One of the first things that catch your eye about Blasted Church Vineyards is what catches your eye on any wine bottle — the label.

But there’s plenty more to Blasted Church than the proverbial pretty face — in fact, the stuff in the bottle is arguably even better than the lovely labels adorning their wines. (If you’re interested in reading more about the winery’s history, etc. they were featured in a winery profile back in June. Click here.)

Plus, Blasted Church is part of our FREE SHIPPING series this week when you purchase six or more bottles. This offer is only around until Sunday, August 16, at midnight. Choose your bottles, and then enter the code FREE15 at check out to get these killer wines delivered for free. Doesn’t get much better than that!

1) Blasted Church Unorthodox Chardonnay

Unorthodox, you say? How so? Well, first off this wine is made from Chardonnay Musqué grape — a highly aromatic clone of the world’s most popular white wine grape. As a result, there are all sorts of lovely baked pear, spice, and mineral notes that show beautifully along with the red apple skin, lemon candy and mineral notes commonly found in Chard. It’s decidedly fresh because it’s unoaked — perhaps not so unorthodox anymore, but still a welcome feature of this Chardonnay. ($19, 13.5% alcohol)

2) Blasted Church Gewürztraminer

The ripe stone fruit is here in spades — think peach, mango and apricot, with hints of ripe pear, spice and lychee notes. It’s a light-plus bodied, viscous and highly aromatic white, with plenty of stone fruit, marmalade flavours and just a hint of residual sugar. ($18, 13% alcohol)

3) Blasted Church Merlot

Here’s a great example of Merlot done right — not just right, but bloody good. Ripe plum, blueberry and blackberry motes work swimmingly with the dark chocolate and vanilla notes. It’s a plush, full-bodied Merlot that’s jam-packed with dark berry, plum and espresso notes, with 20 months in barrels adding vanilla notes, depth and soft tannins. ($26, 13.5% alcohol)

 

Ben MacPhee-Sigurdson is the wine columnist and literary editor for the Winnipeg Free Press. He’s on Twitter and Instagram at @bensigurdson.