Tonight I tried a wine that I sampled at the
Savour Stratford event a couple of weekends ago. It was a Semillon from Rosewood Estates in Niagara. Now for those that don`t know Semillon is a famous French grape, used in the making of Sauternes, and has also found a home in Australia, but not much is grown in Ontario. In the past, Rosewood has usually put the grape into a white blend, but the last two years have seen a straight dry white made from this grape. Last year I slipped the 2008 Rosewood version a 4-and-a-half-star rating and was excited to try the newest incarnation of this wine when it was offered to me at the Stratford event. The vines are a mere 6-years-old (babies in the vine-world), but are showing some real maturity in the glass. This wine was a horse of a different colour when compared to last year`s version, but it proved to be equally as good. The nose was tropical with pineapple, peach and green apple skin aromas. Palate was liking biting into the aforementioned green apple but with peach and grapefruit pith backing it up; there even seemed to be a faint hint of something minerally here. The finish was long and citrusy with really good acidity for backbone. At $18.00 this really is a steal. I won`t hazard a guess as to ageing potential because this wine is tasty right now, and so thoroughly enjoyable. If you want to lie it down be my guest, but keeping it down might be the tough part - you`ll want to break into another bottle as soon as the first one is finished.
