#GoGamayGo is the cry, a hashtag extraordinaire created by the one, the only Janet Dorozynski, JDo to everyone at WineAlign. I could expound upon and extoll the virtues of Canada’s great bright red varietal light but what might I be able to say that hasn’t already been sung by Treve Ring? Head over to WineAlign for a look at Treve’s succinct and exacted Gamay dissertation and the results of the Gamay flights/Medal winners at this year’s National Wine Awards of Canada.

Related – Results of the 2018 WineAlign National Wine Awards of Canada (The Nationals): Gamay

In the spirit of the winners, competitors and Ontario growers who champion this most important and essential grape, here are 12 recently tasted local examples, including five tasted blind at NWAC18.

Adamo Gamay Noir Unoaked Huebel Grape Estates 2017, Niagara On The Lake, Ontario (Winery, $17.25, WineAlign)

A bit muted and sleepy-musty but opens up into a rich and tangy, deep-fruited wine with zip and zest on the palate. Would like to know the fruit source. Means so well… so perhaps in a few months time it will shed a layer of lift and become something approaching the gamay ethereal. Drink 2019-2022. Tasted blind at NWAC18, June 2018  adamoestatewinery  @AdamoEstateWine  @adamoestatewinery

Malivoire Gamay 2017, VQA Beamsville Bench, Ontario (591313, $17.95, WineAlign)

Straight up juicy gamay, of blessed red cherries, tart, crunchy and if nothing more, it really doesn’t matter. This is exactly what you want from the grape. Fresh and bright, so bloody drinkable. Drink 2018-2020. Tasted blind at NWAC18, June 2018  malivoire  noble_estates  @MalivoireWine  @Noble_Estates  Malivoire Wine  Noble Estates Wine & Spirits

Malivoire Gamay 2016, VQA Beamsville Bench, Ontario (591313, $17.95, WineAlign)

In every ostensible way the rule of gamay goings are perpetuated on and on from Malivoire’s entry level effort in 2016. The fruit is full to welling over the pressed edge, the acidity sharp and contrastive and the sense of place firmly etched in your face. This is Niagara gamay though I find it possessing a position one rung down on the bright and lifted ladder. It’s nothing if not a parochially produced, exemplary pleasure to drink. Drink 2018-2020.  Tasted February 2018  malivoire  noble_estates  @MalivoireWine  @Noble_Estates  Malivoire Wine  Noble Estates Wine & Spirits

Peller Estates Private Reserve Gamay Noir 2016, VQA Niagara Peninsula, Ontario (Winery, $18.95, WineAlign)

Savoury and reductive gamay, turns a varietal phrase as it should with fruit and brass in pocket. Juicy and Ontario intense. Delicious stuff, full of fruit in and out complexities, crunchy and beefy layering. Drink 2018-2022.  Tasted blind at NWAC18, June 2018  pellerwines  @PellerVQA  @PellerEstates

Château Des Charmes Gamay Noir Droit St. David’s Bench Vineyard 2016, VQA St. David’s Bench, Ontario (346742, $18.95, WineAlign)

Unusually reductive for the always charming CdC gamay a little bit of agitation will go along way to revealing that great gamay smile. Still it’s a game you need to play because this warm and layered 2016 is locked tight, ante-fresh and yet reeling from the air outside. The palate is deeply forged with ferric, hematic and Cru-Bojo meets nebbiolo tarry structure. The greatest of gamay tannins are sold into capture around this fruit like grains of chains surrounding un-popped plum and wild berry bubbles. While admittedly a bit heavy for gamay just wait for this to burst and give away what it’s got hidden away. Drink 2018-2022.  Tasted December 2017  chateaudescharmes  @MBosc  Château des Charmes

Malivoire Gamay Small Lot 2016, VQA Beamsville Bench, Ontario (Agent, $19.95, WineAlign)

Malivoire’s most important and benchmark Ontario Rosé is one of the first to the table from the 2017 vintage and why not because its quick soak and lightness of being takes no time at all to get ready. This is the antithetical beauty of Rosé and how it must be approached for best results. Malivoire does not take a step forward from the most perfect ’15 and ’16 wines but there is more fruit in this ’17. You can actually nose and taste strawberry plus a hint of tart raspberry. This will appeal to more of the general Rosé loving populace without any compromise for the provincial, provençal geeks everywhere else. It’s ostensibly a better wine in 2017 because it will attract that growing audience without having made any concessions or dis to authenticity. Drink 2018-2021.  Tasted February 2018  malivoire  noble_estates  @MalivoireWine  @Noble_Estates  Malivoire Wine  Noble Estates Wine & Spirits

13th Street Gamay Noir 2016, VQA Niagara Peninsula, Ontario (177824, $19.95, WineAlign)

