No question: Q&A is a superb wine

Photo: Winemaker Michal Mosny

Michal Mosny, the winemaker and co-proprietor of Winemaker’s CUT, recently said the 2020 Okanagan vintage produced the finest grapes he has worked with. “It truly stands out as the best vintage of my career.” He made that comment when releasing an excellent array of single varietals under the Winemaker’s CUT premium Bohemian label. A few weeks later, under the Q&A label, he released 670 cases of a red blend from 2020 that may well be the best red wine of his career.

Not directly related to Winemakers’ CUT, Q&A is a joint venture of wine personalities Jason Priestley and Terry David Mulligan with winemaker Michal Mosny. Currently, the wine is available at $50 a bottle through the Winemaker’s CUT website. The Q&A news release says the wine will be available at “selected premium stores” to be listed on the website. Jason, a Hollywood actor and director from British Columbia, became part of the Okanagan wine industry in 2007 when he joined the ownership group of Black Hills Estate Winery. Ten years later, Andrew Peller Ltd. acquired Black Hills. “After the sale, I continued to search for exceptional terroir capable of producing a peerless Bordeaux-style blend,” Jason says in a statement. “After looking everywhere, all roads lead to one answer and the answer is once again in the Okanagan.”

For his second entry into the Okanagan wine industry, Jason has teamed up with Terry David Mulligan, a veteran broadcaster and wine lover, the current host of Tasting Room Radio. Previously, he had been a co-host with Jason on Hollywood and Vines TV. “The Okanagan has always been the answer,” Terry David says in a statement. “I can attest from the time I lived in the Okanagan.” To make the wine, they enlisted Michal Mosny into the partnership. Born in Slovakia, he and his wife, Martina, came to Canada and settled in the Okanagan. He spent several years as the winemaker at Lunessence Winery & Vineyard in Summerland. He also started making wines under the Winemaker’s CUT label in 2015 and has since opened at District Wine Village. “I heard about Canadian wine for the first time from Terry and Jason’s international television show, Hollywood and Vines TV,” Michal says in a statement. “They are the reason why I decided to move here with my wife in 2012 and make wines in the Okanagan valley.”

Along came the exceptional 2020 vintage, a perfect year in which to launch a premium wine. The fruit for this wine was sourced from two of the best vineyards near Oliver: Quails Wayside Vineyard and Chahal Vineyard. Presumably, the partners have been shrewd enough to negotiate a supply of grapes in succeeding vintages. Here is a note on the wine.

Q&A 2020 ($50). The blend is 45% Cabernet Sauvignon, 38% Merlot, 13% Cabernet Franc and 4% Petit Verdot. The wine was aged 11 months in barrel, of which 14% was new French oak and 16% was new Slovakian oak. Of the remainder, 20% was second-fill French oak and the rest was neutral oak. The wine begins with aromas of dark cherry, plum, cloves and cedar. On the palate, there are flavours of cherry, black currant, blackberry, fig and dark chocolate. The texture is firm but softens when the wine has a chance to breath. This wine should be decanted for consumption now. An elegant wine, it has the bones to cellar for a decade or more. 94.