Wine Recommendation
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Wine Recommendation

Nk'Mip Cellars (Inkameep) 2004 QwAM QwMT Merlot  (Okanagan Valley)

Nk'Mip Cellars (Inkameep)

2004 QwAM QwMT Merlot
(Okanagan Valley)



The premium wines from Nk’Mip Cellars are given the designation, QwAM QwMT, phonetic for the phrase meaning “achieving excellence” in the language of the Osoyoos Indian Band, owners of this winery. To meet the high bar that the label sets for him, winemaker Randy Picton made this wine from grapes grown in two south Okanagan vineyards and picked at peak ripeness.

The result is a dark, concentrated red wine that was aged 18 months in French barrels (80%) and American barrels. Even at three years, this wine still has a lot of backbone from its ripe but firm tannins, a structure that should give this the ability to age superbly for at least another five years. The wine has flavours of black currants and spiced plums. It is big and rich in texture. If you drink it now, you should decant this wine, giving it time for its nascent lushness to develop. 87 points, rising to 89 when given the chance to breathe.

Reviewed August 1, 2007 by John Schreiner.

The Wine

Winery: Nk'Mip Cellars (Inkameep)
Vintage: 2004
Wine: QwAM QwMT Merlot
Appellation: Okanagan Valley
Grape: Merlot
Price: 750ml $25.00

Review Date: 8/1/2007

The Reviewer

John Schreiner

John Schreiner has been covering the wines of British Columbia for the past 30 years and has written 10 books on the wines of Canada and BC. He has judged at major competitions and is currently a panel member for the Lieutenant Governor’s Awards of Excellence in Wine. Both as a judge and as a wine critic, he approaches each wine not to find fault, but to find excellence. That he now finds the latter more often than the former testifies to the dramatic improvement shown by BC winemaking in the past decade.