Here is what 13th Street does best in bring it with honesty style from their wide ranging stable of wines. The essence of Peninsula gamay is captured and with dusty, arid help from the dehydrated vintage. The fruit is ripe, dark and tangy, amalgamating blueberry, mulberry and black purple currants in just the right amount of sapid ways. This is the clean and clear gamay from 13th Street and winemaker J.P. Colas. Drink 2017-2020. Tasted October 2017 and February 2018  13thstreetwinery  @13thStreetWines  13th Street Winery

Southbrook Gamay Triomphe Laundry Vineyard 2016, VQA Vinemount Ridge, Ontario (Winery, $21.75, WineAlign)

Southbrook’s take on Escarpment gamay is more floral than savoury, heightened in timbre and lifted with a bit of awe, like flipping a coin,”heads for her, tails for me.” Not that such a sweetly scented and easily understood wine should invoke Dickens or any other literary distraction but life does seem to slow down with this in hand. It celebrates what gamay can be in Ontario; lithe, fresh, crystalline and balanced. For a brief respite from “the great crises of our laborious human lives,” try a glass of this effortless and inspiring gamay, to be “settled by the idle inspiration of a moment.” Alluring juice from Heather Laundry’s organic Vinemount Ridge vineyard. Drink 2018-2021.  Tasted January 2018 southbrookvineyards  thelivingvine  @SouthbrookWine  @TheLivingVine  Southbrook Vineyards  The Living Vine inc.

13th Street Gamay Whitty Vineyard 2016, VQA Creek Shores, Ontario (Winery, $23.95, WineAlign)

Pressed, with roll-up dried and leathery deep cherry. Also savoury, indelibly caked by a clay funk and then at the finish just a bit of astringency. Cru-esque to be sure but right now a bit nervy and bitter. Let it settle, amalgamate, stretch its gamay legs and ultimately deliver some much solicited and due pleasure. Drink 2018-2020.  Tasted blind at NWAC18, June 2018   13thstreetwinery  @13thStreetWines  13th Street Winery

Leaning Post Gamay Wismer Armbrust Vineyard 2016, VQA Niagara Peninsula, Ontario (Agent, $28.95, WineAlign)

Something has really changed. Call it wisdom, call it experience, call it Wismer but gamay by Leaning Post has morphed and moved into a new place. Just as cured salumi meaty as before and reeking, part fresh flower bouquet and part bouquet garni. Still firm, grippy even, but now with structure, at cru level so to know that probability’s best is yet to come. Impossibly easy to drink however, with a subdue in near absence of the Bretty attitude and then the kicker, a feeling you could very well be drinking pinot noir. Not because of density, extraction or pressing but from the bones and the delicate flesh inextricably woven through the corporeal body. That this juice spent approximately 25 days on its skins and came out this lithe, fine-grained and so very focused is a Wismer-Senchuk reality. “We like our gamay to taste like gamay but act like pinot and this wine definitely delivers” is truth self-spoken. To date this is one of Ontario’s greatest gamays. Drink 2018-2021.  Tasted February 2018  leaningpostwine  nicholaspearcewines  @LeaningPostWine  @Nicholaspearce_  Leaning Post Wines  Nicholas Pearce

Tawse Gamay Noir Cherry Avenue Vineyard 2016, VQA Twenty Mile Bench, Ontario (Winery, $28.95, WineAlign)

Good gamay. Fruit and just a hint of cru tension. A bit of hue and hewed addendum. Real fruit. Proper fruit. Really tight. Drink 2018-2020.  Tasted blind at NWAC18, June 2018   tawsewinery  @Tawse_Winery  @tawsewines

Leaning Post Gamay The Natural Unfiltered 2016, VQA Twenty Mile Bench, Ontario (Agent, $35.00, WineAlign)

The Natural comes dancing in, with no obvious Ontario gamay precedence and in waves of WTF as part of the Leaning Post Antique Series. It’s neither Geek (riesling) nor Freak (pinot noir) but its exotic scents and wax-resist texture make me think of Javanese batik. In the habitual way of natural wines the cloudy demure and silky tannic salve are pretty much a given but it’s almost as if there is a shell or sour candied beet glaze that locks something in, a flavour profile undefined and in terms of texture, is quite waxy. Like patterned areas on a cloth protected so they won’t receive the colour that other parts will, this gamay hides away part of its charm and winemaker Ilya Senchuck’s self-professed idiom of “can’t quite put my finger on it” runs particularly true. Fresh and light gamay it is not, nor is it the deep cru suspect of Senchuk’s magnificent Wismer Armbrust Vineyard 2016. It’s an endangered animal, fascinating, almost prehistoric, vital to varietal knowledge and with respect to gamay, very crushable. Low in alcohol, high in acidity but thanks to the whole-cluster, incessant punchdown and gentle pressing/racking elévage it turned out smoky and dreamy instead of bright and volatile. It’s the new antediluvian gamay, confounding but true. Drink 2018-2021.  Tasted March 2018  leaningpostwine  nicholaspearcewines  @LeaningPostWine  @Nicholaspearce_  Leaning Post Wines  Nicholas Pearce

Good to Go!

Godello

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