LCBO Food & Drink Autumn 2023

BACO TO THE FUTURE Henry of Pelham Baco Noir VQA LCBO 270926, $16.95 Sandbanks Baco Noir VQA LCBO 110049, $15.95

The hardy hybrid Baco Noir grape has come to define a uniquely Ontario style of red wine, thanks to astute wineries like Henry of Pelham (which has some of the oldest plantings) that long ago set their sights on quality and the expression of local terroir in their bot tlings. Robust, slightly smoky and very juicy, with smooth tannins, Baco Noir wine is easy to love—something to be proud of, because we do it better than anyone else in the world.

A TOAST TO NIAGARA

Henry of Pelham Cuvée Catharine Brut VQA LCBO 217521, $32.95 Trius Brut VQA LCBO 284539, $29.95 As “cool climate” became an international buzz word, Ontario put a stake in sparkling wine with two traditional-method (the same process used for Champagne), aged-on-lees wines that com manded comparisons to the best of France— and rightly so! Released in the late 1990s and early 2000s, respectively, Trius Brut and Henry of Pelham’s Cuvée Catharine continue to deliver value-packed, age-worthy bubbles.

Ice-ing on the Cake Inniskillin Vidal Icewine VQA VINTAGES ESSENTIALS 388306, 375 mL, $49.95 The wine that put Ontario on the international stage 30 years ago still wins awards today, thanks to a climate quirk we all love to complain about: those first frosts that precede our winters. With their European roots and deep knowledge, Reif Estates and Inniskillin realized in the 1980s that they could create the rarest of global wine bottlings, icewine. The 1989 Inniskillin icewine won the 1991 Grand Prix d’Honneur at the Vinexpo wine fair in Bordeaux.

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