Big Picture Wines in the Fraser Valley

Dry wines, that blend old world charm and new world taste, are the hallmark of

By Ronda Payne

Summers can be hot in Abbotsford, but there’s one area, in the north of the community, where a micro-climate gets even hotter, making a small wine region with a lot of taste possible. Yes, premium wines are happening in the Fraser Valley.

Cannon Estate Winery joined three other wineries in a roughly two-kilometer radius in Mount Lehman when they opened in November 2022. They bring more than 15 distinctive, flavourful and often brightly-complex wines to the historic village.

Andi Manuel and her husband Justin bought the 20-acre property in 2017 without a thought that it would become a vineyard. A complete surprise to Andi, during their home-design consultation, Justin announced they were going to create a winery, just as a hobby of course.

But, as Andi explains, Justin can’t do anything half-way. The hobby plan grew and grew until it involved Andi’s dad, 12. 5 acres under vine, and grapes on contract from the Vernon, Oliver and Keremeos regions. There are four different soil types at the couple’s Mount Lehman site, now home to 16 varietals in 23 different blocks on clone root stock. Cannon Estate produced 105,000 bottles in 2022.

The winery ambitiously set forth with two distinct labels under the Cannon umbrella. Much of this has to do with the approach of their vineyard manager and winemaker, Patrick Blandin.

“Patrick has 30 years of experience,” Andi explains. “We kissed a lot of frogs before finding him.”

While some potential candidates for the role agreed to help, most wanted to remain in a remote consultant situation, which is not what the Manuels had in mind. They wanted someone on-site, willing to take ownership and be involved daily. They wanted someone like Blandin, who has now become a member of the family.

“We sat down, tried a whole bunch of different wines and talked about varietals. We looked at wines we liked,” she says of talking about wines with Blandin to find the sweet spot for Cannon Estate. “Most of the ones we brought, he said weren’t good.”

The couple laughs about it now, but Andi sees how working with Blandin has changed what they thought they knew about wine. He honed his education and experience in enviable locales like Bordeaux, Burgundy and Sancerre before working in winemaking regions in countries like Turkey, Australia, China and Bhutan. Canada became home to him in 2014 when he worked for

Chaberton Estate Winery. He then joined Cannon Estate in 2017.

Blandin’s wines are as delicious as his accent and he has some very specific thoughts about what should be done to make great wine.

“It comes from the ground,” he says. “And the grapes. Good grapes don’t need anything else.”

As anyone in the industry knows, the process from deciding to start a winery to opening one can be fraught with potholes and the Cannon Estate experience was no different. The family was touring one of their favourite vacation spots (biking with their two boys in the chariot around Naramata bench - which actually inspired Jus- tin’s thought to start the vineyard), when the excitement of their own endeavor had them sharing with wineries in the region. They’d left the extensive land preparation, already planted vines, house construction, winery construction and more at home to take a quick break while also learning.

“We started talking to winery owners,” says Andi. “Everyone was super supportive, but as soon as we told them it was in the Fraser Valley, we did notice this ‘oh, that’s cute; good luck’ air.”

On the way home, Andi’s doubts rose up, but Justin was confident. “It’s too late, we’re too far in. The wick is already lit.” And inadvertently, he named the winery and the two branded labels.

“Cannon is strictly French style connoisseur wine,” Andi says. “It’s light, delicate. The other brand, The Wick, is middle of the road. New World. It’s more punchy, fruit focused and expressive.”

All of the wines are dry, yet the precise blending Blandin does for each premium product makes for an anything but bland experience on the palate.

“Having Patrick doing everything and seeing it from a big picture approach shines through in our wines,” she notes. “Adding no sugar to our wine is definitely unique.”

She adds that one of Patrick’s goals is to make sure the wine is “digestible”

“I never want someone to have two glasses of our wine and feel full,” she says. They’re all super, totally drinkable.”

While some, like the light, delicately fruity Cannon Pondéré are perfect for patio drinking, others, like the Bordeaux-Claret-style Cannon Rapture bring added flavour to pizza and seafood. The Wick Zoom Zoom (for Blandin’s nickname within the industry: Zoom Zoom Zoom) is a bold Riesling blend with playful, punchy fruit flavours and an easy mouth-feel. The deep red of The Wick Bootstrapper, a blend of Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Petit Verdot, is robust and flavourful without the weight of some outspoken reds.

The vineyard layout, plantings and 5,000-square-foot production facility and tasting room are all products of merging the Manuels’ and Blandin’s visions. In the future, there will be three picnic areas, a lounge (to be the new home of the tasting room) and potentially a restaurant. Andi hopes the lounge will be completed by the summer and that their official greeter, Daisy the

Cocker Spaniel, will have more visitors to keep her on her paws as the season turns to outdoor adventure.

With half their grapes coming from Naramata, Cannon Estate falls under the 50/50 land-based rule as opposed to the typical 75/25 rule. Sons Tate and Rudy are likely to be on many more visits to the family-favourite vacation area as the couple continues to make connections with other wineries, their contract grape-growers and potentially even find a vineyard in the Naramata region.

Because Blandin takes on the vineyard management and the winemaking, he’s incredibly busy, but retains both the freedom and control to ensure the vineyard is minimally sprayed, the wines follow traditional winemaking procedures and the end products are as expected.

“It allows for more playfulness, more creativity for Patrick,” Andi says of the minimal additives and focus on blending to create the desired results. We want to create things that people will enjoy.”