2024 Black Market Syrah in B.C. the years of 2023 and 2024 were catastrophic for our local wine industry. In 2024 January polar vortex plunged temperatures below -27°C in the Okanagan Valley. This second consecutive winter freeze caused a catastrophic 97% to 99% drop in the region's grape harvest. In order to stay in business, many B.C. wineries bought grapes from Washington state to maintain cash flow.
Syrah is a particular favourite of mine, from all over the world, and I opened my first bottle of this wine to see how it was doing and how it compared with BC grown fruit. I'd bought some to cellar in support of the winery, which I had been buying from since it was founded a decade ago. It is still small with production around 2500 cases per annum. They only made 80 cases of this wine (grape source was Wahluke Slope, Rosebud vineyard in Mattawa WA.
The wine was quite dark in colour, still almost purple, and it had an elevated nose of raspberry and smoke that I quite like but rarely see outside the Northern Rhone - I hadn't expected that from a much warmer climate like this Washington area as it wasn't like the syrahs I am familiar with from Washington.. High toned with a solid but not overly tannic core and a lengthy finish. Very good showing and I hope the BC government continues the lowered costs associated with this program of 2024/2025 in support of BC wineries.
It made for an interesting experiment and I could see some BC wineries wanting to be able to add a percentage of WA grapes, but I expect that our local lessening of costs to help BC winemakers will probably end now that we are back to normal weather.