It’s been a couple of years now since we found East Dell Estates, a small Beamsville area vineyard that makes some popular Ontario blends. We had picked up their Black Cab (yum!), a mix of Baco Noir, Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon, and their Red Cab (ehhh…) blend of Gamay Noir and Cabernet Franc, but had never before had the opportunity to visit the actual vineyard. Our experience with their wines has generally been favourable, with the Black Cab being delicious, and the Red Cab…well it’s a little too fruity for our liking, but we know people who love it.

Anyhow, we stopped in briefly to try some of their Chardonnays and hunt down an old favourite. After sampling both the oaked and unoaked versions, neither of us were particularly fond of them. The oaked was very nice in relation to the unoaked (I think we’ve come to the conclusion that we like a bit of char in our Chardonnay), and has garnered some rave views in the region, but compared to some of the others we tasted, it just wasn’t quite top-notch. We opted not to buy a Black Cab at that particular moment, but by day’s end regretted our decision and made a mad dash back before closing time to pick one up, with amusing results.

Apology To The Poor Woman We Scared
Or ‘A Tale Of Enthusiasm Gone Wrong’

We had heard from a previous visit that the 2001 vintage of their ‘Black Cab’ was being re-released at the budget-friendly price of $7.95 CDN. Thanks to a particularly large population of aphids that year, there were also an abnormally large amount of ladybugs in the area, and some of their ‘juice’ found its way into many of the wines from that vintage. Sound disgusting? Not at all! In small amounts, ladybug affected wine can actually be some of the more interesting, quirky finds on the market. When frightened the wee buggies secrete a substance called pyrazine, which can lend aromas of peanuts (in unfortunate cases rancid peanuts). For you chemists out there — shout out!– and others interested, pyrazine is a heterocyclic aromatic organic compound with the chemical structure C₄H₄N₂, meaning it’s smelly and circular.

When we visited East Dell specifically to pick some more up, we were, understandably, a little excited. We also managed to make complete and utter fools of ourselves and frighten one of the poor tasting bar staff. With little or no wandering around, we marched right up with a bottle of the 2001, set it on the counter and in order to be sure we had the year correct, inquired “is this the one that smells like peanuts?” Michelle whispered peanut butter in my ear. “Peanut butter sorry, is this the one that smells like peanut butter?”

The poor woman developed an instant case of dear-in-the-headlights and stared rather blankly back at us. Of course, to help clarify matters, I launch into a story about how the last time we were at East Dell (earlier in the morning), one of the staff had told us a story about how the local teaching college had been running all kinds of tests on it because of the taint, and had managed to stink up entire corridors of the school with the smell of peanuts. She, trying to be helpful, declared: “Oh, well I always think of mushrooms when I drink this wine”. If she were a ladybug, I bet the pyrazine would have been flying at a record rate.

We quickly tasted some to confirm and quickly exited just in time to break out into laughter. It was the end of the day, we were tired, and we’d just had our first turn as weirdo customer. All in all a good day. Watch for a full review of this oddity soon.

Dear tasting staff at East Dell: we are not normally that psychotic seeming, and we do apologize for scaring one of your number. In the future we’ll try to behave ourselves, or visit earlier in the day.