Osoyoos Larose 2003 Le Grand Vin

This week’s selection:
Winery : Osoyoos Larose
Varietal: Bordeaux Blend
Price Paid: $14.97
Vintage: 2003
Area: British Columbia, CAN
Alcohol: 13.4%
Purchased: Plum Market – West Bloomfield, MI

Overall: A Canadian Bordeaux… If you didn’t tell me what this was, I would have blind tasted this and guessed it was a nice mid-priced Bordeaux. I really enjoyed this wine and will buy a couple more bottles. Seriously the first word that came to my mind when I tasted it was the classic Bordeaux “earthiness”. It has the lead pencil, earth, tobacco, and dark fruit characteristics with significant tannins and I can’t believe I paid $14.97 on sale for this wine. My advice “Go buy 1 now and see if it fits your tastes”.


Reviews

Wine Maker
Osoyoos Larose
Groupe Taillan of Bordeaux, France (Gruaud-Larose), and Vincor International, based in Ontario, Canada, formed a joint venture partnership in 1998 to develop vineyards and a small winery dedicated to the production of Canadian VQA* wines, that would meet if not exceed the quality standards of their Bordeaux counterparts. The wines would be made from the classic Bordeaux varietals: merlot, cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc, petit verdot and malbec. The partners believed that the unique terroir of Canada’s western wine-growing region, the Okanagan Valley in British Columbia and, in particular, the southern part of the Valley, was capable of producing fruit of sufficiently high quality to achieve their goal.
Read more about Canada's Okanagan Valley
HERE

The wine’s name, Osoyoos Larose, reflects the partners’ roots in France and Canada. Osoyoos refers to the location of the vineyards in the Okanagan Valley, on the mountain slopes above Lake Osoyoos. Larose is derived from one of Groupe Taillan’s most prestigious estates in Bordeaux, the Deuxième Cru, or second growth, Château Gruaud-Larose, which reflects the centuries-old winemaking traditions of the world-famous wine region.
The Osoyoos Larose Joint Venture Partners Groupe Taillan owns six world-renowned winemaking estates that have been defining international standards of quality for over two centuries. Located in the Médoc region of Bordeaux, three carry the outstanding Grand Cru Classé designation: Château Gruaud-Larose of St-Julien, Château Ferrière of Margaux and Château Haut Bages Libéral of Pauillac. Groupe Taillan’s three other estates, Château Chasse-Spleen of Moulis, Château La Gurgue of Margaux, and Château Citran of Avensan are all equally well regarded as exceptional Cru Bourgeois. Groupe Taillan is also the largest producer of Appellation Contrôlée wines in France, with large scale négociant operations in most of the country’s leading wine regions: Bordeaux, the Côtes du Rhône, the Loire Valley...