Zeta has a Fetish for the Labyrinth at Garry Oaks

Elaine Kozak and Marcel Mercier, the two-year-old winery's owners, think Meritage is a "stuffy" word lacking resonance with consumers. "One of the basic principles of positioning yourself in the market is that you should present a product that invites a question," Kozak says. "Then people become engaged with it."

The name is doing the job. Some well-heeled Americans who heard about it wanted to send private jets to pick up award-winning Fetish by the case. A Florida restaurateur wants the wine for his list and he also wants to distribute it there. And the owner of a bar at a location not disclosed by Garry Oaks proposed stocking the wine because a fetish club meets in his bar every month!

Garry Oaks has other wines under equally creative labels. A wine made with a tongue-defying variety called Blaufränkisch (the unfortunate synonym is Lemberger) is released by Garry Oaks as Labyrinth. This fall, the winery will release its first estate-grown Zweigelt under the presumably more marketable label, Zeta. To some ears, the name might suggest a dance hall girl, appropriate for a wine that Kozak describes as "lush and round and all those good things."

Kozak and Mercier are relative newcomers to the British Columbia wine scene, but their focused winery has attracted significant notice since opening in 2003.  After tasting the wines last year, Jancis Robinson, the influential British wine writer, described Garry Oaks as "a winery to watch .... The wines are extremely impressive."

It is high praise for a couple who came to winegrowing from the corporate world. Kozak, who grew up in Alberta, is an economist. Mercier, also an Albertan, has a postgraduate science degree and worked for many years as an international consultant in environmental management. When they decided to exit the fast lane, they bought a former orchard on Salt Spring Island. In 2000 they began planting vines on a well-drained south-facing slope, developing a three-hectare vineyard that will reach full production this fall.

(Theirs is one of two wineries on Salt Spring. With a smaller vineyard next door, Salt Spring Vineyards also opened in 2003. A third winery called Fulford Creek is under development nearby, possibly opening this year.)

Fetish came about because Garry Oaks began buying Okanagan grapes, since Kozak and Mercier needed to get the winery open and generating cash before their vineyard was able to support them. After Fetish and Labyrinth developed a following, they tied up their grape suppliers with long-term contracts.

The volume of the 2004 Fetish, still in barrel, represents a quarter of the 2,000 cases that Garry Oaks expects to produce from that vintage. The blend of the 2004 is about half Merlot, half Cabernet Franc, the ratio on which Kozak has settled after two vintages. The 2002 Fetish was 65% Cabernet Franc and the balance is Merlot while the 2003 Fetish (currently available for $28 a bottle) is 65% Merlot and the balance is Cabernet Franc.

Kozak also has taken several passes at refining the style of Labyrinth. The 2002 wine was aged only in stainless steel tanks. The 2003 vintage, a wine she describes as softer and as a "crowd pleaser", spent six months in older oak barrels and has about 10% Pinot Noir. The 2004 vintage will be finished with a firmer structure.

The one-time economist turned herself into a capable winemaker by getting a diploma in enology from the University of Guelph as well as by mentoring with the winery's consultant, Okanagan winemaker Ross Mirko. He remains the consultant to Garry Oaks, tasting the wines and providing counsel.

The three red wines with proprietary names belong in what Garry Oaks calls its Originals tier. That sets them apart from the varietal wines - the winery's so-called Classics series. The varieties grown in the densely planted Garry Oaks vineyard (3,500 vines per hectare) were chosen because they are calculated to ripen on Salt Spring, and because the wines produced are distinctive from each other.

Aside from Zweigelt and several experimental varieties, the significant varieties grown here are Pinot Noir, Pinot Gris and Gewürztraminer. Ripening them has not been an issue, especially in a warm season like 2004. The Pinot Gris was picked at 23 Brix.

A tank sample of the 2004 Pinot Gris, tasted at the winery recently, showed a crisply fresh wine with lively flavours of melons and green apples. The Gewürztraminer, also a tank sample, is delicately perfumed and shows vivid fruit.

The 2003 Estate Pinot Noir, not yet released, is a wine with a silky finesse. Both the aroma and the flavours display notes of cinnamon and sage, along with lively fruit. Kozak believes some of the spiciness comes from the Oregon-coopered Garry Oak barrels in which the winery ages the Pinot Noir.

Garry Oak is a tight-grained white oak found in British Columbia and the U.S. west coast. A few oak trees growing on the winery's Salt Spring property inspired the winery's name.

John Schreiner is author of The Wineries of British Columbia