David Lawrason Review

Thursday, May 14th, 2009

 

We are very humbled to have David Lawrason review our wines.  He is a very prominent Canadian wine writer whose opinions are held in the highest regard within our industry.  Here is what David had to say about our wines:

Five Rows Cabernet Sauvignon 2004
89 points
Only two barrels were produced of this inaugural wine – 45 cases, which sold
out quickly. Lowrey Vineyards has been farmed for five generations, but this
is the first wine; and a dandy.  It is a light cabernet sauvignon but very
tasty and savoury with lifted, well integrated aromas of red currant,
raspberry, tea, mocha and spice. It’s very supple, smooth and juicy on the
palate with very soft tannin and excellent length.

Five Rows Sauvignon Blanc 2007
91 points
Only 47 cases were produced from a vineyard but this is very much worth
mentioning for the quality that has been rendered by grower Wes Lowrey’s
first vintage. These grapes have also supplied Creekside’s successful
sauvignons. Fermented in old French oak this  has an almost impeccably
smooth, creamy yet not the least fat texture. The nose is ripe, fresh, light
spicy and semi-tropical (I thought immediately of Cloudy Bay) with
lemon-lime, green melon and vaguely minty notes. Very focused on the finish
with excellent length. Very classy wine.

Five Rows Pinot Gris 2007
88 points
From fully ripened grapes this a mellow, mild, richly textured pinot gris
with fruit aromas in the realm of green fig, green banana and ripe pear.
It’s full bodied, very smooth and satiny on the palate with a warm, slightly
sweet ambiance. Very good length.

www.davidlawrason.com

Five Rows Launch

Monday, Dec 08th, 2008

With great excitement we are pleased to announce that our long journey to a finished product is finally nearing completion.  Our first wines have passed VQA sensory and lab evaluations, and the labels have gone to press.  We are now accepting orders for our Five Rows 2004 Cabernet Sauvignon, 2007 Pinot Gris and 2007 Sauvignon Blanc.  These wines will all be available in special 6-bottle case allotments, with red wines retailing for $300/case and whites $150/case.  We hope to have a short run of labels in hand soon, however getting labeled wines to customers pre-Christmas might prove to be a little challenging.  I assure we will do our best to get orders out as expediently as possible, even if it means fashioning some temporary labels with markers and duct tape.  Please call us at 905-262-5113 or email wes@fiverows.com with any orders or queries.

2007 Five Rows Sauvignon Blanc

Like other varietals in the Lowrey Vineyard, my parents planted Sauvignon Blanc Clone 297 in separate years and in varying soil profiles to help add complexity to Creekside Estate Winery’s portfolio of wines.  Clone 297 has proven to be anything but “farmer-friendly” with a weird combination of extremely low winter hardiness and eye-popping vine vigour.   However, when the winter co-operates and the vines are tended aggressively – great wines can be achieved.  2007 was that Vintage.  Older French Oak barrels (2003 & 2005 Berthomieu) were used to ferment this Sauvignon Blanc.  Following treatment with a pectinase enzyme, one barrel was fermented wild and the other with BA11.   The yeast mix seemed to pull different aromatics and flavours from each batch with the wild being more tropical, and the BA11 bringing more citrus notes.  47 cases were bottled Sept 25, 2008.  This Sauvignon Blanc was bottled untraditionally in stretch hock glass because…well…that’s what we had!

2007 Five Rows Pinot Gris

The warm, dry Vintage of 2007 taught me an important lesson in Pinot Gris ripening.  In early September, my wife and I decided to take a pre-harvest “recharging” trip to New York to see Broken Social Scene play at McCarren Park Pool in Brooklyn.  When we left, the Pinot Gris looked and tasted great with tiny berries, intense flavours and bountiful acidity.  Upon returning three days later on Sept 10th, I nonchalantly grabbed a berry sample of the Gris, and to my astonishment it was showing a sugar level of 24.4 Degrees Brix and a Titratable Acidity (TA) of 6.5 g/L!   The TA was taking a nosedive, and if we had decided to stay any longer in NYC I might have missed these perfect winemaking parameters!  I hesitantly concede that there won’t be any more early September vacations for me.  The quick decision was made to pick our roughly one tonne of Pinot Gris later that afternoon.  The ferment was established in a stainless steel tank with a yeast strain called R2 that is renowned for long, cold ferments and great varietal character development.  Over the next four weeks, the wine slowly chugged away while I occasionally stirred the lees to add some mouthfeel and complexity.  I decided to stop the ferment at a specific gravity of 0.998 to leave the wine with a touch of residual sugar.  38 cases were bottled Sept 25, 2008.