LCBO Sale Wine of the Week: July 6

Columbia Crest Grand Estates Chardonnay

Sale $16.00, Regular $18.00
Discount (until July 16): $2.00
LCBO #162073 | 750 mL bottle

Tastes like: Buttery popcorn and tropical fruit — rich, dry, fruity and oaky. And rough cut wood (yum!).
Pairs with: Buttered popcorn, smoked salmon or trout, blintz and caviar, chicken liver paté.
Good for: Cooler summer nights when you want something big and rich but don’t feel like a red.
Alcohol: 13.5%
Drink: Now.

Why we're drinking this
The state of Washington produces some stellar wines, much of it in that cool-climate category that everyone talks about these days. Their wines are in line stylistically with the cooler zoned Californians and even our own Okanagan (and sometimes Niagara) flavour profiles. Columbia Crest has been in the game since the early 1980s and quite handily solidified a reputation for making solid, crowd-pleasing wines. They are the only Washington winery to have achieved Wine Spectator magazine notoriety as “winery of the year.” We see their wines regularly here at the LCBO.

Tasting note
What? We thought we were drinking a Californian Chard! Yes, this is an oaky bruiser, in true sunshine state fashion. You either love or hate this style, in which the sweet spicy oak, vanilla and cake spice — plus a hefty dose of fresh-sawn wood — meets your nose and palate with, shall we say, not one iota of subtlety. This wine is quite a force. It’s dry, but the ripe tropical fruit and hefty oak spice make it seem bigger than it really is. And for sure, that’s some burnt marshmallow coming through loud and clear. It really is quite delicious though — again, if you go for this kind of thing. It’s not quite in vogue right now (hello, 1990s?) but we like it all the same. So there.

Find it at your LCBO
Check availability on the LCBO website!


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Columbia Crest Grand Estates Chardonnay

This week's selection by kwäf Taste Bud Dick Snyder