We had another full house for our Friday Night Flight to South Africa, and we tasted some fantastic wines with real insight into the emerging Cape industry.

Australia, Argentina, Chile, and California, amongst others, preceded South Africa into the contemporary world marketplace for wine. Since 1990 when Nelson Mandela was released from prison, the ANC elected into government in 1994, and the apartheid regime dismantled, South Africa has been catching up rapidly. They have been upgrading their knowledge of vineyard management and vinification, investing in modern technology, matching international varietals to appropriate sites in the fantastically-beautiful South African countryside, and learning how to market their wines on world markets. There remain issues to be worked out with labour and participation of the black majority in the industry, but many producers are showing how progressive policies repay the effort.

South Africa will succeed as an exporter of good value/quality brands (of which Arabella is such a good example in our marketplace), international varietals with a distinctive South Africa accent, and distinctive South Africa flagship varietals Chenin Blanc and Pinotage.

Highlights of our tasting included a remarkably rich and complex Post House Chenin Blanc, Thelema Vineyards rich, earthy and meaty Shiraz, and the elegant Graceland Cabernet Sauvignon.

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I used to think that one of the really good reasons for being interested in wine is that it offers a delightful doorway into other countries’ cultures, literature, and art.

But with some of my Christmas money I purchased at McNally Robinson Cain Todd’s The Philosophy of Wine: a Case of Truth, Beauty and Intoxication (McGill-Queen’s UP), and it gets me thinking more about wine as an object of direct contemplation in its own right, and not just a medium for other interests.

His purpose is to defend the argument that a realist/objectivist aesthetic appreciation of wine is possible, against the generally relativist/subjectivist claim of other recent works that argue that wine is a lesser form of art than music, painting, and sculpture.

When we describe and evaluate (fine) wine, are we reporting on the actual materiality of the wine itself, or are we merely reporting on our own personal intellectual/emotional responses to it? Cain is not entirely persuasive, but his short book, written in language accessible to literate winos, is challenging and a welcome addition to the growing bibliography of works on philosophy, aesthetics, and wine.

Cheers,

The Professor

We had a full house for our Friday Night Flight to the Rhone valley, where we enjoyed a variety of interesting wines. From the south eastern and southwestern limits of the southern Rhone delta we tasted La Vieille Ferme white from the Luberon, and a Mas Neuf from around the city of Nimes.  Beyond Luberon and crossing the Durance isProvence, and beyond Nimes are Languedoc and Roussilon, where Catalonian culture becomes increasingly evident. One of the most fascinating parts of wine is way it creates a door into other lands and cultures.

The most impressive wines of the night were Domaine de la Presidente Cairanne 2009, a powerful wine that will merit another 2-3 years patience. From not far away in Chateauneuf-du-Pape, the 2005 Domaine de la Solitude was already beginning to show distinct meatiness on the nose, and promises more complexity developing in the coming years.

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It is always so interesting to discover new grape varieties and wines, and we have done so recently in wines from Spain and southern France.

Malvar is a varietal we have never before encountered, but it is native to the area around Madrid. The Zestos 2010 Malvar is a delicious wine that both Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc lovers will warm to.

Marselan is a new varietal created in the south of France b ycrossing Grenache (for its ability to withstand the southern heat) and Cabernet Sauvignon (for its ease of growing and full-bodied flavour). The La Villa de Maison Valade Marselan from the region of the Aude reminds me of Carmenere -good colour and flavour, with a tight green grip of tannin. Good value from the south of France.

Cheers,
The Professor

Like most things, wine goes through trends.

For a while there oaky chardonnay was all anyone wanted to drink, then there was a tipping point and you couldn’t buy an oaked chardonnay, and now people are kissing the barrel a bit again and saying, “hey, that’s not so bad.”

I remember a few years back when people came into the store, saying they had been to BC, or Alberta, or the US and had tried some Australian critter wine, and when it arrived in Manitoba there were people skipping down the street crying, “it’s here, it’s here!” Now the Aussies and their critters are in trouble.

Malbec is having a good run, but someday it too will be so yesterday. The Beaujolais Nouveau thing waxes and wanes.

In past year or two I have noted a pick-up in sweetly-grapey moscatos and other aromatic and just off-dry whites like Gewurztraminer.

