A Good Cauz To Come To The Aid Of Your Party

So you want to throw a wine party but you’re not too sure how to go about it. As someone who has a difficult time locating his under-50-percent-occupancy-rate tool box but has five corkscrews you’ve come to the right place. I hosted a wine event in Muskoka a couple weeks back, so I thought I would go over the wines I choose and the reasons for them. Think of it as a basic template you can use for your own party. Now I’m not arrogant enough to think you should stick to my entire plan, rather treat this column as a jumping-off point where you can pick and choose a couple suggestions to implement in your own grand wine soaked plan.

The wines:

1-Veuve Ambal Cremant De Bourgogne Grande Cuvee Brut $18.65:

You can’t have a wine event and not start it off without bubbly. It gives the party a heightened sense of formality, it’s the perfect light/acidic drink to kick things off and it goes well with so many foods. Beyond that it’s just fun. Cremant is the perfect choice because it brings more complexity than most of the Prosecco and Cava options you’ll find in Canada, and it is about $50 cheaper than your typical Champagne. Also you can impress your friends by telling them that Cremant is made in the exact same style as Champagne, but as it is not made within the borders of Champagne region you can get a good bottle for a really good price. 

Yes this wine does not possess the same level of depth as good champagne, but we have five more wines to try and who has the cash to be slinging Pol Roger around all night? Pound for pound you will not find a better value sparkling wine than Cremant, everyone will love it.

2-Featherstone Black Sheep Riesling 2017 $16.95

This is the Canadian content part of the evening and a well-deserved one. Featherstone is a medium sized winery in Niagara and their calling card is this bottle. You need to have at least one bottle of Riesling because everyone in the wine world (total guilty of this) demands that the rest of the world drink more Riesling so pick up this damn versatile white wine that I have written about in the past. Don’t worry it’s completely dry with plenty of fruit and acidity on the end. 

With there being so many complaints about the high price for Canadian wine this one punches well above its weight coming in at under $20. Fun story: The name of the wine comes from the fact that the owners unleash their sheep into the vineyards to eat all the leaves. Basically these animals are pruning the bottom level of each trunk allowing the sun to fully ripen each cluster of grapes. I won’t tell you what they do with the sheep afterwards but let’s just say it’s delicious.

3-Gérard Bertrand Réserve Spéciale Viognier 2015 $14.95

A perfect white for those ridiculous people who are desperate for something different than Chardonnay.  Listen, I get how we are awash with New-World-wildly-overly-oaked Chardonnay, but I’ll never understand the individual who aggressively states they will no longer drink Chardonnay. Get those fools a glass of Chablis (Northern party of Burgundy. Rarely sees any oak below the Grand Cru level) and then ask them how they feel about Chard! 

Sorry I got sidetracked.  This wine is packed with white flower, perfume and has a higher alcohol level than the first two wines. Hey, we’re getting into the night, time to raise the stakes. Most of the guests at my party had never heard of Viognier, so it was great way to introduce them to a white wine that is famous in Northern Rhone and can give you as much complexity and power as Chardonnay without being a factory produced butter stick from California.  

4-The Winery of Good Hope Reserve Pinot Noir 2016 $19.95

Wow, is it hard to find good Pinot Noir that tastes like Pinot without breaking the bank. This fella is from a high altitude region of South Africa (Elgin, to be specific) which means cooler climates and longer growing seasons. I won’t go into a big discussion about geography and Pinot Noir, so I’ll just sum it up by saying hot climates are generally bad for Pinot. It’s a delicate grape that needs a more delicate temperature otherwise it just gets big, fat and full of alcohol. 

This wine has none of those traits. What I love about this wine is you get plenty of the tangy black fruit and cherry that you’d expect, but there is also some barnyard type funk on the nose that reminds me of Burgundy. I don’t want to go all French Wine Snob on ya’ but I’ll pick up a half case of any Pinot that even vaguely reminds of Burgundy for under $25 bucks. The bonus here is again you are introducing a large group of wine drinkers to a grape they are familiar with but form an area they probably are not. I’m on a hot streak for South African Pinot Noir; check some out if you can.   

5- Fantini Farnese Sangiovese IGT $8.80

The key for this wine is to not let the crowd know how much it costs until after they try. I guarantee you they will be shocked. The group I was pouring for were taken aback by the price. For the cost of a small bag of popcorn at the movies this wine has plenty of ripe cherry, leather, tobacco and spice. This wine is currently one of my go to “weekday wines” and will go over like a magic trick where no one has a clue how the magician did it. 

Also this wine is great in keeping down your average price-per-bottle— wine events can get expensive fast. Finally, people appreciate learning about new-value wines. I find we often get in a rut with our everyday wine that we consume, so you gotta shake it up.

6- Lavau Vacqueyras 2014  $26.95

The first bottle that is actually over $20! The wine is a blend of 50%Grenache, about 40% Syrah and the rest is Mourvèdre, the typical grapes you would find in a Côtes du Rhône. What makes this wine interesting is the location of where it is from. When Skydome was just about done my father was able to pick where his season tickets were going to be. He found the section where the luxury seats were with the comfy foam seats and picked the first two seats on the other side. He got to sit about three feet away from the more prestigious section without having to spend anywhere close the same amount of money. It was a smart move by my pappy. 

I bring up that story because it reminds me of the area where this wine is from, Vacqueyras. Vacqueyras’ neighbour to the southwest is the far more expensive and yes prestigious region of Châteauneuf-du-Pape. Now I’m not saying all Vacqueyras wine will taste just as good as their neighbour, but they are similar in style, grape blend and come in at about half the cost. This is a bigger savoury red wine with lots of floral notes, dark fruit, herbs and fresh pepper.

So there you have it. As far as I can tell everyone had a great time and all were thankful they had someone coming to pick them up. With all my wines I wanted to have:

-Bottles that people had never heard of

-Grapes or wine regions that were new to them

-Alternates to what they’re used to drinking

-Value

-Some good stories associated with each.

I hope my itinerary will be helpful the next time you either throw a full-blown wine party or you’re just thinking of some wine to bring to a dinner. Happy hunting.

Matt Cauz @mcauz56. Matthew has explored the wineries of Bordeaux, Burgundy, Barolo and many other parts of the world that do not start with the letter “B” including New Zealand and California. When he’s not looking for that next great bottle he is a radio host for TSN 1050 in Toronto.