Holiday Wines & Food – Part 2

It took a little while to recover from our December 23rd dinner party – especially considering the other drinks we had when we went out afterwards, and then again the next day; but before we knew it Christmas day had arrived! I finally had an iron-clad reason to open some of my most cherished wines: I have a nasty habit of keeping special bottles closed because the situation “just isn’t special enough” (even my own birthday often doesn’t measure up for some reason!).

December 25: Christmas Feast!

We had some very good friends over for Christmas dinner and I’d been planning the meal for quite a while. Unfortunately (or fortunately) in reading so many great recipes I had a little trouble narrowing it down, so I made a ridiculously large amount of food: in addition to our traditional Tofurkey, garlic mashed potatoes, dressing, and turnip we also made Creamy Brussels Sprouts with Pearl Onions and “Pancetta” (aka veggie bacon), Maple-Glazed Spiced Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Yams, and a huge Wild Rice, Hazelnut, and Dried Cranberry Pilaf. Finally some homemade cranberry sauce – made with Cab Sauv and maple syrup – rounded out the meal. (After too many years eating canned cranberry sauce we discovered how ridiculously easy it is to make your own only a couple of years ago.)

While we waited for everything to finish boiling, baking, and roasting we toasted to the happy holidays with Sumac Ridge’s delightful Sparkling Gewurztraminer. This refreshing fruity bubbly was released for the first time in 2010, and may still be available in some stores, but Sumac does specify numerous times that it is a “limited offering”. Sparkling Gewurztraminer is certainly rare in BC – this may be the only one – and it was a real treat to get to try some. The wine is off-dry and with plenty of mousse to tingle your tastebuds; we enjoyed some mini Samosas and Pakoras with it. I hope Sumac makes this wine a regular part of their portfolio; I’d like to try another bottle with some other Asian foods and see how well it pairs.

Our dinner wines were of the white and red variety, both of which I had been looking forward to a great deal. Coming out of the fridge was the highly regarded Mission Hill 2006 Perpetua: the first vintage of this excellent wine. This is an ageable Chardonnay that has done very well in the cellar over the past couple of years, and I’m so glad to have added the subsequent two vintages to my collection. The latest 2008 release is equally well-regarded by some of BC’s top critics, and although it is not available via Mission Hill’s online store (it’s “Cellar Exclusive”) you can find it at many private stores and Mission Hill’s line of retail stores – Artisan Wine Shop. Our experience with the 2006 was sublime; it is a marvellous, sophisticated wine that is clearly made with a great deal of care. Perpetua is a must-have bottle for collectors of BC’s finest wines.

Waiting in the decanter was our red wine of the evening – CedarCreek 2006 Platinum Merlot. Although my “schedule” would have me opening this bottle in Fall 2011, I had two bottles in my collection and just had to try it out now. The gentlemen at Icon Wines suggest holding it until 2012, but they do admit that trying a bottle now couldn’t hurt. The fact that this wine may not even have peaked yet amazes me, because it was already fantastic by 2010. Even more amazing is the fact that it is still widely available in VQA stores and the like, despite the release of the 2007 vintage (which won Gold at the Canadian Wine Awards). Ironically the 2006 only received a Bronze at the 2009 CWAs, but it also received a rare and prestigious Lt. Governor’s Award; such are the vagaries of wine judging. I was sufficiently impressed by this wine that I will soon be replacing the consumed bottle, to keep two (and I wish even more) in my collection; perhaps I will open another this Fall, and the last in 2012 or beyond.

 

Holiday Wines & Food – Part 1

Now that December is fading into the background at a rapid pace I’ve finally got enough of my wits back about me to reflect on the many wonderful wines we celebrated with this holiday season. In particular I finally got to enjoy some of the wines I have been holding for celebrations or carefully aging in the limited space I have available. This Fall brought the “release” of the 2006 Chardonnays I’ve cellared – not exactly a long-lost vintage but just enough aging to provide some extra character. Considering most of BC’s reserve Chardonnays are in the 2008 vintage at present, and others are seeing the release of the 2009 vintage I was looking forward to opening my 2006 wines and pairing them with delicious holiday feasts!

