Sparkling and Sweet Wines – Medal Winners from NWAC 2018
Announcing the Results from the 2018 National Wine Awards of Canada
In 2018, over 1,850 wines from 257 wineries were entered into the National Wine Awards of Canada, making this largest and most comprehensive wine competition in Canadian history. In late June, 22 judges assembled in Penticton BC for five full days to determine the best wines in Canada. Wines were tasted blind in multiple rounds based on category or style.
Due to the amazing array of top quality Canadian wines entered this year, we have decided to break the announcement of the results into more manageable pieces. Each day for the next two weeks we will be announcing a few categories at a time, with the highly-anticipated Platinum Awards to be announced on July 27th, the Best Performing Small Winery on July 30th, and finally the Winery of the Year, along with a list of the nation’s Top 25 Wineries, on July 31st.
We’ve asked a few of our judges to summarize their impressions of each category. Today we present Chardonnay and Pinot Gris with a few words from Treve Ring:
Sparkling
Category Overview by Judge and Panel Leader Treve Ring
Rooted in cool, Canada has emerged an indie darling of sparkling wine (we do share the 49th parallel with Champagne, after all).
We’ve come a long way since Baby Duck splashed across the world in 1971, selling more than 60 million bottles in Canada within ten years. Today there are more than 200 wineries from Vancouver Island to Nova Scotia producing fizz, and in forms from ancestrale to frizzante to charmat to traditional method.
During the fiscal year ending March 31, 2017, Canadian sparkling wine sales in Canada amounted to approximately 58.2 million Canadian dollars, whilst imported sparkling wine sales amounted to approximately 0.34 billion Canadian dollars. That’s a clear sign (to me at least) that the potential future for sparkling wine is, well, sparkling.
This year we had an outstanding 16 sparkling wines medalled gold, and possibly surprising to some, the top three by the numbers all came from Ontario. BC and Nova Scotia had ample gold coverage, and all three regions splashed through silvers and bronzes. The best wines were those that were purpose built: pure fruited, high acid, structural. And delicious.
Today we are also pleased to announce the Medal winners in these sweet categories:
