
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Tinhorn Creek Vineyards 2014 Oldfield Series Chardonnay - $35
Sourced from the winery's Golden Mile Bench vineyard from youthful vines, the juice was barrel fermented in French oak then aged for 16 months in a 50/50 split of oak and stainless steel vessels where the wine underwent a softening of the acids via a secondary, malolactice fermentation. The result of all this work is a beautifully constructed Chardonnay with ample, peach, caramel-golden delicious apple, lemon rind and sweet nutty-brioche notes on the pleasing nose.
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Painted Rock Estate Winery 2015 Chardonnay - $35
The finished wine is as complex as its ever-evolving, multifaceted recipe with aromas and flavours of honeydew, pear, tangerine, lemon/lime, vanilla, stonefruit, spice and brioche. Pure, refined and elegant with a harmonious balance of its core elements: fruit, acid and texture. An effortless intensity which will help the wine hold for many years and develop further over time as the intensity is slowly dialled back to reveal layers of dried and candied fruit aromas and flavours.
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 - Liam Carrier ©copyright 2016 IconWines.ca

Featured Wines: Italy's Gateway Drug

If any of the wines in this week's Featured Wines column tickle your fancy, you can order them directly from Jordan by email (JCarrier@everythingwine.ca) or find him in the Vintage Room of Everything Wine's Morgan Crossing location in South Surrey.

By Jordan Carrier

Amarone della Valpolicella is an effective gateway drug to Italian wines: the lower acid, fuller body, lesser tannins and elevated fruits serve as a friendly entry point for those wine drinkers arriving from Napa or Australia. The indigenous Valpolicella grapes of Corvina, Rondinella and Molinara (which all sound like mild rashes) can’t achieve that kind of concentration on their own, however, being naturally lighter and thinner-skinned, so the Veronese put them on a weight-loss program of sorts, called Appasimento. After harvest, the grapes are left to dry for a minimum of 3 months (although most houses go way longer) in a well ventilated room, where they lose over 60 percent of their water weight, concentrating the flavours and thickening the juice. Since the resulting wine is so big, and normal Valpolicella can be so comparatively dilute, the Veronese gave it the name Amarone, which means “Big and Bitter” (although it’d be more fun if it meant “Blood of the Slaughtered Raisin”). 

Here are some amazing examples:

Masi Mazzano/Campolongo di Torbe 2009

We don’t often look to Amarone to find expressions of Terroir. The extra drying process places another perceptive filter between the soil and the glass, and can add a sort of corrective sameness to the finished wine (vineyard/vintage gave you under-ripe grapes? No problem, dry them longer!). The legendary house of Masi Agricola, however, gives us a terrific Terroir lesson by bottling two sides of the same valley separately. The sunnier side, Campolongo di Torbe drinks decadently ripe and lush, while the eastern-facing Mazzano vineyard (dried and vinified exactly like Campolongo) boasts Northern Rhone-like structure and austerity, as well as super-charged cellar potential. This is Nerd Amarone, to be sure, but a great example of Where being more important that What or even How. Very little came into BC, this is what I could get:

Masi Mazzano 2009, 95 points Wine Spectator, 2 wooden 6-packs available, $151.99 +tax

Masi Campolongo di Torbe 2009, 94 points Wine Spectator, 2 wooden 6-packs available, $46.99 +tax

Tezza Corte Majoli 2011

A teeny tiny winery from the milder Valpantena area of Valpolicella, near Lake Garda, this is boutique Amarone at a mainstream price. Brothers Flavio, Vanio and Federico Tezza don’t spare the oak, using only older French barriques (24 months) to soften the texture, but the nose is what shines, here. Way-cool bits of dark cherry, prune, spice, cola and cedar are all competing for your nose’s attention, but the delivery is butter and the finish is like comfort food: sweet spice and toasty glycerine. No ratings yet for this 2011 vintage. 3 cases available, $51.99 +tax

Fasoli Gino Orgno 2009

I have never been run over by an Italian locomotive wrapped in a purple velvet blanket, and now I don’t need to be. Produced by a 4th generation Amarone family, Orgno can’t be called Amarone because it’s made out of organic Merlot, an international grape, and somewhat of a banned substance in Valpolicella. Merlot is already a full, concentrated grape even before appasimento, so the drying process is kind of like crossing the Ghostbuster beams: it’s unnatural and it’s going to knock down buildings. Huge ripe red fruits and hints of leather, truffles and licorice, everything you taste after tasting Orgno will taste like Orgno. 2 six-packs available, $128.99 +tax