December 23: Five Courses of Food and Wine

Some friends who were unable to join on Christmas day came by to celebrate with us a couple days early, and I was inspired to create an honest-to-goodness five-course meal with designated wine pairings. It was an adventurous meal considering I had spontaneously come up with the first three courses while laying in bed the night before!

With assorted cheese phyllo-pastry appetizers we first imbibed the very enjoyable See Ya Later Ranch (NV) Brut – a crisp and refreshing sparkler that SYL describes as “reminiscient of freshly baked bread rounded out by orchard fruit.” I ordered a full case of this 90-point wine when it was on sale earlier in the month, and this was not the first nor the last time a bottle was opened with glee over the holidays! Unfortunately See Ya Later’s website isn’t completely clear regarding which release the current offering consists of: the latest tasting notes pertain to the Fall 2008 release, which may or may not be the wine currently for sale in stores and via the winery.

As we sat down at the table for our salad course I was happy to finally open my Quails’ Gate (2008) Dry Riesling: it was an excellent pairing for the mixed greens with feta and pomegranate seeds, drizzled in tart mustard vinaigrette. The herbaceous citrus tang and lip-smacking dry finish kept the wine in play alongside the flavours of the salad. My 2008 bottle was only one year removed from the currently available 2009, and in fact Quails’ Gate suggests their Riesling can be aged for up to five years for further development; as John Schreiner suggests: “this is a serious cellar-worthy Riesling.”

For the soup course I broke out a cherished red from Church & State: their Gold-medal-winning 2007 Hollenbach Vineyard Pinot Noir. The 2009 Canadian Wine Awards lavished gold upon this wine, as did this Fall’s BC Wine Awards at the Okanagan Wine Festival. It pained me to hear last year that Church and State recently ended their relationship with the Hollenbach vineyard and would be forgoing Pinot Noir until they could develop their own vineyard(s). The soon-to-be-released 2009 Church & State Pinot Noir will be the last for some time. In any case the 2007 was marvellous, much more fruit-forward then I had anticipated with charming bright cherry notes. Fortunately the French lentil soup I had prepared contained plenty of tomatoes and the caramelized onion & goat cheese crostini on the side was a triumph with this wine. Each crostini was spread with caramelized onions on one half and fresh Salt Spring Island goat cheese on the other – each topped with a cherry tomato half. The sourness from the goat cheese and sweetness from the onion were exquisite with Church & State’s delicious Pinot Noir. I’m so pleased that I have another bottle to enjoy next year – I’m interested in how it will have developed with additional cellar time. This wine is still available in stores so don’t miss this chance to try a bottle before it disappears for what could be a long time!

Finally the entree I had planned on all along could make its appearance, paired with Mission Hill’s (2006) Select Lot Collection Chardonnay. On our plates was a fully vegan Cauliflower & Mushroom Potpie with Kalamata Olive Crust. We’ve enjoyed this particular recipe many times before as the rich and creamy (yes, creamy!) filling soothes while the biscuit-style crust surprises you with mouth-watering savoury olive bites. The potpie was a natural match with the buttery Chardonnay, and the wine held its own against the tart olive flavours due to good natural acidity. The SLC Chardonnays from Mission Hill are consistently an excellent value for a premium wine only one step removed from their top-tier Perpetua. The price difference is rather staggering at $22 versus $40 to step up to Perpetua. Although I add a bottle of Perpetua to my collection each year the Select Lot Collection is a clear value winner when looking for excellent BC Chardonnay.

We ended the meal with assorted Christmas cookies I’d been baking all week (and only just finished eating a week into January) and another Quails’ Gate winner – the Fortified Vintage Foch (2007). Following Quails’ Gate’s advice I’d cellared this Port-style dessert wine until now, although it would still have been fine for a few more years no doubt. The FVF is sweet and rich, but not at all cloying or syrupy; it was an excellent end to the meal alongside some fruitcake, rum-balls, Nanaimo bars, and many other sweet treats. For fans and collectors of BC dessert wines, in particular the rare Port-style variety, the FVF is a must-try.

Soon to come is an account of our Christmas dinner feast in all its over-indulgent glory. Could seven side dishes been too many? Never!

