Wine touring is all about meeting your expectations. The chance to breeze through the vineyards in wine country as you seek and sip your favorite bottles. If you are looking for a lively wine touring experience filled with grand showcase wineries, majestic lake views, quaint gift shops, and opulent destination resorts, then keep moving down Route 3 to the Okanagan. There’s nothing like that in this valley.
Welcome to the Similkameen Valley. Forget about Starbucks, there aren’t even traffic lights in this part of the world. The focus here is on living a natural lifestyle. It’s not hard to forget about natural since it literally towers over you in this deep and extremely scenic valley.
It is in Cawston, in the most southerly region of the Similkameen that John and Virginia Weber have chosen to build their winery, Orofino. Crafting mostly single-vineyard variety-based wines along with a blend or two, the emphasis at Orofino has been quality. The roster of growers, many of whom are also neighbors, are luckily in simpatico with their desire to create intense, complex, age-worthy, and tasty wines. The relationship between grower and vintner can be tricky waters to navigate because each may have different goals in mind regarding quality and quantity. Orofino has managed to create a spectacular lineup of wines with their growers because the focus extends beyond the simple goal of selling products. The goal here is great wine made in a great community. The relationships in this region are evidently stronger than the need to be competitive.
Evidence of this comes through even in the best of times. When I sat down with John Weber in mid-February, it was just days before Orofino’s Syrah 2009 took home the gold medal as the top wine at the Gold Medal Plates Canadian Culinary Championships in Kelowna on February 11th. In a Similkameen Wineries Association press release soon after, John thanked the growers of the winning Syrah, Murray and Maggie Fonteyne of Cawston’s Scout Vineyard “for their terrific work in growing these grapes for us.” When one wins, everyone wins. Welcome to the Sim.
Wines Tasted in this podcast:
Riesling 2007
Gamay 2010
Pinot Noir 2009
Syrah 2009
Passion Pit Cabernet Sauvignon 2009
Beleza 2009
(EXCLUSIVE! If you listen very carefully, John will mention a special new wine to be released this coming spring! You heard it here first!)
I like talking about wine. I can and do talk about it all day long sometimes. Most of the time, I’m lucky enough to get payed to do that.
Stephen Wyse from the boutique winery Young & Wyse in Osoyoos, BC, likes to talk about wine too. When I got to talk to him in his wine shop recently, the time went by quickly and the result is this podcast which pushes 45 minutes. It’s a great conversation with a guy who knows wine. He also has some great advice for anyone who is feeling a little burned out with their job.
We’ve featured Young & Wyse before – exactly 2 years ago in fact – when Amber, AJ, and I tasted their Shiraz from their first vintage in 2008. Their winery has been on our radar ever since with unique blended wines like the “Amber” (our Amber bought one, of course) and the Black Label aka the “33,30,24,13″. Now with new vintagea of Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon and a cozy wine shop just outside of town, this is one winery that should be on your must-visit list.
This week, we focus on something that a great many ‘serious’ wine lovers seem to disregard: Rosé. It’s almost a bad word among a certain generation of wine lovers who won’t touch the stuff.
THAT IS GREAT!! Please keep ignoring it!
Keep assuming that it’s all simple, sweet, girly wines and pay no mind to it at all. Without you wanting to buy it, demand will stay low and prices will match it accordingly.
For the rest of us who know about how good r-o-s-é’s from BC can be, here’s an awesome one from Bartier-Scholefield (produced at the Okanagan Crush Pad in Summerland) that Nick and I tried recently. Cheers!
The grapes have been harvested for the season and the winemakers and cellar staff are busy pressing and fermenting. We talk about what goes on in the wineries at harvest time and how those grapes make it into your bottle. Join us with a great bottle of Road 13′s Jackpot Chardonnay!
The grand opening of Hester Creek’s new wine shop and winery took place today in the sun, and then rain, and then sun again near the end.
Let me say just say this – if you visited Hester Creek before, even recently, it will be worth visiting again soon. The wine shop is spacious, the tasting bar is large and brightly lit and they’ve even paved the parking lot!