One of the truly big hits of recent years is the Italian bubbly Prosecco. It is a beautiful dry or just off-dry refresher, priced between some of the raw Spanish cava wines, and California’s and France’s high-end bottles.

We now see reported in Decanter magazine that the prosecco producers have let these bubbles go to their head. They have announced that production of prosecco will double over the next two years, and quadruple over the next 25 years, to 220 million bottles! The “consumer will shun general sparkling wines for higher quality products” a spokesperson for the producers told Decanter. That wine drinkers have been drinking less, but better – especially in Europe – and can be expected to continue to do so, is probably a sound conclusion. But it beggars belief that the quality, and quality image, of prosecco, can be sustained over a quadrupling of production.

Fads come. Fads go.

Cheers,
The Professor

We had some fun and learned a lot at our last Friday Night Flight on Aromatherapy! Our goal was to taste a selection of wines in a category that is increasingly popular: aromatic whites. These are wines,sometimes dry, but also a bit off-dry, with a distinctive aroma/bouquet/scent.

It was fascinating to taste first the popular Susanna Balbo Torrontes, then to finish the evening with the same grape, same producer, but in late harvest style. We found clear family resemblance between the two, while each claimed a distinct personality.

Gewurztraminer is a highly aromatic varietal whose classic bouquet is sometimes described as lychee, rose petals, or spices like nutmeg.Because it has such a strong personality on its own, it is rarely blended. But a favourite at La Boutique is the Hatley’s Fuse blend of Gewurtz and Pinot Gris from the Blasted Church winery near Okanagan Falls in British Columbia. We loved the exotic off-dry style, perfect with sushi.

There is growing interest in the Muscat grape and its versatility. In the south of France muscats are drunk as both an aperitif and dessert wine. In Italy slightly sweet bubbly moscatos are fun and refreshing. We are seeing more and more still and dry moscatos from California and Australia consumed as regular table wines or at receptions. We tasted the Two Hands Brilliant Disguise Moscato and decided that its grapey and lemon-limey personality would be beautiful as an aperitif with melon and prosciutto, or for dessert with a fruit flan.

Aromatic reds are not as obvious. But we found a beauty in Umani Ronchi’s Lacryma I di Morro d’Alba. This is a local varietal from near Ancona in the Italian Adriatic region of La Marche. It is very dark in colour, and on the nose it is redolent of blackberries, plums, and violets.Outstanding value.

Occasionally Cabernet Sauvignon shows off a distinct hint of eucalyptus or mint on the nose. Cabernet Sauvignon’s parents are Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc, so one can only hypothesize the minty note in some Cab Sauv clones comes from some genetic pieces of Sauvignon Blanc, which can have a minty note. We tasted something new, the Thelema Vineyards “The Mint” Cab Sauv from near Stellenbosch, South Africa. A beautiful wine.

The other goal of our tasting was to show what a big role the nose plays in our overall appreciation of wine. We carefully pinched our noses, sipped some wine, and found that we could hardly taste it. But when we released our noses, the flavours of the wine really popped on the palate. No dry cleaning bills were incurred! And we learned how much our taste of wine owes to our noses. The nose knows.

Next stop on the Friday Night Flight: Spain on 18 November. We look forward to seeing you there!

Cheers,
The Professor

It is interesting the way that the Ontario and BC wine producing areas are developing in distinctive ways. My thoughts are pushed along this route again by the opportunity to taste recently a quite delicious, and varietally consistent, blend of the Rhone valley white wine varietals Marsanne and Roussane from Twisted Tree vineyards in British Columbia.

Ontario has done very well in giving specific VQA designation to distinctive micro-climates in the region, and figuring out which varietals best suit these sites. Their more difficult climatic conditions are forcing them to specialize.A good example here is the Closson Chase Chardonnay from Prince Edward County that we have in the shop. PEC is specializing in Burgundian varietals Pinot Noir and Chardonnay,and the Closson Chase is a beautiful expression of that aspiration.

British Columbia,despite the arguably more divergent climatic zones within the Okanagan valley,has been less open to defining micro-climates within their VQA legislation.Winemakers there want to be as free as possible to blend grapes from different parts of the valley. The climatic variation has also, however, made the BC industry somewhat more experimental, more willing to test whether interesting varietals (Marsanne and Roussane, Tempranillo, Carmenere, Malbec, Pinotage etc.) can find a comfortable niche.

