WineAlign - Awards - 2021 NWAC Sauvignon Blanc

Results of the 2021 WineAlign National Wine Awards of Canada (The Nationals)

Sauvignon Blanc

Category Overview by Judge Michael Godel

The Canadian winemakers’ attraction with sauvignon blanc borders on infatuation and this in spite of the very fact that these vines hate extreme Canadian winters and their grapes rarely duplicate or replicate with any consistency. The wines can be sharp, metallic, vegetal, composted and especially herbaceous. No matter it seems to so many oenological Canadian fanatics who, like any other global counterparts worth their Blundstones in mud or salt adore the challenge to makes wines that can run with the best in Bordeaux, Sancerre and Marlborough. When they get that loving sauvignon blanc feeling the righteousness shines on through.

(Jump straight to the medal winners.)

The cool climate viticultural regions of Canada are indeed capable of delivery the grassy, herbal, gooseberry and even tropical white wine embrace while conversely gifting examples best described as flinty, smouldering, blanched nut creamy and so very rich. We know by now that sauvignon blanc from multifarious Canadian soils can imitate them all; Loire Valley (Sancerre, Touraine, Pouilly Fumé and Cheverny); Bordeaux (Pessac-Léognan, Graves, Côtes de Bordeaux Blayes et Franc and Entre-Deux-Mers); New Zealand (Marlborough, Martinborough and Nelson). There is a sauvignon blanc made in many locales across Canada to please each and every consumer palate.

This year’s NWACs proved to be different. In the past the sauvignon blanc flights might have been assessed and surmised with shrugs, resignation and responses ranging from meh to OK. At the culmination of those varietal groupings this past October the post-flight comments included “wow!, unexpected! and most convincing!” Never before have so many wines scored so high, turned heads, palates and minds into the camp of the duly impressed. And so friends, like it or not, love it or hate it from Canadian soils, sauvignon blanc has fully arrived.

The proof is in the numbers. There were 38 medals awarded to Canadian sauvignon blanc at the 2021 Nationals, four Gold, eight Silver and 25 Bronze. That’s 25 per cent more Gold, (100) more Silver, (56) more Bronze and (52) overall. Ontario outshone British Columbia three to one in the top spots, with total Niagara pros Creekside Estate, Peller Estates and Organized Crime joined by La Frenz of the Okanagan Valley. That said, six of the eight Silver winners are B.C. born with Creekside the only winery showing up twice in the top 12. Trius captured the other Ontario Silver to join the ranks of Burrowing Owl, Mayhem, Deep Roots, CedarCreek, Red Rooster and Little Engine. The overall split was almost 50-50, with 20 medals awarded B.C. wines and 18 to those from Ontario.

No longer a trend but a real connectivity and shared excellence is duly noted between British Columbia and Ontario. Whether is goes solo or blends with sémillon the critics are increasingly finding that sauvignon blanc can indeed buy a thrill as witnessed by the maturation of Canadian winemaking when it comes to using these worldly and highly flexible grapes. I have said it before and it bears worth repeating. It’s just so bloody obvious that sauvignon blanc offers consumers what they want: Equality, diplomacy and something for everyone.

And the winners are…

Creekside 2020 Sauvignon Blanc, Niagara Peninsula, Ontario
La Frenz 2020 Sauvignon Blanc Wits End Vineyard, Okanagan Valley, British Columbia
Organized Crime 2020 Sauvignon Blanc, Beamsville Bench, Niagara Peninsula, Ontario
Peller Estates Niagara 2019 Signature Series Sauvignon Blanc, Niagara-on-the-Lake, Niagara Peninsula, Ontario

Burrowing Owl 2019 Sauvignon Blanc, Okanagan Valley, British Columbia
CedarCreek 2020 Platinum Border Vista Sauvignon Blanc, Okanagan Valley, British Columbia
Creekside 2020 Backyard Block Sauvignon Blanc, Creek Shores, Niagara Peninsula, Ontario
Deep Roots 2020 Sauvignon Blanc, Naramata Bench, Okanagan Valley, British Columbia
Little Engine 2019 Sauvignon Blanc Gold, Okanagan Valley, British Columbia
Mayhem 2020 Sauvignon Blanc, Naramata Bench, Okanagan Valley, British Columbia
Red Rooster 2020 Sauvignon Blanc, Okanagan Valley, British Columbia
Trius 2020 Distinction Sauvignon Blanc, Niagara-on-the-Lake, Niagara Peninsula, Ontario