In case your holiday weekend gets to stretch out a little longer, here’s a cartful of NOBs (Notable Okanagan Blends) for a leisurely tasting. Most of them are newly released, but one or two date from previous release years. This means they could present a challenge in terms of sourcing. As always, the winery is your best bet. Prices were correct at time of acquisition—within the past year.

Blends can be more satisfying to taste and are often more directly indicative of the winemaker’s art, as well as basic winemaking craft. Many of them come with proprietary names, rather than an ingredients list. Quite a few of the world’s best substances are the result of good blending: tea, perfume, and wine. Here are a few from the wine valley in our own provincial back yard. I wanted to include the big award-winning Autumn Gold from Wild Goose but couldn’t locate a bottle this time around.

Blasted Church Hatfield’s Fuse 2007 ($16.99) This has become almost a flagship white for the Church, running in unbroken vintages right back to the initial portfolio release. It still satisfies, especially when the weather’s warm. You might find big aromas of fresh thyme and exotic fruit, along with flavours of ripe pineapple and a little lemon. It’s sensational with spicy Sichuan green beans, and goes handily with cioppino, crab boil on the beach, clams in a herby broth on angel-hair pasta, and cold lobster salad with arugula, radicchio, and sweet greens; curries, too.

Joie A Noble Blend 2007 ($21.40) Ditto the above, the flagship thing. As has become customary, the wine starts off with a mega-blast of aromas, then fresh, slightly spicy initial flavours, even showing a little licorice. Very Alsatian—that’s the avowed model for the winemakers, who have listed the formula: Gewürztraminer, Kerner, Pinot Blanc, Pinot Gris, and Ehrenfelser. While it’s hardly the season for it, I can see cooking up a huge choucroute on the next rainy day and getting into this in a big way. It continues to be one of the loveliest wines this country has yet produced.

Golden Mile Cellars Road 13 White 2006 ($16.99) There must have been a prodigious production of this popular blend (Ehrenfelser, Gewürztraminer, Chenin Blanc, Viognier, Chardonnay, and Orange Muscat), because this vintage is still on prominent display at my neighbourhood liquor store, despite the fact that I did my part by buying a couple of cases last fall. Still daisy-fresh and a full-flavoured treat, luscious and round and super-fruity, it’s a very versatile summer dinner wine. But here, today, it’s got to do the McCoy thing along with the Hatfield. Of course, there’s no reason you can’t like both.

Church & State Church Mouse Sauvignon Blanc/Semillon 2006 ($14.77) The Vancouver Island winery claims “grassy lemon and lime highlights”, and we found those. We also found it was a good match with tuna steaks à la Lucy Waverman. Very crisp and dry, the Sémillon hardly argues with the Sauvignon but mellows it out a little, and it works well in the glass, full and deep. But it’s not so much a solo sipper as a food companion.

Sumac Ridge Black Sage White Meritage 2006 ($24.99) The same groundbreaking B.C. winery’s other white Meritage, Pinnacle, costs a penny more—go figure. This is the same blend of varieties as the Church & State; the extra $10 gives you a lot extra: more depth, more ripe fruit, and more mellowness. While there may well be the stated “gooseberry and light vanilla oak” aspects, it’s a satisfyingly rich, round wine. Salmon would like it, as well as fresh pan-fried trout; so would dolcelatte Gorgonzola with white celery stalks.

Blasted Church The Dam Flood 2007 ($18.99) Don’t know what the blend here is, but it delivers big ripe berries; a good, full weight; and a fragrant and fresh finish. If you’ve got goat cheese in the fridge and some sourdough baguette, maybe a little pâté or prosciutto with fresh broad beans, or Pecorino cheese with black pepper and some wildflower honey, this makes a terrific light supper.

Twisted Tree Six Vines 2006 ($21.90) After sampling some of this new winery’s good whites a few months ago, we were keen to look at this red: a Meritage in all but name, consisting of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Carménère, Petit Verdot, and a splash of Malbec. Great big plummy aromas, mellow fruit, light spice, a bit of pepper—and even after being open for two weeks, kept cold, it proved fresh on the retaste. Excellent with all types of goat cheeses, too.

Van Westen Voluptuous 2005 ($29.90) A big favourite in this corner, this vintage is probably Rob Van Westen’s best yet. Of course, I say that every year! Sixty-seven percent Merlot and 33 percent Cabernet Franc, it’s 100 percent barrel-aged for 18 months in one-third new French oak, with the requisite malolactic fermentation for mellowness. The winemaker has secreted “plum, cassis, and blueberry laced with chocolate, vanillin, and spice” in his blend, and “tannins coat the mouth in a dusty, cocoa like texture,” he offers, by way of tasting notes. A very, very long finish. And a very long keeper, I would think: five years, maybe more?

Let’s leave it there for now. I did have a couple of others, including a fabulous Fairview Cellars the Bear’s Meritage 2003 ($24.90). But I couldn’t find any reference to it on the winery’s Web site, so I’m assuming it’s long sold-out, which is something that happens with great regularity at Fairview Cellars. If you’re curious, a call might turn up a bottle; it’s worth a try.