Stratus Vineyards, 2020 ‘White Label’ Cabernet Franc (Amphora)
Established in 2000, Stratus Vineyards ushered in a new era in grape growing and winemaking in the Niagara Peninsula and Ontario, with a strong focus on innovation and sustainability. Their 55 acres, 22 hectares, of vineyards are planted with a diverse range of grape varieties, 10 red and 6 white, that serve as their palette from which they craft their iconic Stratus Red And Stratus White blends, both inspired by the European tradition of assemblage. The estate's 100% gravity-flow winery was the first winery facility in the world to receive LEED certification for environmental sustainability. Founding winemaker and Loire-native J-L Groux guides the Stratus vision towards excellence in the cellar, and he is supported by winemaker Dean Stoyka, who's been with Stratus since 2010.
Like many Niagara wineries, Cabernet Franc is an important part of Stratus's focus in the vineyard and cellar. They are farming around 18 acres, or 7.64 hectares, of Cabernet Franc, from which they make a single varietal Cabernet Franc red and rosé, consistently one of my favourite Cab Franc rosés from the region I might add, and the grape plays a supporting role in their flagship Stratus Red. Today, we're looking at the newest addition to the Stratus family of wines, their White Label Cabernet Franc, a wine that was 20 years in the making.
Stratus and their vineyards are located in the Niagara-on-the-Lake regional appellation, and more precisely in the Niagara Lakeshore sub-appellation, which is one of four sub-appellations that make up Niagara-on-the-Lake along with Four Mile Creek, the Niagara River and St-Davids Bench.
The Niagara-on-the-Lake region is situated east of the city of St-Catharines on 12km-wide stretch of relatively flat land, that is bordered to the north by Lake Ontario, the south by the Niagara Escarpment, and to the east by the Niagara River. Like everywhere across the Niagara Peninsula, Lake Ontario's moderating influence makes viticulture possible here in Niagara-on-the-Lake, and during the growing season, in general conditions get progressively warmer and the growing season shorter as you move south away from the lake.
The Niagara Lakeshore sub-appellation is at the most northerly end of the Niagara-on-the-Lake region, closest to Lake Ontario, stretching about 3km from east to west, and it is bordered by bodies of water on three of its four sides, the Welland Canal to the west, Lake Ontario to the North, and the Niagara River to the east, and most vineyards are less than 2km away from the Lake, helping to moderate conditions, both in the summer and winter.
The region's relatively flat, low-lying topography, 75 to 95m or so above sea level, that slopes gently to the north means the region receives the strongest influence from the lake, which makes its daytime temperatures a little cooler than some other parts of the Niagara-on-the-Lake region, but its evening temperatures warmer, giving it a gentler climate overall and helping to extend the ripening period into the evenings as well as extending the growing season as a whole. So while the region has the fewest growing degree days of all the Niagara-on-the-Lake sub-region, it has a very long growing season and the most frost free days, making it one of the best locations in the Niagara Peninsula for ripening long season varieties.
In terms of soil, the topsoil varies slightly in texture depending on where you are, ranging from sandy-loams, silty-clays or heavier clay-loam till, all of which are very deep glacially-derived soils, with varying amounts eroded materials from the escarpment, such as limestone, sandstone and shale sediments and pebbles throughout. The bedrock here is known as Queenston Formation Red Shale, which is a combination of mostly red and grey, calcareous and argillaceous shales with a high iron oxidie content.
So the Stratus white label range was launched with the 2020 vintage, and was created out of a deep understanding of their vineyard parcels in order to optimally express these microsites in excellent vintages, a study that would've only been possible with a lot of time and attention to detail. So in any given vintage, the vineyard block destined for the White Label range could change, and is the fruit is selected for quality at the time of harvest. So in the case of this Cabernet Franc, of the estate's 15 individual blocks of Cabernet Franc, their Block 1 was selected for the 2020 vintage. This is 0.5 hectare block that was planted in 2001 with Clone 214.
It's situated about 2km south of the Lake and about 2km west of the Niagara River, in a bit of a goldilocks zone in terms of microclimate. In terms of soil in this block, it is a deep lacustrine silty-clay, that is mixed with a lot of limestone and shale pebbles and rocks throughout. It is a fairly coarse textured soil with excellent drainage. The vineyard is farmed sustainable, without any herbicides, and they also employ the use of cover crops throughout the blocks. Selective leaf removal and green harvesting is done as well, and the desired yield for their Cabernet Franc is around 2.5 tons per acre.
From a winemaking perspective, in keeping with their intention to create the purest expression of place for their White Label Cabernet Franc, they decided to use amphora for the fermentation and aging. So, the fruit is all hand-harvested, hand- and optically-sorted, and 100% destemmed. The fermentation takes place in clay amphora, two to be specific for this vintage, one was inoculated with selected yeast, and the other was fermented with indigenous yeast. The fermentation temperature hoovers around 26 to 28C. The total time on skins is around 28 days, and no punchdowns are done during this time, rather they will do a modified rack and return method to aid a gentle extraction and to keep the cap wet. After the post-fermentation maceration, just the free run wine is age then again in amphora on fine lees for another 18 months before bottling.
Key wine facts below:
Producer: Stratus Vineyards
Region: Niagara Peninsula, Ontario, Canada
Appellation: Niagara-on-the-Lake VQA
Sub-Appellation: Niagara Lakeshore
Soil: Stony, lacustrine silty-clay
Alcohol: 14.8%