Quadruple Tasting Conclusion

When we last saw our heroes they were leaving Village Wines Kitsilano and headed downtown. There was a Blasted Church tasting at Liberty Wines Robson I was looking forward to, and with our group now five-strong we rolled into Liberty’s snug surroundings to hear more about those wonderful wines. First up was the deliciously fragrant Chardonnay Musqué, an unoaked marvel that turns common notions of Chardonnay on their head. Blasted Church has earned a slew of awards for their 2009 vintage of this Chardonnay clone, including Best of Class at the Okanagan Spring Wine Festival, followed by Gold at the All Canadian Wine Championships and Silver at the Canadian Wine Awards. They only made 372 cases and are sold-out according to the winery’s online store, but I’ve seen a few bottles remaining in shops around town. The Musqué has very nice acidity to pair with food, and Blasted Church suggests some creative creamy seafood dishes.

In addition to the aforementioned Chardonnay there were also two reds from Blasted Church’s extensive portfolio present, starting with the unique red blend “Big Bang”. Big Bang’s predecessor was known as The Dam Flood, a blend of Merlot and the rarely-seen Lemberger. The 2008 Dam Flood took home a Double Gold (Best of Class) at this summer’s All Canadian Wine Championships, just shortly before Big Bang was released in July. The name change this year was the result of a dramatic reduction in Lemberger content due to winter damage, and thus Gamay and a bit of Foch was sourced to replace it. The newly-minted blend has pleasant mocha and vanilla notes with a toasty finish, and is a noble follow-up to the much-loved Dam Flood. Finally we tried the Blasted Church Merlot (2007); fruit-forward and smoky it was awarded a Silver medal at the Canadian Wine Awards.

If you are interested in learning more about Blasted Church wines I would highly recommend visiting their website: it is very well-put-together and provides full page wine profiles, plus detailed tasting notes and food pairings. The online store is excellent, and even indicates how many cases remain from the total produced for each wine. Release dates are shown for each wine, as well as anticipated dates for future vintages. As a student of wine websites I would rank Blasted Church at the top; they have done everything right and as a customer I am extremely impressed.

Our growth continued as we picked up a sixth team member when she finished work downtown, and we headed to our final destination at Taylorwood Wines in Yaletown. Along the way I took a detour to Okanagan Estate Wine Cellar, an out-of-the-way store found in the basement of The Bay. Okanagan Estate carries mostly Vincor wines such as Sumac Ridge, See Ya Later, and Nk’Mip; I’m assuming they have some sort of connection to the corporate parent. I was looking for new vintages of Jackson-Triggs Sunrock wines and stumbled upon a tasting of Nk’Mip’s new icon red blend called Mer’r’iym. This Meritage-blend comes from the 2008 vintage, and can obviously use some more aging, but tasted pretty great at the time. I needn’t go into extensive detail as John Schreiner has written an entire column about Mer’r’iym quite recently. Suffice to say, getting in on the ground floor of what should be a very successful new wine is a good idea in my book!

We finally arrived at Taylorwood to cap off the day’s excitement with a tasting of Quails’ Gate, one of my favourite wineries due to their high-quality portfolio and unique offerings including Chenin Blanc and Marechal Foch. We got to try the 2009 Chenin Blanc and it was great as usual. Quails’ Gate is proud to remind us that the 2007 vintage was served to President Obama during his first state visit to Canada, a pretty impressive achievement to be honest. Also available was the entry-level Chardonnay, a nicely balanced blend of tank- and barrel-fermented grapes that provides a good stepping stone to my favourite, the Stewart Family Reserve Chardonnay. Although the Reserve Chardonnay was not being tasted that day I’ve tried the Gold-medal 2007 vintage and was extremely impressed at the time, so much so that I bought two more bottles for my collection. I’ve also added the very well reviewed 2008 vintage to my collection as well. Following the Chardonnay we tried Quails’ Gate’s take on Foch, of which they produce three different wines: the “regular” Old Vines Foch, a Family Reserve version of the same, and a Fortified Vintage Foch in 375ml bottles. The regular Foch is meaty with a nice mouthfeel and some pleasant sage flavours. The Fortified Foch was also being tasted, of which I already had a bottle at home. It is produced in the style of Port, but is not as thick or cloying as you might expect; well-priced at $23 and worth a try, especially for those interested in BC’s small but growing fortified wine sector.

