Grape & Grain | Why you really should try French red wines from Canada

In summer 2014, when Li Wencheng bought the 12-hectare Chateau Puy Guilhem in Bordeaux, he was not only the proud owner of one of the most beautiful views in the whole of Fronsac, overlooking the valley of the river Isle, but he also left former owner Jean-Francois Enixon with something of an opportunity.

Selling to the Chinese architect (who also owns La Fleur Jonquet in Graves, Chateau Lucas in Castillon and Wencheng Castle near Beijing) gave Enixon the chance to do something he and his wife had thought about for a while – move abroad and make wine somewhere new.

“We decided the best way would be to find a French company with an estate overseas,” says Enixon. There are plenty, from the Rothschilds in Chile, China and Argentina to the Drouhins in Oregon, to LVMH in pretty much all of the above. But he went instead to the Merlaut family, owners of the prestigious Chateau Gruaud Larose in Saint Julien along with more than a dozen wine properties in Bordeaux through their Taillan Group. “I was introduced to the wines of Osoyoos Larose through a friend who works for Denis Merlaut. I was surprised to find that they even make red wine in Canada, and even more surprised by how good it was.”

Enixon may not be the only one. For most people, Canadian wine means ice wine, that wonderfully sour-sweet kick of pleasure that comes from white grapes such as vidal, picked at temperatures of about -10 degrees Celsius when they are frozen on the vine.

But head further south to British Columbia, about four hours from Vancouver, you’ll find the 212km Okanagan Valley. You’ll still find ski resorts here, but not so much ice wine, as temperatures rarely drop low enough for the grapes to freeze for prolonged periods. Instead, for the past 20 years this has been the scene of increasingly exciting red wines, particularly in the southern tip of the valley where the sun shines longest.