Foxtrot Vineyards is now sold out of the 2008 Foxtrot Vineyard Pinot Noir. The 2009 will be released in the next month. Until then the 2008 Erickson Vineyard Pinot Noir is still available from our website and private wine stores. Please sign up for our mailing list to receive notification when the 2009 Pinot Noir is released to mailing list members.

John Schreiner recently reviewed our 2008 Pinot Noir on his blog John Schreiner on Wine.  For the full article click here.  His comments on the 2008 were as follows:

95 POINTS. Foxtrot Pinot Noir 2008 displays deep garnet hues and shows alluring aromas of cherries, plums, raspberries and spice. The fruit flavours carry through on the palate and on the long, long finish. The texture is the classic velvet of the ripe tannins that have become a hallmark of the Foxtrot style. The wine is at once powerful and elegant.

A note to those who buy the wine: lay a few bottles away for two or three years at least. As delicious as the wine is now, it will be even better and more seductive with additional age.

Winediva Daenna Van Mulligen recently reviewed our 2008 Foxtrot Vineyard Pinot Noir on her websites winediva.ca and winescores.ca. The wine was recently released to our mailing list and is now being made available for general release. Below you can read what Daenna had to say about the wine.

Three vintages in a row now I have reviewed this truly fantastic Pinot Noir and it has remained consistent, with some vintage variation, of course. The 2008 is lovely –more feminine than the 2007 and more approachable upon release.

Like any good Pinot Noir it evolves as you sip – it launches with aromas of cherries and wild red berries, cedar and fine spice with undertones of rainforest floor then moves into sweet pipe tobacco and floral notes with hints of wild herbs. It is elegant and finely woven – juicy berry/cherry fruit, cocoa and leather flavours that linger on an impressively long and silky finish.

94 points – WineScores.ca

Daenna Van Mulligen recently posted this review of our 2009 Chardonnay on her website WineDiva.ca and winescores.ca.

When you see Foxtrot the dancing bear – Pinot Noir may be the wine that comes to mind, but the other variety they focus on, Chardonnay, should not be overlooked.  Expect fresh buttery brioche, tangerine peel, pears and sweet praline aromas.  It has lovely weight in the mouth - creamy fruit spiked with coriander seed and vanilla spice flavours. There is obvious oak here but it is wonderfully balanced and the finish is impressively long and fresh.  Pair with lobster…chicken salad will be delicious too.  92 pts @ winescores.ca

Jurgen Gothe recently gave very high praise to our 2009 Chardonnay in The Straight.  Here is what Jurgen had to say: This tiny winery’s products with the big price tags and the quirky labels are infrequently seen in restaurants or shops, if only because Foxtrot’s output is so small. But for all that small stuff, this Chardonnay is as big, bold, and assertive as any French Burgundy. Speaking from recent experience, you can drink it with cassoulet. And if someone brings you a bottle to dinner, stash it away and carry on with what you’d been planning to serve.

Currently we have very limited quantities remaining of the 2009 Chardonnay and the 2010 won’t be released until the Fall.

Torsten, Gustav, Kicki, Anna-Marie and Nadine would like to wish all friends of Foxtrot a very happy holidays and new year.  We hope everyone can enjoy a bottle of Foxtrot and great food with friends and family during the holiday season.  All is quiet now in the cellar except for bubbling in the 2010 barrels from the ML fermentations.  We look forward to the coming new year and release of the 2008 Pinot Noirs and bottling the 2009 vintage of Pinot Noir and 2010 Chardonnay. Happy holidays from everyone here at Foxtrot Vineyards!

Foxtrot Vineyards and Galiano Inn & Spa present a special winemaker dinner on New Year’s Eve 2011 in partnership with Painted Rock Winery.  Foxtrot winemaker Gustav Allander and Gavin Miller of Painted Rock will both be in attendance to speak about their award winning wines paired with Chef Dean Hillier’s outstanding food.  Foxtrot Vineyard’s critically acclaimed 2009 Chardonnay and Lieutenant Governor Award winning 2007 Pinot Noir will both be poured at the dinner.