WIth a number of Quails’ Gate wines already in my collection I instead purchased a couple of new releases on my shopping list: Laughing Stock’s 2009 Chardonnay, and the long-awaited 2006 Pipe from Sumac Ridge. Pipe is Sumac’s take on Port; it is a delicious fortified red blend that we consistently enjoy with chocolate anything and everything! Sumac produces Pipe in 500ml bottles, unlike the more common 375ml size used for dessert wines, so you get pretty good value, plus the extremely classy bottles look great on the table. Pipe lasts nearly forever so keep one on hand for those special guests, or when you have a luxurious chocolate dessert that needs a partner!

The Mythical Quadruple Tasting

On the weekend before Christmas, I suggested to some friends that we spend Saturday afternoon visiting some of our local wine stores. It being the holiday season everyone was holding tastings, and before I knew it I had come up with a list of four exciting events we could take in while stocking up for Christmas and New Years: the quadruple tasting was born!

We met up at the 39th & Cambie Signature BC Liquor Store where Mission Hill was celebrating the tenth anniversary of their bell tower with a wine tasting of their Five Vineyards wines. Mission Hill may have the most tiers of any BC winery besides Jackson-Triggs; the Five Vineyards wines represent the first of their four tiers and are suitable for day-to-day consumption. For only a few dollars more however you can upgrade to the Reserve series and experience some excellent value for money with six whites under $20 and four reds under $25.

Among the three wines being sampled that day where the Five Vineyards Chardonnay (2008), Pinot Grigio (2009), and Cabernet Merlot (2008). The Chardonnay is well priced at $14 but I would certainly rather spend my money on the Reserve Chard for $19, a Silver Medal winner at the 2010 Chardonnay du Monde. A couple dollars more yields the Pinot Grigio ($16), which has some nice tropical notes and was an 88-point Judges Choice at the 2010 Wine Access International Value Wine Awards. There are certainly more Pinot Gris (oaked) than Grigio (unoaked) in BC so it is refreshing to find one every once in a while. Lastly, the Cabernet/Merlot was mellow, but quite youthful and somewhat shallow. Credit goes to Mission Hill for including 5% Petit Verdot in the blend however, a rare component in an entry-level blend.

From Cambie we headed down to Kitsilano to visit Village VQA Wines where a triple-tasting of Thornhaven, Hester Creek, and Lake Breeze was taking place. We tried Thornhaven’s Pinot Gris (2008), Gewurztraminer (2008), and Pinot Noir (2007): the Gewurztraminer in particular had a beautiful nose and provoked an immediate purchase from one of our party, and the Pinot Noir was pleasantly fresh and fruity – good value for $18. The Hester Creek (2009) Cabernet/Merlot was young like Mission Hill’s, but more approachable in my opinion. An aggressive price of $16 and a slew of international awards shows Hester Creek is serious about value-priced wines. The final wine we tasted was Lake Breeze’s (2008) Meritage, a tart blend with a pleasantly complex nose. Lake Breeze also produces a bigger brother to their base Meritage called “Tempest”; the 2007 vintage of which just received a high Silver Medal at the Canadian Wine Awards.

While at Village Wines Kitsilano I picked up one of the last 2007 Compendium’s on shelves nearly anywhere I would imagine. Even Mission Hill themselves only sells it directly from the winery store now (i.e., not even online). I’m told yields were down in 2007 and many VQA stores only received one half case to sell! Too bad because this big red received a Gold Medal at the 2010 Canadian Wine Awards alongside its sibling, the 2007 Quatrain; I consider myself lucky to have two bottles of each! I also added to my collection that day my first magnum: Gray Monk’s 2007 Odyssey White Brut, a Lt. Governor’s Award-winning sparkler that has all but disappeared from store shelves to make way for the 2008 vintage, no doubt also quite tasty. I tend to shy away from large format bottles due to storage complications but for only $45 this was a fantastic value, and will lay patiently in waiting for the right opportunity to open, hopefully sometime soon!

