Wine Tour 2: Malivoire

Sorry for the delay . . . my home internet connection has been wonky for the last little while, so I'm having to dial up via another account. This should have been posted yesterday.

Second stop of the day, as the rain began to come down, was Malivoire. It was going to be our third stop, but Thomas & Vaughan across the street wasn't open for tasting.

We'd spent more time at Angels Gate than we'd originally intended, so we kept our tasting down to a minimum (never a good plan when you're on a tasting tour, I assure you). The tasting area at Malivoire has been revamped since the last time I visited, with a couple of stainless steel tanks moved out of the way to allow a larger area for visitors. It certainly made the area seem much less cramped than it used to.

The 2004 Estate Bottled Gewürztraminer had a nose I can only describe as being "Turkish Delight": rose and lemon. Very unusual. The wine had some of the oily mouth-feel that true Alsace Gewürztraminers often have — this is a good thing — but there was a slight bitterness on the finish that didn't seem to belong.

The 2003 Courtney Single Block Gamay was quite good: this has been a consistently big wine each vintage I've tried. The nose had some black pepper and earth with something resembling fresh-cut paper (yeah, I know, but I'm just reporting what I smelled). The body had good fruitiness up front and a long finish. Very nice, but I'm afraid it's a little over my budget for Gamays at $25 per bottle.

The 2003 Estate Bottled Cabernet Franc is a wine that can be cellared for a few years. It's drinking well now, but there's lots of tannic structure to allow it to continue developing for a while. The predominant aromas on the nose are violet flowers and redcurrant jam. The wine has good body, and a long finish.

The last wine I tried was the Limited Edition 2003 Old Vines Foch. I'm not much of a fan of hybrids like Foch and Baco, but this is certainly a big, burly red wine. The most noticeable thing coming out of the glass was an aroma similar to chocolate malt! On the palate, there's plenty of black pepper and black cherry flavour, with (to me) a bit of unwelcome green pepper flavour. A medium-long finish. This is, as the name says, a limited edition, so if you'd like to get some, you'll need to act quickly . . . they're selling out fast.