Sovereign Opal, not one you see everyday

The Whitehorse Liquour Store seems to be making an effort to get in some new Canadian wines. I had the Sandhill Merlot ($18.60) recently. It wasn't my favourite, but not bad. Sandhill has some better varietal wines than this Merlot (the Syrah is very nice) which I hope to see here in the future. One suprise I found was a Sovereign Opal from Calona Vineyards ($14.60) (same owners as Sandhill) located in the Okanagan. Sovereign Opal is a Canadian bred grape, created at the Summerland Research Station. It is a cross between Marechal Foch (a red French/American hybrid that is one of the few hybrids considered to make quality wine) and Golden Muscat. The result is a fairly mild floral and fruity white wine and for the same price, it is much nicer than the Gewurztraminer I tried a few weeks ago with similar characteristics. It is a bit too sweet for my usual tastes, but served cold it was a very nice accompaniment to butter chicken and would go well with mildly spicy foods in general. My second glass was a bit warmer thant the first, and that is when I started to notice the sweetness and a bit of cheap white flavour, but kept in the fridge throughout dinner, it would remain quite nice. Mom and Helen were both present at dinner and they both thought it was lovely (and Mom generally loathes sweeter wines).

Other wines I've tried recently: Masi Masianco ($17.75, Italian white) was not my favourite, but I think that was heavily influenced by injesting the last of the Yellow Tail Chardonnay before I opened the Masianco. My sister and brother-in-law quite liked it. It has quite a honey taste to it. I probably won't bother byuing it again to see if I like it with a clean palate. As with the Masi Soave I tried a while back, I think you can do better for cheaper.

And speaking of better for cheaper...Rudolf Muller Classic Riesling ($11.40, dry German white). It is not quite as good as a nice dry Riesling from Ontario, but it is quite a bit cheaper, and I can't get Ontario Riesling here. It is better when it is colder, but it has really nice Riesling flavour (mostly stone fruits) and not much cheap white flavour. I am quite delighted and will be buying it again (although there is at least one other dry Riesling in the liquour store waiting for me to try it). Btw: when I say dry, I mean sweetness code of zero, not one or two as are many of the other German wines which give cheap German whites a bad name. This is a good cheap German white. Try it.

Also sampled again recently: the Cono Sur Organic CS Carmenere ($15.50, Chile). I've had it before and liked it a lot more. This bottle seemed kinda rough. It does have a somewhat odd, almost Zinfandel-like taste to it (I thought powdery, but Mum thought it smelled like dead moose which I can kinda see). I will leave it on the counter for a day or two and see if it smoothes out at all.