Robinson reviews Ontario Chard: Top Marks to Hardie and Clos Jordanne

A few days ago I received an email newsletter from one of my favourite personalities in the lesser-known Ontario wine producing region of Prince Edward County, Norman Hardie. He was quite excited to tell everyone that in a tasting of 40 Ontario Chardonnays, his and that of Clos Jordanne in Niagara won top marks at 17.5 out of 20.

Of course it is foolish to get wrapped up in numerical assessments of wines. The fact that top white burgundies often see scores like this but sell for considerably more expense should be taken with a grain of salt. This is by no means another Judgement of Paris, but I think it does point out a couple interesting things. First of all attention is being paid to a cool climate viticultural region outside of Europe. The Canadian entry in the World Atlas of Wine only in the last edition added separate headings for BC and Ontario. I expect it will be sometime before Prince Edward County is delineated in the Atlas, but a tie with Clos Jordanne should shake things up significantly within Ontario. PEC winemakers have probably had one of the quickest turnarounds on being dismissed as loon-bag country bumpkins to respected vignerons. I recently saw an ad for Closson Chase, another high-end PEC producer, in a national magazine.

If I’m lucky there are still a few bottles of his Pinot Noir kicking around my parent’s cellar (read: crawlspace) in Toronto.