 | | VinoCellar.com Wine Forums | |
| |
| | | Author | Messages | |
ChangeMe
Grape Destemmer
Posts:53
 | | 06/22/2006 2:13 AM |
| I'm not sure if anyone's posted/discussed this place before, but since I came out of Online retirement (i.e. my last term at University) and didn't find it listed, I thought I should.
Those interested on some background reading can find it here:
(Home Page)
http://www.warmlakeestate.com/index.html
(Wine Business Monthly)
http://www.winebusiness.com/html/MonthlyArticle.cfm?dataId=37564
This is a newer venture by a former Lockheed-Martin engineer named Mike VonHeckler and 39 investors to create explicitly Pinot Noir on the US side of the Niagara escarpment. In fact, the story [as I've heard it] is that based on the winery's lobbying, the Niagara Escarpment was listed as an AVA this past October.
They make three wines from Pinot Noir: a top-tier bottling ("Warm Lake Estate" label @ $40USD), a mid-range drinker ("Mountain Road" label @$25USD), and Port-style dessert plonk ("Glacé Noir" label @$20USD). Trick is, he's created enough hype that he sells futures of the top bottling. Brilliant in terms of marketing, but as for the wine, well...
I'll say that I wasn't thrilled. Maybe it's the vintage year, but I think there may have been problems in production. I didn't take down notes there, but my report is forthcoming after I do some vol/acre math. However, if anyone else has anecdotes or opinions about Warm Lake, this could be a great place to share them.
Otherwise, I hope everyone's been well since I last posted. I'll be sure to post my thoughts on the wine/winery tomorrow. | | | |
| Pool Boy
Laurl, MD (DC suburb)
Master of Wine
Posts:13698
| | 06/22/2006 3:31 AM |
| | Haven't been up to Notl to try some wine in the Botl in 9 years I think, but this sounds like it might just be a lot of hype. I look forward to your specific TNs. | |
www.roguefood.com -- www.cellartracker.com | |
| ChangeMe
Grape Destemmer
Posts:53
| | 06/23/2006 1:32 AM |
| So, as promised, the wine... and I'm not assigning points, I don't think it's fair to here... you can read why.
For $2.50 per person we were allowed to sample all three wines, though I don't think that's a refundable sampling... at least it wasn't yesterday.
2004 "Mountain Road" Pinot Noir ($24.99)
In a word, forgettable. I'm not saying it was a terrible wine, it just did not stand out to me. Light colour - it straddled the border of red, copper, and faint purple. Alcohol was (ballpark) 12%, but the structure featured elegance over power. The flavour profile was slightly unsettled, some green edges that bounced off a moderate mix of floral, berry and earthiness. I'd expect to pay $15 Canadian for a bottle like that here.
2004 "Warm Lake" Pinot Noir ($39.99)
Bigger wine, denser flavour, structure of acidity much greater. Great oak too, French without a doubt. Light enough to pass for some Gamays though. 12.5% alc/vol. On those conditions, I'd say that I preferred it to the "Mountain Road" blend. However... let's look at the wine itself. Crimson/rust colour, it's as though a pinkish-magenta is trying to emerge. (Colour stabilization seemed to be an issue - I've heard of Pinot losing it if not properly treated, but this was ridiculous.) As I sipped more, it integrated cranberry, violet, mushroom and blackberry with a subtle note of rust. Yeah... it might have been psychosomatic, but I honestly thought I picked up rust. It's possible the colour was a result of oxidation; tasted a tad oxidized too. And another note on appearance: slight haziness. Probably unfiltered? Faint waft of sulfur, probably from excessive added sulfites. And that was $40US per bottle. Now, maybe this was a bad bottle, but other tasting notes I saw indicated the same thing. They glossed over the chemical faults though... I think that the focus in the winemaking was more on having cool 'techniques' rather than science. Check out their webpage for more on that. And again, I'm not trying to knock them: 2004 was a hard year around this area, but this is just a tough sell at $40.
Future Samples were sold for $7.99. I purchased a small vial, good to fill 2/3 to 3/4 of a standard glass. Much better colour, but nothing too different from what I'd expected/tasted earlier. Heck, it's just a barrel sample in a tiny glass bottle.]
2004 Glacé Noir ($19.99 for 375mL)
Slightly funky with a light cherry aroma. Bordered on a 5PM Spitoon smell, but was muted at that, though. Masked heavily by higher alcohol and sugar. And again, not trying to be mean... but I could taste the texture of some sugar. 17% alc and 10% sugar (or 100 grams/L, approx). Well chilled, so no heat coming off the alcohol... slightly creamy, it was oak aged apparently (at least according to the out-of-place big print on the label)... it was made from the unusuable "triage" fruit: hand sorted stuff that wasn't to be wasted. Calling it "Glacé" is a misleading name for Icewine fans like myself. $20 for a half bottle of Port style wine that needs to be heavily chilled doesn't really appeal to me.
Anyways, other than that, the staff was very friendly. Judging from how the lady approached us initially it's fair to say they get a mix of non-wine drinkers along with the heavy buyers. Makes me wonder who's buying all the futures though. Apparently they only made 26 barrels in 2005. That's less than 6,000L of wine off "45 acres". Unless there are more vineyards below the escarpment site, there's no way they have 45 acres planted on their property. Even lowballing a 650L crush per tonne, that'd place the entire '05 harvest at 9 tonnes. Canada's Niagara Region saw HEAVY crop damage in the 04/05 winter, but 45 acres should have yielded more if the vines were indeed hilled up to avoid winter-kill.
Anyways, the way '06 has been over here so far, the vines are booming. We've got grapes all over the place just itching to be harvested. I worry about overcropping of course, but we'll see what happens. One producer has already reduced his Pinot clusters by 60%, but others are going to gamble on getting the heat to move volumes up for other vinifera. Like I say, we'll see what happens.
On the whole though, I was very encouraged by the efforts and attempts by VonHeckler. He's got a vision, a plan, and most definitely a clientale. Warm Lake is in a tough spot to grow grapes, and Pinot's tough enough as it is. What surprises me is the elevation - I would have expected him to be lower to capture Lake Ontario's more blatant benefits. Maybe there's a good slope I just didn't notice, or another ridge beyond what I could see. In any case, the vines I saw driving in looked partly damaged; some were dead. Might have been spring frost, the winter was mild this year on the whole.
I'm going to cross my fingers for years to come, the heart is there for sure (even if my wallet isn't). | | | |
|
| | You are not authorized to post a reply. |
|
| |
ActiveForums 3.7 |
| |
| |
|
| | Proposed Change to American Viticultural Area Naming Standards Monday, March 10, 2008
| Wine Primers - Links to Your Wine Education Tuesday, February 12, 2008
| Wine Country Report: Day trip to the Willamette Valley Monday, February 11, 2008
| VinoCellar's Favorite Wine Links Saturday, February 09, 2008
| Wine Retailer Reports - Thanks Winetex! Monday, February 04, 2008
|
|
| |
| |
| |  | Membership: |  | Latest:looper |  | New Today:0 |  | New Yesterday:1 |  | Overall:2041 |
 | People Online: |  | Visitors:110 |  | Members:5 |  | Total:115 |
|
|
| |
| |
|