Sucky Ontario wine

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Sucky Ontario wine

Written by Eric Mathurin

Friday, 09 January 2009

I was in the LCBO the other day picking up a bottle of wine for dinner when the person in line next to me, a "hipster" in his early twenties, asked his friend to grab another bottle of wine. He then snidely uttered the following blasphemous statement: “Nothing from Ontario!”

The bottle I had in hand was indeed an Ontario wine. I couldn’t help but glance over at the bottle he already had to see what superior vino he was purchasing. It was, unsurprisingly, a bottle of hugely popular Yellow Tail Chardonnay.

But that’s really beside the point—popular doesn't mean bad.

What irked me was the implied blanket statement that Ontario wine, as a whole, bites. That would be tantamount to judging the whole of all Australian wine on the basis of the very existence of the popular, ubiquitous Yellow Tail, Little Penguin and other [Insert Crazy Animal Named Wine Here] brands. In fact, the Australian wine industry is trying to distance itself from the very oaky, jammy, vanilla-infused brands and “style” that have been popularized there because Australia does make many very different styles of wines. So if you don't like Yellow Tail, they have a lot more to offer.

True, there are a lot of crummy “Ontario” wines. The majority of which are actually “Cellared in Canada” wines like Sawmill Creek whose grapes need not, in fact, even originate in Canada. They may have been vinted here, or merely just bottled. These are table wines of varying qualities that may or may not be total crap or value for the dollar.

It is also true that some wines bearing the VQA label (meaning 100% of the grapes were grown in the region) may be terrible quality. Wine is an agricultural product and the season could have been bad or quality could have slipped somewhere in the production. Or they could be trying to make wine in bulk, as cheaply as possible, to meet the demand for a low price-point wine. But, by and large, Ontario makes some truly tasty and quality wines and it would be a shame not to at least acknowledge the fact—even if most or many Ontario styles haven’t suited your particular taste.

Tastes change with time, though.

When it comes to wine, everyone seems to have an opinion. Whether it’s informed or not, there is only one opinion that matters most and that is always right: Which wines taste good to you. If it’s Yellow Tail, so be it. But let’s not confuse quality and taste—the objective and the subjective. Most wine reviewers that I’ve read (such as Globe and Mail columnist Beppi Crosariol and wine writers Bill Munnelly and Tony Aspler) recognize this point and are rarely snobs about wine. They truly love wine, and drink lots of it—all grape varieties, from all countries, in all styles, and at all price ranges.

Ontario has some high quality wines, period.

Whether you like them or not.

I’m not an expert on the subject of Ontario wine but I know what I like. (For now. At this point in my life. For some occasions.) And I recognize these local wines as high quality, and highly drinkable to my (current) tastes: Clos Jordanne Pinot Noir and Chardonnay; Stratus Red, Cabernet Franc and White; Henry of Pelham Baco Noir; Malivoire Gamay; Tawse Merlot; Cave Springs Reisling, Gamay and Chardonnay; Stoney Ridge Musqué; Flat Rock Pinot Noir. Awwww… geez! There’s just too many to list, and too many still to try! A good source for local wine information is Billy’s Best Bottles and The Wine Atlas of Canada by Tony Aspler.

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