Joined by another friend returning from a holiday party, we took a quick hop across the Burrard Street bridge, bringing us downtown to visit Liberty Wines Robson for our third tasting event, which I shall detail tomorrow…

Wine Club: Episode Three

Last weekend was the third iteration of our small wine and dinner club, with hosting duties rotating to the third couple such that now all of us have hosted and created all three courses. Having started with entree duty, I was finally rotated to appetizers, and had been looking forward to it for ages – I had the perfect unique wine to share. A visit to Vista D’oro in the early fall had yielded a bottle of their fascinating Pinot Noix – a Sherry-like wine made from Pinot Noir that has aged for a year with Brandy-macerated walnuts. At the time of my visit the tasting room staff had suggested it would be the perfect accompaniment to a salty savoury olive tapenade so I immediately mentally linked it to one of my favourite appetizer recipes for Kalamata olive sundried tomato tapenade. Served alongside some Salt Spring Island Feta and a fresh baguette the tapenade was a big hit. The Pinot Noix provoked a great deal of mussing as it tickled our noses and palates: there was fruity Pinot Noir there but also the nutty Brandy walnut flavours, quite a roller-coaster experience and altogether delicious.

Our entree of the night was a truly exceptional duo of lasagnes prepared with almost entirely fresh homemade ingredients, right down to the ricotta! Homemade tomato sauce and pasta yielded results that are actually making me hungry as I write about it: mushroom lasagne for the vegetarians and a traditional meat dish for the other half of the crowd. Sandhill 2007 Small Lots Three was the ideal match – a blend of Barbera and Sangiovese with a touch of Merlot. The bottle had been opened earlier to decant and by dinner was awash in smooth juicy fruit. Considering only 266 cases were made I consider myself lucky to have tried this charming wine, some of which is still available on Sandhill’s website – get it while it lasts!

The final course was quite a sight to behold as we were presented with delightfully arranged dishes of poached pears and Poplar Grove Tiger Blue. The pears had been poached whole in mulled wine, and I’d certainly never had anything like that before! Ironically our dessert chefs pulled out a bottle of “D’oro”, the famous fortified walnut wine from its namesake winery Vista D’oro. Primarily Marechal Foch with Merlot and Cabernet Franc this wine is a unique and treasured treat. The aromatic red wine sauce and sweet pears mixed with the strong sweet flavours of the D’oro and tangy Tiger Blue made for a very enjoyable and memorable final course!

Upon reflection I’ve realized what makes our wine club so enjoyable for everyone: it is a non-competitive distributed compliment system! Since we are all making different courses that fulfill different functions, we are never in competition to “out-do” one another in a given evening; to do so would be attempting to compare apples and oranges, quite literally in some cases. Each course can be appreciated entirely on its own, and thus each amateur chef/sommelier receives unique compliments and praise. Because everyone contributes uniquely the compliments are distributed across all three couples, and everyone leaves happy in the knowledge that they helped make the evening a success! I’m looking forward to our next meeting in January: I’m back on entree duty and have already settled on the menu item and accompanying wine, neither of which I have ever tried before – it should be exciting!

Legacy Liquor Store

Last month a new private liquor store called Legacy opened in the Olympic Village (aka Millennium Water) neighbourhood; and not just any store, but the “largest private liquor store in BC!” At 8,600 square feet I can testify that this is a big store for someone used to the tight spaces of VQA wine stores and shops like Liberty Wines. I was fortunate enough to attend the grand opening and check out the BC wine selection, which impressed me a great deal in the expansive offerings and the aggressive prices. Although the majority of their selection was marked only by hand-written Post-It notes on that first day I could tell that Wine Supervisor Lesley Anne Saito has sourced some unique and hard-to-find offerings, and has permission to price them very fairly.

