Marathon SAQ Sweet Wine Hunt in Montreal

Berserkers,

I went into Montreal this past weekend to take the little nieces and nephews to see The Avengers and my usual 3 day sweet wine hunt all over the city. The plan for the latter went out the window when I got a call on the train informing me that my 93 year old grandmother fell down and had to be taken to hospital. Fortunately no breakage of bones, but since she is 93 a weekend stay in hospital followed by a CAT scan on her hip this Monday to be sure required significant plan alteration as I had to go to the hospital to see her.

So my 3 day wine hunt became a half-day morning hunt at 3 specific locations in order to get it out of the way immediately and be able to deal with family matters of both the pleasant and unpleasant kind. So I got going promptly Friday at 9:30 AM right when the stores opened which as you’ll soon see would prove a bit of a surprise for some people…

First stop was the Atwater Selection store. There were two items I came here specifically for:

• Domaine du Trapadis 2007 Rasteau Vin Doux Naturel – If made in the Languedoc region this would be a Maury or a Banyuls. It’s essentially exactly the same thing. This completes my Southwestern France sweet wine collection which includes Banyuls, Maury and Rivesaltes Ambres.
• Mount Horrocks 2008 Cordon Cut Riesling – An Australian passito wine dried on the vines themselves after a snip of the cordon. I have previously raved on the board about the fabulous 2003 and 2006 vintages and had to pick up the 08 vintage.

Next up was the downtown Signature store. Here I walked in and found the place deserted of staff which was odd. I made my way to the back where the high-end prestige collections were only to find that the entire staff was having a professionally led tasting session. I guess they weren’t expecting a client to show up Friday morning at 10:00 AM right when they opened. Here I picked up the following choices:

• Domaine Pouderoux Hors D’age 15 Ans and Mas Amiel Prestige 15 Ans Maury – These Maurys from two different respected producers were aged a year outdoors in glass demijohns and then 13 years in oak and yet another year in bottle. I’m extremely curious how they will compare to 20 year Tawny Ports as the process is similar but more complicated and the ABV is 5% lower.
• De Trafford 2009 Straw Wine – A South African passito wine made from Chenin Blanc. I have to try for the curiousity factor alone
• Forrest Estate 2009 Botrytised Riesling – Self-explanatory title. I actually have other New Zealand and Australian stickies in my collection but picked this up due to one curious factor – it has 100% exactly the same RS, TA and ABV ratings as my Jackson-Triggs 08 Riesling icewine: 240 g/L, 8.3 g/L and 9% ABV exactly. I’m dying to try these two literally side by side and see how they compare to each other as I have never before come across two wines with such identical factors.

After this stop, it was a zip right to the Beaubien Selection store to finish off the purchases. Here I was focused on older rarities that I am taking a bit of a chance on as I am not entirely sure of their longevity as well as some newer vintages of previous favorites:

• Concha y Toro 2009 and Errazuriz 2010 Late Harvest Sauvignon Blancs – Newer vintages of two old favorites. I have previous raved about the 2007 and 2008 vintages of each respectively. Quite good QPR on these as they are as high quality as any late harvest half-bottles you’ve had but at less than $15 a bottle each.

• Hekate 2008 Passito – A classic Italian Moscato based passito with one important difference – the producer adds in other dried grapes from varietals from their estate as they deem fit which can include Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio, Viognier and others. My curiousity gets the better of me on this one.
• Quinta de Roriz 2000 Vintage Porto – Though it was once available at the flagship Summerhill LCBO store, I chose to wait until I could head in to Montreal to acquire this due to a deep price discount.
• Olivares 2004 Monastrell Dulce – A Spanish dessert wine made from late harvested Monastrell that clocks in at a whopping 220 g/L of sugar. This is the first wine that concerned me due to its age, though the insane amount of RS sugar and high 15.5% ABV should protect it.
• Rietvallei 1908 Robertson Muscadel – A South African red Muscadel wine that also concerns me but which theoretically should also be able to age in bottle.
• Cossart Gordon 1997 Bual Colheita and Blandy’s 10 Year Old Malmsey – Just as I consider 20 year olds the standard for Tawny Ports, so do I consider 10 year olds the standard for Madeiras. Here I lucked out in two brands that the LCBO doesn’t carry and one of them is a 15 year old Colheita.

Nice haul here. I actually showed a tremendous amount of willpower by not purchasing four different bottles of Tawny Colheita which I will pick up next time out. This haul will allow me to ease off for the rest of the year and only grab a few really wants for the rest of the year. I will of course report back on how these all turned out. Cheers.

Glad to here that your grandmother is OK.
The Maury will be similar to tawny Ports, but with different flavors being from a different grape variety.