essex wine report

during the dark days there were no wineries here and the best canadian wines could best be described as carbarator cleaner, but boy did nafta change this. our illustrious gov't decided to protect the beer industry. in return it opened up the wine market and thus would sacrifice the domestic vitners. well fast forward to 2006 and guess what?? canadian beer is getting worse by the second and the wine; well, it wins awards.

prior to prohibition essex county grew grapes and made wine.  well it took about 50 years for the industry to restart.

my happiest one has to be erie shores. its tucked down in the southest part of the county(just south of harrow) on county road 50. its not big and the retail store is quite small. don't bring in 50 of your closest friends with you or you'll be tasting in shifts but its cute. its funny but it seems all the little wineries down here feature the winery cat and yes they have one. i really don't understand the relevancy of this but i just realized that the wineries i like all have cats.

county road 50 goes along the lake and they are on the north side of it. the other side features a small farm field then some "quite small" cottages so they definitely get the lake effect.  there must be something special down there as there is a cluster of wineries opening up in the area. down the road will be viewpoint(when it finally opens). if its all i hear it will be, it will be a destination winery worthy of any appellation.

in years past my favorite summer/deck wine was vinho verde. happy bright and just was great with a barbee or sippin. i'd keep a case on hand.

now, its erie shores. their rose is superb and now replaces vinho verde for me. their reiesling, blanc de blanc do it for me too.

 rose- it was the first modern one i had had. forget mateus or the cheap french rose's. this is crisp and fresh and not sweet. this is the perfect deck wine. the ones i bought in niagara are real nice but they lack the happiness of this wine.

riesling- another winner. crisp in style, very refreshing. i tend to like the big round ones but guess what, i really like this one. was at the winery with a friend who likes big round german rieslings and he liked it too. another great summer wine.

blanc de blanc- crisp fresh. had this while making pasta with the yute. maybe the fact that he turned the pasta machine rather than me helped but i really enjoyed it.

chardonnay- here we go again tso( the significant other) likes chardonnays so i buy them in protest. but i'm starting to like some of the good ones and this one i like. i guess i've just had to many over oaked australians. 

as its been real hot down here lately, i haven't been drinking reds but theirs are good too. i especially like the duet.

to sum it up, they make happy wine. its not expensive and is actually quite a bargain. go to the winery and meet alma and harvey and you will get it too. they are just real nice people who seem so happy making wine. this comes across in their product. the snootiness of some of the niagara types isn't here. what i'm struck with is that they look so pleased when you try the wine and like it.

that sums it up. my basic rule is that if i can see a 20ish sofia loren stomping the grapes when i try the wine its a winner and their wines do it for me.