I have since revisited Legacy and although there were still a few empty spots on the shelves the majority of their wine has been displayed – with plenty of room to grow. In fact with such large common spaces in the centre of the store Legacy is able to build massive flexible displays like the tower of Joie wines I admired during my second visit. Upon entering I immediately spotted some rare gems in the BC wine section and was forced to make the difficult decision of which two bottles to purchase – my typical wine-shopping bag only has room for two, to keep my buying habits in check! Although Lake Breeze’s 2007 Tempest caught my eye – having just been awarded a high silver medal at the Canadian Wine Awards – I ultimately settled on two even rarer big reds for my 2007 collection. The first choice was relatively easy, as Legacy is the first store in which I have ever spotted Rollingdale’s La Gauche Cabernet Sauvignon-based blend. With only 385 cases produced, and a sterling 91+ points review from Icon Wines I knew this little-known wine would be a valuable addition. Rollingdale also produces a Merlot-heavy blend called La Droite (the names refer to the Left and Right banks of Bordeaux), but I don’t think I’ll be so lucky as to own the full pair; perhaps as Rollingdale’s reputation grows so too will their production and distribution.

The second bottle I selected was Bill Eggert’s “The Bear”, a complex Meritage blend from his Fairview Cellars winery. I was lucky enough to find the 2006 vintage earlier this year, and now thanks to Legacy I can add the 2007 to my collection. Once again I put my trust in the talented team at Icon Wines: their 91-93 point review for this vintage was hard to ignore. The Bear is said to be included in the wine lists of many top BC restaurants, and I look forward to aging mine a few years in an attempt to do justice to Bill’s hard work. Fairview Cellars recently updated their website to include more than just contact information – it now lists the current releases and purchasing information. In fact the 2008 vintage of The Bear is already available via the winery, and Bill is keeping the price at a very reasonable $35. A high-quality boutique winery Meritage for under $40 is a treasure in BC’s cut-throat industry, given the many challenges and expenses faced by small producers. I hope to keep adding wines from Fairview Cellars to my collection over the years; I would suggest keeping your eyes peeled for entry level blends like “Madcap Red” and “Two Hoots”, I certainly will be!

November Acquisitions - Part IV

Le Vieux Pin: Pinot Noir Reserve (2007)

This is one of the last Pinot Noirs from Le Vieux Pin, released only recently alongside the larger non-reserve 2008 bottling titled “Adieu”, officially their last bottling of Pinot Noir. It remains to be seen if a 2008 Reserve is resting in the cellars for release next year, but if 2007 marks the end of a (albeit short) era for Le Vieux Pin they have certainly gone out on a high note. Based on a strong recommendation from the staff at Taylorwood Wines I purchased this wine for my 2008 collection after reading a very positive review from John Schreiner; I particularly liked his description of the palate as being “almost as rich as a dark fruitcake.” Le Vieux Pin cropped the vines for this wine to a ridiculously low 1.4 tons per acre and released fewer than 300 cases, hence the $45 price tag – more than many Meritage blends in fact (still less than Foxtrot’s $55 Lt. Governor’s Award-winning Pinot Noir however). Still, if the early reviews are correct I think this wine will have excellent aging potential and will be a valuable addition to my collection; I may even taste it alongside Quails’ Gate’s 2007 Stewart Family Reserve Pinot Noir in a few years to see how two $45 Pinots stack up.

Poplar Grove: The Legacy (2006)

Perhaps one word sums up Poplar Grove’s approach to winemaking and that is “patience”. This merlot-heavy blend is a particularly good example of this approach, as after spending two years in oak the good people at Poplar Grove held it for a further 18 months in bottle to ensure it is fully approachable upon release. Considering it was released at the same time Mission Hill was taking the wraps of their 2007 red blends you can see how patient Poplar Grove is willing to be for our benefit. Bottle aging is expensive: with cellar space at a premium many wineries are hesitant to hold their product for long after bottling. Plus, it must be nerve-wracking to stare at thousands of bottles of $50 wine that you are NOT selling yet for months on end: who knows what calamity could befall that wine while it waits, everything from fires to mudslides can wipe out a year’s worth of product – and profit. Suffice to say, Poplar Grove must be very pleased this wine is now in stores, and receiving many positive reviews from the likes of John Schreiner, the often conservative Anthony Gismondi, and the fine gentlemen at Icon Wines. Although I’m certain The Legacy is excellent right now, mine is awaiting consumption in 2013 alongside an equally well-received Poplar Grove 2006 Cabernet Franc; I look forward to it!