Foxtrot Pinot Noir, 2009: The Opening

It is no secret that we are big fans of Foxtrot Pinot Noir from the Naramata Bench in BC's Okanagan Valley.

Readers of this blog may remember that we volunteered to help with their 2009 harvest and ended up picking about 3500kg of grapes over two very happy October days.

We stopped in to see the good Foxtrot family again in August 2010 and were offered a taste of how the 2009 was developing in the barrels.

In April of 2012, the day we were waiting for finally arrived, and the 2009 Pinot Noir was released.

Aya made an appropriate feast for our first taste: roast pork with a mushroom cream sauce, polenta with truffle oil, and delicious summer green beans with garlic.

The wine was amazing.

We chilled it for about 20 minute, and straight out of the bottle it showed those New World, cool-climate Pinot Noir characteristics of bright red fruit. But it quickly began to reveal a little black pepper, tea and earthiness that Foxtrot is famous for. The big surprise, however, was how it developed over the hour and a half that it was open; it just got better and better, more and more complex, while staying balanced, nuanced and supple. It still had not peaked by the time our glasses were empty and we found ourselves sniffing our glasses all through dessert and afterwards, hanging on to the last whiffs of this wine's deep character.

We received our bottles just before we left for Japan, so we were able to take one to Aya's father. We didn't open the Foxtrot while we were there, but stored it safely in his cellar. With any luck we will open it with him next time, and, after tasting this first bottle, we are sure he will enjoy it as much as he does his favourite Burgundies.

Birthday Wine: Foxtrot Pinot Noir

Some special food for a recent birthday:

Rambutan!

Mangosteen!

Buying one of these outside of Thailand is always a gamble. Despite their thick skin, they bruise easily (see the brownish bits) and the bright yellow is a sign of doom:

Injury to outer skin results in percolation of bitter latex into the edible flesh, which makes the whole fruit bitter and inedible.

 We got to this one just in time. A good half of it was perfect: snowy white, membranous and thick with tropical flavour.

Not pictured: Passion fruit! We slurped up its aromatic, crunchy seeds so quickly we forgot to take a photo.

Dinner started with some fat scallops.

And continued with pork in a rich, cream sauce.

Served with the excellent Pinot Noir from Foxtrot from the Naramata Bench in the Okanagan.

Very much in demand, this Pinot is quickly coming to exemplify the Naramata terroir. Medium-bodied with classic cherry and slight earthy notes, it has a rich, supple finish reminiscent of the famous Burgundies. While not as acidic, it has amazing balance and well deserves its growing reputation.

Puffball Mushroom

Giant puffball!
Found on a walk near Mum's cottage on Amherst Island.

Thick, floppy slices. The interior pure, soft and springy, like marshmallow but not spongy.

The thick, leathery rind peels off all in one piece.

Into the hot butter.

Golden, and filling the house with a deep, earthy aroma.

Just some salt and pepper. Wishing we had a cold Chardonnay or a cold-climate Pinot Noir. 

Next round: smaller pieces to encourage more crispy golden edges.

We tried some with sautéed garlic, too. Absolutely delicious!

Dig-Dig #13: Foxtrot, Bromley Rock, and Home

Our destination in the Okanagan was Foxtrot Vineyards, where we helped harvest their fat, juicy Pinot Noir grapes last October.
The grapes are slowly ripening in the heat and we are looking forward to joining the harvest again this year.

But August is time for peaches, and we were generously allowed to take all we could carry of these honeyed, aromatic marvels.

Translucent yellow plums, too. This is just to say...

Our real reason for visiting Foxtrot was an opportunity to barrel-taste the 2009 Pinot Noir. Kicki and Anna-Marie were very generous with their time, helping us understand what we were tasting. The different toasted oak barrels and yeasts impart very different flavours and characters, but in each sample there were the tell-tale signs of their famous Foxtrot Pinot Noir. Soon it will be bottled and then released some time in 2012. We can't wait to open a bottle of wine whose grapes we helped harvest.

Foxtrot's Pinot Noir has been awarded one of the few extremely prestigious Lieutenant Governor’s Awards for Excellence in British Columbia Wines. Anyone who has tasted this amazing wine will know that the recognition is well-deserved.

From John Shreiner's famous blog:
"Seventy-one wineries submitted 281 wines for one of the toughest of British Columbia’s wine competitions. A maximum of 12 awards are available. This year, 11 awards will be presented to winemakers at the end of July by Lieutenant Government Stephen Point..."

With our car full of fruit and a couple of mixed cases of wine from the Naramata Bench and Black Sage Road, we made our way home. In the heat it was hard to resist stopping for a swim at Bromley Rock Provincial Park, so we didn't. The water was the coldest of the whole trip, but it felt wonderful. Aya bravely managed a full dip, to her screaming delight.

Just one last stop in Chilliwack for a dozen ears of sugar-sweet corn, and then we were home. Five thousand kilometers in eleven days.