Expect an exciting evening with live music, sparkling wine at midnight, and dancing along with BC’s top two cult wineries.  For more information and to order tickets please visit Galiano Inn & Spa or call 1-877-530-3939.

As of last Tuesday Nov. 23 the 2010 harvest is now officially completed here at Foxtrot Vineyards.  All of the Chardonnay and Pinot Noirs are now in barrel and undergoing their malo lactic fermentations.  The growing season, although delayed by the cool spring weather, was ideal for Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.  September brought large amounts of rain and cool weather increasing the risk of rot.  However, the hard work we put into our vineyard along with our growers throughout the season paid off and we escaped the month with no rot.  Our patience in September paid off and October brought warm temperature and by Oct. 16th the first Chardonnay grapes were ready to be picked.  Not long after we began bringing in Pinot Noir from our Naramata Bench Growers and our home Foxtrot Vineyard.  The warm summer and cool fall produced grapes with fantastic acidity and vibrant flavours without excessive sugars.  Although we are still early in the winemaking process, with the wines still undergoing Malo Lactic fermentation, I beleive this year has produced some outstanding Pinot Noirs and Chardonnays that should age well for many years to come.  The last two fermenters were pressed off inside the wine cave, as temperatures outside had dipped to -10C, and meant I had to bucket the skins into the press by hand the old fashioned way.  It will be interesting to see how the wines develop from the different vineyards.  Our plan as we increase production using grapes from other vineyards is to keep these separate and bottle them as vineyard designate wines.  As the winemaking process is kept virtually the same for each vineyard the expression of each site will come through in each wine.  The first of these, the 2008 Erickson Vineyard Pinot Noir, will be released this Spring of 2011.  The vineyard is located approximately 0.8km north of the Foxtrot Vineyard and its vines were planted a couple years before Foxtrot’s.  Look for more details this spring as we announce the release date.

Other News

During harvest Foxtrot Vineyards was pleased to be part of the Gold Medal Plates event held at the Sheraton Wall Centre in Vancouver.  The event, which helps raise funds to support Canada’s high performance athletes, saw some of BC’s top chefs compete for Gold, Silver, and Bronze and the chance to compete at the 2011 Canadian Culinary Championships.  Congratulations to Neil Taylor of Cibo Trattoria on taking the bronze.  From James Chatto’s report on the event:  “He made spectacular use of local, seasonal ingredients with a carpaccio of wild venison, tender and smoky, dressed with slices of superb pine mushrooms (the best in the world). A tangy, earthy black truffle and celeriac aioli, smooth as a Jim Cuddy lyric, grounded the dish while paper-thin shavings of red-wine-soaked pecorino pushed the flavours skyward. Wild watercress added the “green” to the flavour and colour spectrum of the dish. The wine pairing, with Foxtrot Vineyards awesome 2007 Pinot Noir from the Okanagan vineyards, was the most precise and seductive of the night.”

New Years Winemakers Dinner

In December Foxtrot Vineyards will also be having a winemakers dinner with Painted Rock Winery on New Years Eve at the Galiano Inn and Spa.  Look for more details shortly.

Here is an excerpt from the latest issue of Western Living Magazine where Foxtrot Vineyards is mentioned:

If Van Westen offers a connection to the Bench’s past, Foxtrot, located a couple of sharp turns up the mountain, is a glimpse of the future. Founder Torsten Allander has a name straight out of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, but the only intrigue here is why his wine isn’t better known. The winery operates adjacent to his residence, and though son Gustav is the winemaker and daughter (and recent Wharton grad) Anna-Marie is handling the business, the operation is anything but small-time. Foxtrot is a small-production winery, but here they focus on achieving the highest expression of only two varietals, pinot noir and chardonnay. Their 2007 pinot is made in small quantities (550 cases) and, at $55, it’s expensive. It’s also one of the finest pinots I’ve ever tasted from Canada, with a silky austerity, earthiness and a hint of oak that screams Vosne-Romanée. Burgundy also inspires their chardonnay, a no-apologies tribute to Meursault: all hazelnut, tropical fruits and subtle vanilla. Both wines are sold almost exclusively to restaurants in Alberta and British Columbia but can be shipped if you snag a few before they’re sold out.

Click here to read the full article.