The tasting room was packed when I arrived, most likely due to the rain that had everyone claiming space inside rather than lounge outside or mill about on the patio. Unfortunately, the first thing that I could smell upon entering the wine shop was a good dose of Calvin Klein or similar blend of fragrance, which almost entirely masked the wonderful scents from the hors d’oeuvres created by Chef Heinz Schmid. (If you don’t already know the effects of wearing too much perfume in general, please don’t douse yourself in anything smelly before going to a wine-related event…)
After a Pinot Gris and some appies, I started to take in the sights. The large main room, with the curvascious tasting bar as a center piece, has many rooms and spaces adjacent to it that will be useful for functions. Off to the right is a private dining room with an entrance to a small, viewable barrel cellar. The dinning room also has its own private entrance and patio outside. The main room has a large, partially covered patio as well which will easily handle the summer (or wine festival) crowds that will do doubt be descending on Hester Creek in the future. There is a viewable demonstration kitchen just to the right of the tasting bar and probably a whole lot of different rooms that I didn’t get the chance to see on this occasion. Perhaps soon.
I’m glad to see that Hester Creek is on the up and up. It was only about six years ago when it would not have been possible to say that. I’m glad to see that this winery will be around for many more years to come. Cheers!
In this week’s podcast, we talk about the value of awards in wine competitions. Do the best wines always win? What does it matter? Join us in tasting an award winning wine – the Thornhaven Gewurztraminer 2008, the Best in Category at the Okanagan Spring Wine Festival 2009.
In our third installment, we talk about the two sides of the valley just south of Oliver, the Wine Capitol of Canada. On the west side, the Golden Mile with its history and diversity, and on the east side – the Black Sage bench, with its distinctive terroir. Join us for a tasting of Quinta Ferreira’s Syrah 2007 that you won’t want to miss.
Lots of wine here and the best thing is that it’s so easy to get there. It’s right on the highway and there’s tons of easy parking, especially for those of you traveling in RV’s or with a trailor. Their parking lot looks like it can accomodate at least 4 (probably more) full-sized RV’s or pickups with 5th wheel trailors without backing up or any crazy parking lot tricks. It’s on the west side of Highway 97 and is on the right as you head south from the town of Oliver.
The other great thing about this winery is that there are lots of different styles of wine here for every palate. Crisp pinot Grigio’s (called Mamma Mia) and big, dark, full-bodied reds (check out Maximus). All of that is surrounded by a beautiful large wine shop that makes you forget that the highway is only steps away.
Taking a moment during a wet afternoon in our home of Penticton, I am reminded of a recent road trip to Vancouver Island. The days were warm and the evenings cool and damp; A different climate than our dry desert valley. In this southern island hamlet, you can feel the ocean’s briny breath….. There is a different focus for wine in the lower mainland and the gulf Islands, given the more tropical nature of its weather patterns. Early ripening hybrids and vinifera thrive in this coastal region, producing light, crisp, aromatic and fruit driven wines that are truly cool climate.
Not being as familiar with this area and it’s smaller boutique wineries, I was very excited to find out a winery specializing in honey meads was in the neighborhood of our hosts’ hometown of Sooke! Tugwell Creek, which runs past our friend’s home, comes out near the meadery that bears its name. An art as ancient as grape wines, mead combines honey, spices and sometimes berries to create wines that are rustic, complex and intriguing. Romans believed mead had properties to strengthen, heal and lengthen life.
Tugwell Creek Harvest Melomel ’08.
Besides a blackcurrant as well as a sparkling dessert wine, we tasted a seasonal mead that is infused with logan, goose and marionberies, all grown on the farm. The colour was a rich amber hue, reminiscent of a well extracted pinot gris. On the nose, strawberry fruit seems stewed with the marriage of honey. Almonds, nutmeg and orange rind, this wine has a very complex and mysterious aroma. A creamy palate of the same stewed fruit and spices remind me of autumn and winter delicacies such as pumpkin pie, christmas cake and candied fruits. Finishing off dry, this wine may very well be an excellent alternative for fish or fowl…. Think turkey dinner.
If you are interested in the meads from Tugwell Creek and where to find them, visit them on the web at www.tugwellcreekfarm.com
In our second podcast, we talk about the various regions of BC Okanagan Valley. As you drive south on Highway 97 from north to south, we’ll tell you about some of the wineries that you’ll see along the way. Taste along with us as we check out the Amicitia White 2008 from Dunham and Froese Estate Winery.
It is in Cawston, in the most southerly region of the Similkameen that John and Virginia Weber have chosen to build their winery, Orofino. Crafting mostly single-vineyard variety-based wines along with a blend or two, the emphasis at Orofino has been quality. The roster of growers, many of whom are also neighbors, are luckily in simpatico with their desire to create intense, complex, age-worthy, and tasty wines. The relationship between grower and vintner can be tricky waters to navigate because each may have different goals in mind regarding quality and quantity. Orofino has managed to create a spectacular lineup of wines with their growers because the focus extends beyond the simple goal of selling products. The goal here is great wine made in a great community. The relationships in this region are evidently stronger than the need to be competitive.
