Mount Baker Mountain White and Mount Baker Mountain Red

Mount Baker Mountain White and Mount Baker Mountain Red

These are both blended

non-vintage table wines from Mount Baker Vineyards and Winery. I've written about their Mount Baker Syrah 2005. We bought both wines at a local Haggen with a wine manager who picked Mount Baker as their featured winery as part of the Washington Wine Month celebrations at $6.99 for a 1.5 liter bottle. Both wines are part of the Mount Baker Washington State wines tier of table wines.

Mount Baker Mountain White

The white was crisp and pleasant, with a floral-citrus aroma, but a little on the sweet side. I think Mount Baker Mountain White would work very well for someone one who knows they like sweet whites. I suspect it's primarily Riesling, but there's absolutely no information about this wine on the Mount Baker Winery Website, or anywhere else. This is a good wine for spring and summer sipping on a deck with a cheese plate, a Thai take-out dinner, or marinated Asian-style grilled salmon. I wish I could ship a bottle to my mother; she would love the combination of slightly sweet, floral, and citrus.

Mount Baker Red

In the glass, the wine is a rich dark crimson. The aroma is fruit-forward, with a touch of coffee or perhaps cocoa. There's some real body to this wine in terms of the tannins, but the mouthfeel is almost watery. No legs on the glass at all, but nontheless, this is a very enjoyable table wine. It's substantial enough to stand up to rather hearty fare. This is one of those wines that improved the longer it was opened. It changed rather dramatically in aroma as well as in flavor; the flavor opened up and became much more complex. The Mount Baker Red blend is a richer, deeper Burgundy style blend, with a slight resinous finish. It's a blend of 50% Malbec, 20% Merlot, 15% Sangiovese, 15% Cabernet Sauvignon. The Malbec is definitely dominant, but it's a pleasant change from more fruit forward Washington reds. This is a robust, vibrant wine, and would work quite well with steak, or spicy Mexican, or as the burgundy in boeuf-bourguignon. In our case, it worked quite well paired with a pasta salad with hearty chunks of peppers, olives, brocolli, pepperoni and grated mozarella