Sense of Place

There are few things that we eat or drink that taste like they come from a place.

Roquefort, Comté or Camembert cheeses comes from specific areas in France. Darjeeling, Assam or Nilgiri teas comes from demarcated  regions in India.

And it is why many wines are labeled with only the location of where they are grown; Chablis, Chianti, Rioja, Port.

In some circles this is called a sense of place. And the wines from Prince Edward County have that too. They are equally distinct and unique from wines grown in any other region of the world.

But what makes something taste like it comes from a place? Why does Pinot Noir from Burgundy taste the way it does? Or from Oregon? Or from Niagara?

Mostly it is where in the world the grapes are grown. The climate that affects the grapes and the soil they are grown in. This is called terroir. Other factors that round out this term include tradition of the region, human influences and of course terrain. Are the grapes grown on a slope or flat land, for example. Elevation also plays an important factor. These all contributes to the sense of place.

But what makes the wines of Price Edward County so unique? Scientifically it’s the bedrock of limestone under the loam and clay that provide the perfect conditions for growing grapes. Add in the relatively dry growing conditions, the proximity to the lake, and the PEC terroir is ripe for grapes to tell the story of the land in this time and place.

Wines here are often produced in small batches, sometimes only a single barrel of a wine at a time. This of course, does’t automatically confer exceptionality, rather that they are just harder to come by. But many of these wines are worth seeking out because they taste like they come from no other place on earth.

That is what terroir is and what a sense of place means.

To illustrate how important site selection is and how it affects the taste of the wines, one experiment worth pursuing would be to seek out the two single bottle offerings from Closson Chase, the South Clos and Churchside. Each vineyard, planted on either side of Closson Road, is planted with Chardonnay and Pinot Noir and you are able to taste the difference that is terroir.

The quality of many of the wines from Prince Edward County are on par or surpass those at the same price point from anywhere in the world. And they are grown right here in our backyard. We don’t have to travel far to taste the wines and meet the people who make them.

For the wine drinkers here, we are lucky to call this place home. And for the visitors, welcome. We are thrilled that the wines here have pulled you in. That you too can taste that something special, magical even, is happening here.