But what a shame it is that Twisted Tree did not realize how important it is to establish and maintain a consistent identity in the marketplace. As I understand it from the Wine Access magazine 2011 Canadian Wine Annual, Twisted Tree no longer exists as such, but has been renamed because the owners concluded that the name was “bland.” Near Osoyoos, Twisted Tree is now called Moon Curser Vineyards.

Cheers,

The Professor

JuiceBlog

At our most recent Friday Night Fight we presented the firstof three scheduled (and hopefully more) features on Great Wine Rivers. Wetasted a fantastic range of wines from Spain’s Ribero del Duero and thePortuguese Douro.

We began with two lovely table wines, the Grandjo Branco andTinto, the first a refreshing and aromatic white dominated by an aromaticMuscat on the nose, and the crisp Fernao Pires, an indigenous Poruguesevariety, on the palate. The tinto is also composed of indigenous Portuguesevarieties, and shows some rustic earthiness on the nose, with good fruit andtannins on the palate. Both are excellent value in traditional rather thaninternational styled wines.

For our third wine we moved upstream to the Ribera del Dueroand the 100 per cent Tempranillo Braccamonte 2005. The Spanish portion of theriver can experience baking hot daytime temperatures, but being at significantelevation above sea level it can also get cool at night. So the wine developsexcellent fruit definition, and firm acidity to keep this wine, which has someage, well-preserved. It still has plenty of life and pleasure to give!

Our next wines provided a fascinating contrast oftraditional and modern styles for red table wine from the traditional port winearea of the Douro. The Quinta do Cidro 2004blends Touriga Nacional with Cabernet Sauvignon, and the dark colour and firmtannins showed through the influence of French and American oak. This wine wasa big favourite amongst our appreciative guests, and is a fantastic wine. Themore traditional style with a blend of Tinta Roriz, Touriga Nacional, andothers, was the Quinta di Aciprestes Reserva 2005. It showed a slightly lighterhue, beautiful depth and complexity, and would be magnificent with roast lamb.Outstanding value.

We had to have some port! So we finished with the FonsecaLBV 2005. This wine is unfiltered and really delivers great flavour andcomplexity. I can’t wait for Christmas when I get my annual allowance of portand Stilton!

 

I really love this Great Wine Rivers concept, so look forothers coming soon: the Loire and the Garonne.But up next on our Friday Night Flight: California.

Cheers,

The Professor

A couple of years ago your faithful correspondent and long-suffering spouse drove east to revisit old haunts of great triumph and tribulation. On the way we spent several interesting days in Niagara, seeing first-hand how the micro-climate there works in practice to produce such interesting wines. We were en route to Ottawa and, regrettably, had to drive past Ontario’s hot new wineland in Prince Edward County.

So I have been interested to revisit Geoff Heinrich’s book A Fool and Forty Acres. Heinrich was one of the first to rediscover (wine grapes had been grown in PEC for over a century) the potential of the County, especially for Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.Prince Edward County is a peninsula, virtually an island, on the north side of Lake Ontario, just off the highway between Toronto and Kingston, near Belleville. It has become a bucolic escape for many of Toronto’s high fliers,ready to risk turning a large fortune into a small one.

The lure of the County is the soil, very similar to Burgundy,filled with the limestone that is so conducive to good, even great, wine. The tragedy of the County is the weather: on the north side of Lake Ontario, it does not benefit in the same way from the moderating effect of the lake, and winter can be deadly to vinifera grape vines.

Over the past ten years or so some outstanding wines have come from the County, and Heinrich is seen as a trailblazer, so it has been it has been interesting to reread his book. So next time, there will definitely be no drive by.

Cheers,
The Professor

Ah, summertime and the living is easy. Your thirsty wino has been soaking up – some sun and some words. A quenching summer read is Matt Kramer on Wine, written by Matt Kramer, of course. It is a thematic collection of columns from the author’s regular perch at the Wine Spectator, as well as several other publications.

