Amphora Chenin Blanc 2023

Wine Profile

Chenin Blanc makes up less than 1% of the white varieties grown in BC. It ripens mid season and is generally associated with cool climate wine growing regions. This fruit comes from a single block at McIntyre Vineyard in OK Falls.

Tasting Notes

Our sophomore release of Chenin Blanc has aromas of orange blossoms and Okanagan peach with notes of wet rock and yellow apple. The palate is full of ripe mandarins and lemon zest with white peach and honeydew. Pair the bright and juicy flavors of this wine with your favorite seafood, such as fresh oysters and sushi. 

Winemaking notes

The grapes for this small lot were whole cluster pressed and fermented using wild yeast in clay Amphora. The long and slow fermentation allowed for lots of lees stirring and a partial malolactic fermentation to occur. The wine was aged sur lie in the Amphora a further 4 months before bottling.

Vintage notes

The end of the 2022 season was abnormally warm, going from summer weather at the end of October to winter overnight and a deep freeze in December which adversely affected the plants. Early bud dissections revealed extensive damage and the resulting yields were very low, especially in our Syrah, Malbec and Semillon plantings.  

Although the Okanagan Valley had a slight delay to the growing season with cooler than average weather through April and May, the weather very quickly changed to a long, extended period of hot, dry days through the balance of the summer. We saw bud break at our Naramata vineyard at the beginning of May and kicked off our harvest by picking the first fruit on August 23rd for our traditional method sparkling wine. This was a full month earlier than vintage 2022, which was a very late and more moderate summer. Most of our varieties ripened a week or two earlier than normal due to the warm weather and lower yields. The low yields also brought good concentration to the flavours and ripe tannins for our Bordeaux-styled reds.

Vineyards

Sourced from a single block at McIntyre Vineyard in Ok Falls