B.C. WINE NEEDS MORE RELATABLE LABELS
As the weather warms up and the snowpack begins to melt many of us will turn our attention to returning to the interior to discover B.C. wine country.
Not that long ago that meant the Okanagan, but we know now with so many emerging regions, and sub-regions to explore that our 1990s valley terminology is in serious need of an upgrade. Modern wine touring is tied to geography and geology, and despite the many industry deniers, consumers are embracing the idea that place matters.
During his recent visit to the Vancouver International Wine Festival Spanish wine icon Alvaro Palacios spoke of “mystical Priorat,” classified as a Spanish DOQ or Denominacio d’Origine Qualificada, covering wines produced in the Priorat county, in the province of Tarragona.
The DOQ covers 11 municipalities and an area characterized by its unique terroir of black slate and quartz soil known as llicorella. It is one of only two regions in Spain to qualify as DOCa (DOQ in Catalan), the highest qualification under Spanish wine regulations, alongside Rioja’s DOCa.
To translate, a DOQ seeks to explain the relationship to the land. In this case the members are empowered to promote local culture and respect for the territory and landscape of Priorat. But within the Priorat DOQ, Palacios has fought to strengthen the link between the region’s wines and its specific origin.
The approved project Vi de la Vila, allows for the identification of the 12 zones, or villages, of grape production allowing producers to specify on the label to which sub-zone the grapes in the bottle belong.
The first Vi de la Vila to be marketed was bottled in the year 2007 and by the beginning of 2012, more than 20 brands had registered. The Priorat labels that come under this regulation now indicate the name of the sub-zone from which the grapes originate.
Some days I dream that at the same time we approved the giant wine regions of the Okanagan Valley, the Fraser Valley, Vancouver Island and the Similkameen Valley, back in the early 1990s, we also established a series of village names that could be attached to those regions to make finding, tasting, and understanding local wines so much easier.
At the moment, we are establishing additional emerging regional names to rescue producers from the generic VQA British Columbia designation, but we are still nowhere with specific, smaller areas save for the Golden Mile Bench.
Even the GMB designation (the only solo sub-appellation in the province) with its strong science base, has no village ID making it difficult to relate to on the label and, worse, for anyone driving around looking for it. Imagine if it was Okanagan Valley, Oliver, Golden Mile Bench. Now you know where that wine originates, and how to find it on a map.
B.C. wine needs better signage that directs us to a place. The Similkameen Valley is good example of what might be with a little cooperation. It’s Canada, it’s British Columbia and it’s The Similkameen Valley. All we need now is Cawston and Keremeos to be delineated on the label and in time, an upper or northern bench and its southern counterpart. This would bring certain clarity to the wild, stony, windy sites that are the essence of the region.
They are many who would argue we are not ready for this complication in wine; that few people know the location of Similkameen, let alone Keremeos or Cawston. Yet those villages exist, and the land has been around for a millennia.
If you can charge up to $150 for a bottle of British Columbia wine it goes without saying you should be able to authenticate its origin down to the vineyard block, not a valley that is hundreds of kilometres long.