Lake Erie North Shore

With Gary Killops

April 2010

Things are changing at Colio Estate Wines, Ontario’s 5 th largest winery. As the Lake Erie North Shore winery prepares to open their new building on the Niagara River a new “Lake & River series” appears to be set to replace their “Colio Estate - VQA Varietals and Premium Blends”

Currently four wines have been released in the series.

River Rock Red 2008 , a blend of Cabernet Franc, Shiraz, Merlot, and Cab Sauvignon.

Moonlight White 2009 , a blend of Chardonnay and Gewurztraminer.

Rose 2009 , a blend of Villard Noir, Pinot Noir, and Vidal.

These three wines are VQA Ontario.

The forth wine in this series is a Cabernet Sauvignon 2008, which is VQA Niagara Peninsula.

A Cab Franc and Baco Noir will be released soon.

All of the labels feature a canoe which has appeared on the last two versions of their general list wines that make their way into the LCBO.

This new look will replace the ugly yellow / orange labels. The original concept of the bright orange and yellow labels was to make them stand out on the shelves at the LCBO. It was a branding idea by someone in marketing that didn’t work.

The series will also follow Colio’s “Girl’s Night Out” series by using the Stelvin style screw caps.

While a few Niagara wineries have made the move to the Stelvin style screw caps Colio is the first Lake Erie North Shore winery to give them a try. Pelee Island Winery also recently started using the Stelvin caps on their new Light House series.

Screw caps are still a controversial issue. There is still a lot of public perception that wines with screw caps are cheap wines. Colio has opted to introduce these caps in their VQA wines which is a sign of quality. Public perception may take some time and education but it’s the right move. Most wines bottled in New Zealand now use a screw cap. Perhaps with the help of New Zealand, even those in the Vintages section perception of screw caps will be a thing of the past.

The general list of Colio wines that are found in the LCBO are not meant to be cellared. They are drink now wines so replacing the cork with a screw cap is a good idea. This totally eliminates the possibly of faulted corked wines due to TCA which is common in about 5% of all wines with cork stoppers.

About Gary Killops

Gary writes and reviews wines from Lake Erie North Shore and Pelee Island wine regions on his blog at http://www.EssexWineReview.com Growing up in Essex County he wasn't aware that there were so many local wineries producing excellent wines. A visit to a local winery one Saturday afternoon changed that. Now most weekends are spent visiting wineries, talking with wine makers and enjoying wine from the area.

Gary's report Nov 09, Dec 09 Feb 10

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