Kramer is well-known as well for his book on Burgundy, and this collection reflects that - it is worth the effort if only for his defence of the concept of the quintessentially-Burgundian concept of terroir. Rare too is the wine book that can deploy Thomas Kuhn’s concept of paradigm, and the Platonic ideal of the form. We also like a lot his illustration of the subjectivity, or relativity, of taste in his insights into the good, the bad and the ugly of the retailer’s palate, the wine critic’s palate, the winemaker’s palate, the sommelier’s palate, and the consumer’s palate.

Challenging was his report on the robust scientific refutation of the functional efficacy of those devices which claim to pump the air out of a wine bottle, the better to preserve the wine inside. I use them, love, and think they work. But science says no. (Apparently so too do those Shopping Bag ladies on television.)  I hate the idea of being in the same sort of camp as the climate warming deniers!

A worthy read.

Cheers,

The Professor

We had a small but fun summertime group for our Friday Night Flight recently around Tuscany. The Toscolo Vernaccia di San Gimignano is a really distinctive white suitable for casual summer sipping, but robust enough to support light creamy or pesto pasta, or fish with toasted almonds. Something really different from Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, Riesling, and Pinot Grigio.

For the reds, we began with the Fontodi Chianti Classico 2006, a quite “feminine” aromatic wine, really suitable for summer. The 2007, which we previewed recently, is even better. We have tasted two Morellino wines from Scansano recently, from the same 2007 vintage (Morellino is the nickname of the Sangiovese clone grown in that area of Tuscany south of Chianti). They are quite different in character. The Biondi-Santi tasted earlier is a bigger more tannic wine, while Argientera tasted last Friday is a lighter wine. It was also very interesting to taste the Rosso di Montalcino 2007 and Brunello 2004 from San Filippo. The family resemblance was clear, but the Brunello clearly a wine of more depth and complexity.

Coming next, on Friday 9th of September, 'No Heartbreak: Pinot Noir'.

Cheers,

The Professor

Beautiful summer weather, along with friends, is all the excuse you need to have a party. Whether it be a garden party which can be a little more formal or a simple impromptu bbq on the deck, all you need are friends and food. 

The Garden party might have you cook roasted quails and caramelized onions on the bbq while the deck party might be as simple as Angus all beef patties and Italian style pasta, bean or potato salad all made with olive oil. 

BBQ’d quails aside from being a little tricky to eat are one of the most flavourful game birds. The trick is to cut them down the back so they can be cooked flat and marinade them first in white wine and good olive oil.  Please ask Chef Tony in the kitchen or myself for the recipe the next time you’re in. The original recipe was given to me some 40 years ago by my sister-in-law from Northern Italy which I adopted for the BBQ.  Very tasty!  For those of you who have never done caramelized onions on the bbq you are missing out on something that is easy to make and can be a delicious condiment to so many types of protein. To prepare: julienne an onion, place in a covered aluminum container and let cook over indirect heat until golden brown.  I served this exact dish to my family and friends seated on the patio a few weeks ago.  Crisp and golden brown quails on the outside and tender, flavourful meat on the inside were served with an amazing 1995 Spanish Grand Reserva Rioja from Muga($89.99).  A classic, traditional Rioja with notes of dried herbs, sweet cherry jam, new saddle leather, tobacco, and spice box are followed by copious plum and cherry flavors. 

As mentioned, parties can be very impromptu and can be arranged in a matter of minutes. Burgers are an easy and fast way to have the neighbors over with the kids.  I’m sure we all have our own recipes for making burgers but the most important thing is to use good quality lean beef from good cuts.  My burger recipe consist of lean ground Angus beef, an egg and Italian style bread crumbs which has great flavours like Romano cheese, parsley flakes and spices.  If this is too time consuming then I suggest the in-store made Angus patties which are just beef and are very lean, which reduces flare ups on the BBQ and burnt burgers.   The pasta, bean and potato salad from the cold table, which I’ve talked about many times before, are all traditional Southern Italian recipes my mother taught me. Potatoes, pasta or beans make up 90 percent of the salad with the dressing to enhance and bring out flavours.  Please ask for a taste at the cold table and judge for yourself. 

Try this combo with a glass of Sol Mayor red or white wine from Spain, you won’t be disappointed.  Both of these wines are of exceptional value.  The white shows aromas and flavours of citrus and peach while the red is fresh with flavours of strawberry and plum.  The wines are lighter in style which is perfect for the summer heat and are excellent to drink with a meal or use them in your favourite sangria recipe.