The summer of 2005 might have burned itself into memory as the city’s sweatiest, but southern Ontario’s hottest season on record did have one happy result: winemakers were practically dancing in the vineyards. All that heat and dryness pumped extra weight, Aussie-style ripeness and almost tropical fruit into the region’s grapes. And though we’re just beginning to taste the results, one thing is certain: the 2005 vintage will easily be Ontario’s best yet. When I tried some early-release, non-barrelled whites recently, many of them were still aromatically suppressed from the addition of sulphur at bottling (that bottle-shocked nose quickly disappears), but the vintage had rendered normally unsung wines into minor works of art. Fielding Estate 2005 Gewurztraminer, Vineland Estates 2005 Pinot Blanc and Flat Rock 2005 Twisted (see review at right) were standouts. Still, nothing comes easily for Ontario wine growers. Before that summer, winter’s blasts killed nearly half of 2005’s crop, and many wineries recouped the loss by supplementing with out-of-province juice. So look for the VQA logo—the only guarantee that a wine is 100 per cent Ontarian. And make it a habit: that long, smouldering season’s reds and barrel-aged whites are also bound to be stars.