Pinot Noir on the Niagara Peninsula

After a long and curious absence the peripatetic visitor has returned. Not me, the visitor is the wine tasting event, which hasn’t graced our living room in almost two years. On this occasion, the theme was Pinot Noir, from “anywhere in the world.” 

Living on the Niagara Peninsula in the heart of Ontario wine country has introduced us to a number of local wines including Pinot Noir. And as expected, wines in this region have a different taste and style than other Pinot-growing regions. Although our guests could bring wines from anywhere, in fact we had wines from Ontario, British Columbia, Oregon, and California (including 2 wines from the same local winery but from differing years).

There were eleven guests and 6 bottles of Pinot. We began as usual with an aperitif wine, a local sparkling Cuvee from Henry of Pelham Winery here in St Catharines, one of Dory’s favorites.

Here are the wines:

A) La Frenz, Naramata Bench Pinot Noir, Okanagan Vally, BC, Canada. $28. 2013, 13.5%

B) The Foreign Affair Pinot Noir “Ciao”, 2009, Niagara Peninsula, Ontario, Canada. $34. 14.2%

C) Keint-He Voyageur Pinot Noir, 2013, Niagara Peninsula, Ontario, Canada. $19. 12.5%

D) King Estate Pinot Noir, Signature Collection, Eugene, Oregon, 2013, 13.5% $26 (US)

E) The Foreign Affair Pinot Noir, 2010, Niagara Peninsula, Ontario, Canada. $34. 14.2%

F) Fog’s Reach, J. Lohr Winery, Arroyo Seco Monterey California, 2012, $40, 14.9%

Pinot Noir can be wildly different depending on where it is from and how the winemaker chooses to make it. It is sometimes light and fruity, sometimes rich and earthy, sometimes showing lots of depth and sometimes fairly simple. Our guests showed a wide range in how they scored these wines - one wine was rated 4/20 by one guest and 20/20 by another guest! Clearly tastes differ according to the preferences of the individual. 

The top wines, based on the scores on a blind tasting sheet, were a tie between B) Foreign Affair Ciao 2009 and F) Fog’s Reach J Lohr 2012. Several of us thought they might be the same wine, because we knew there was a duplicate bottle. Both these wines are on the full side of the taste spectrum, with lots of complexity with flavors evolving over time.

There was (almost) a double - two bottles of Foreign Affair Pinot Noir from different years. The older, 2009 bottle (B), with the word “Ciao” printed on the label, was preferred over the 2010 (E), which scored 5th. The temperature of the 2010 was colder, and that certainly made a difference, but it’s hard to tell if that is the whole story.

The King Estate (D) from Oregon came in 3rd, complex but lighter in body than the top scoring wines. The Keint-He Voyager Pinot from Wellington, Ontario was another lighter bodied wine, fruity, and it scored 4th. Finally, the LaFrenz (A) from British Columbia was light bodied, fruity but not special and it scored 6th.

In the more than 12 years of doing these wine tastings I’ve come to be less interested in the numerical rankings and more interested in how the rankings express individual taste preferences. My take away from this is that bigger taste profiles, with complex flavors that evolve over time, are preferred by more people. I like those bigger wines, no question. But I’m also learning to appreciate some more subtle wines. I liked ALL these wines, and it was really interesting to see the variety.