I’ve made no secret of my admiration of Road 13‘s wines out of Oliver, BC.

Winemaker Michael Bartier has gained quite the following for his attention to detail, terroir and blending techniques.  Road 13 has a wide array of labels on offer, from their now legendary Old Vines Chenin Blanc to cult-favourites Pinot Noir, Syrah and so on  – they’ve always provided great value and typicity to their varietals and region.

‘Typicity’, meaning; is the end product particularly typical for its region, varietal and general expectation?

Sorry, it’s a wanky word we use in the industry for lack of a better term.

Mr. Bartier visited me today during a Vancouver tour of the latest offerings from Road 13.  ‘Stemwinder’ and ‘Rockpile’ they are called.  A white and a red, both blends, which are offered up to be examples of British Columbian wines.  Period.

Not varietal-focused (“Ah, yes, this Riesling DOES have some petrol notes to it!”), but examples of terroir, where the wines come from.  The idea was to simply make good BC wines, nothing more, nothing less.

The results are fantastic.

The Stemwinder, an ’09 blend of (because we DO want to know) Chardonnay, Chardonnay Musque & Sauvignon Blanc, leads like a great oak-integrated tropical Chard, but finishes with the citrusy crispness of a Sauvignon Blanc.  The sum, though, is greater than the parts.  This is not a split-personality, but more a complex individual.  Good stuff.

Rockpile, the ‘red blend’, took a while for me to wrap my head around.  Complex?  Yeah – but it was as lean and lifted as it was dark and brooding.  Black, black, black fruit with heightened elements of basil, mint and sage (that herbaceous trio offering examples of the typicity of BC reds).  The acid, right where it should be, carried it through the finish.

I’m going to stray from giving you the breakdown of the red varietals, because I didn’t know them and that resulted in my increased positive image of the wine.  Do the flavours reflect what it’s made from?  Sure.  But I would’ve been hard-pressed to nail ‘em.

And that’s the idea.  It hardly matters what, specifically and mathematically, went into the wine(s), but more the end result: a damn good bottle o’ juice.

They’re both available via the BCLDB and, I’m sure, you’ll be seeing them in many other places as well.