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Great weekend for Niagara wines at Vintages: Top Rieslings, Chardonnay and Pinot Noirs highlight release

St. Catharines thomas dans son lieu-dit WISMER

Vintages releases a very good selection of what Niagara does best this Saturday with top Rieslings, Chardonnays and Pinot Noirs all hitting the shelves.

I’m particularly impressed with the selection of Rieslings that runs the gamut of styles and includes an appassimento style from Foreign Affair.

There’s also a chance to pick up a bottle or two of Thomas Bachelder’s (top photo) Saunders Vineyard Chardonnay and some nice selections from the excellent 2009 Pinot Noir vintage.

Here’s what to look for Saturday:

164483_webRosewood Natalie’s Süssreserve Riesling 2010 ($15, 90 points) — This is a signature style of Riesling for Rosewood and former winemaker Natalie Spykowksy. Riesling juice is added back to the wine before bottling to add complexity, natural acidity and sweetness. The 2010 version shows an attractive nose of lime cordial, sweet ginger, apricots and peach. It’s off-dry on the palate with lovely, honey-sweet fruits, juicy apricot and mango with a ginger accent. Delicious stuff.

Chateau des Charmes Old Vines Riesling 2010 ($17, 89 points) — This wine is the follow up vintage to the wonderful 2008 Old Vines Riesling. The wine wasn’t made in 2009. The grapes were selected from vines that are 20-30 years old, the oldest sourced from the Paul Bosc Estate Vineyard. It shows a beautiful nose of ripe citrus, apple blossom, grapefruit, touches of ginger and flinty minerality and displays the ripeness of the vintage. It has good bite on the palate from fairly lively acidity and displays brilliantly the apple-citrus fruit, the underlying spice note and crisp finish. Can age for two or three years.

The Foreign Affair Riesling 2009 ($25, 88 points) — This Riesling sees 20% of the grapes dried. It shows a nose of sweet tropical fruit, pineapple and pulpy citrus. It’s weighty (for a Riesling) with complex flavours, a mineral edge and balancing acidity. Such beautiful concentration through the finish.

The Good Earth Dry Riesling 2010 ($20, 88 points) — This is how winemaker Andrea Glass likes her Riesling — clean, crisp and bone dry. “I love dry Riesling,” she says. “It’s the quintessential oyster wine or with anything else you can squeeze a lemon on.” The nose displays, not surprisingly, fresh-squeezed lemon, apples and just a hint of peach. It is quite austere on the palate with citrus-grapefruit fruit and wet-stone minerality.

13th_Street_Premier_Cuvée_Brut_Sparkling_Wine_web13th Street Premier Cuvee Brut 2008 ($35, 90 points) — A blend of 55% Pinot Noir and 45% Chardonnay made in the traditional method. It possesses a lovely bready-yeasty nose with citrus, creamy pear and vanilla toast notes. It hits the palate in waves of racy acidity, bubbles, citrus, baked apple and biscotti. The finish is finessed and long lasting. Another argument why this winery is one of the finest in the region for making sparkling wines.

Le Clos Jordanne Claystone Terrace Chardonnay 2009 ($40, 89 points) — A nose that’s very tight at the moment (reviewed a year ago) but shows flinty minerality, wood smoke, lemon and bright apple notes as it opens up in the glass. On the palate, it’s a fresh attack of stone fruits, minerals and spice with a firm core of racy acidity and creamy oak spices. Cellar for three to five years.

Bachelder Niagara Saunders Vineyard Chardonnay 2010 ($45, 91 points) — This single-vineyard Niagara Chard from the Beamsville Bench is the tightest of the three Niagara wines made by Thomas Bachelder (tasted last summer), especially on the nose, but I anticipate it will open up with a little more bottle age. It’s showing baked apple, some cream and spice and a touch of flinty minerality on the nose. It’s much more expressive on the palate with broad stone fruit flavours, poached pear, cream and spicy caramel and toasted oak flavours. Lovely.

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Le Clos Jordanne La Petite Colline Pinot Noir 2009 ($45, 89 points) – The most thought-provoking Pinot in the Le Clos 2009 collection. The nose is laced with stony minerality, red currants, bramble fruit, violets, savoury spices and wood smoke. It is a powerful Pinot in the mouth, still very young and somewhat tight, but revealing cranberry-cherry flavours, a core of minerality, lovely spice box notes, cedar and texture built around of core of plush tannins. It’s smooth and balanced through the finish with firm acidity.

Malivoire Mottiar Vineyard Pinot Noir 2009 ($40, 91 points) — The fruit for this Pinot is from winemaker Shiraz Mottiar’s personal vineyard on the Beamsville Bench and is a blend of five different clones. The nose is all about rich, ripe and intense red berries that are nicely spiced with vanilla and oak. So delicious on the palate with defining red fruits, silky tannins and silky smooth all the way through the finish.

Other Niagara wines released but not reviewed:

Featherstone Cabernet Franc 2011 ($17)

Fielding Estate Vidal Icewine 2010 ($23 for 200 ml)

Peninsula Ridge McNally Vineyards Proprietor’s Reserve Pinot Noir 2010