Hester Creek Petit Verdot Malbec 2024 – A Different Kind of Okanagan Red

The Hester Creek Petit Verdot Malbec 2024 is a wine with an interesting story behind it.

This is not a typical Hester Creek wine made entirely from grapes grown on the Golden Mile Bench. 

The grapes for the 2024 vintage came from the Columbia Valley in Washington State, just south of the Canadian border. 

The reason was the brutal winter of 2023–24, when extreme cold caused devastating damage to vineyards across the Okanagan. 

With very little fruit available from their own vineyards, Hester Creek decided to look south for grapes that could meet their quality standards.

It is an unusual chapter in the winery's history, but I think it is also an interesting one. 

Instead of buying finished wine or juice, Hester Creek went directly to growers in the Columbia Valley and selected vineyard blocks themselves, with similar climate, soils, grape varieties and viticultural history. 

The grapes were hand harvested, transported in temperature-controlled trucks, hand sorted at Hester Creek and fully crafted by the winery's own team.

The winery has been very open about this approach and says the goal was to produce quality wines while giving their Okanagan vineyards time to recover.

And in the glass, the wine certainly doesn't feel like a compromise.

Petit Verdot and Malbec

The nose is fairly simple, but pleasant. 

Dark berries and cassis are immediately noticeable, followed by ripe cherries and a lovely cherry-jam character.

It doesn't have the complexity or the layers of some of Hester Creek's more ambitious reds, but there is nothing wrong with that. 

Sometimes a wine can simply be enjoyable.

On the palate, the wine is full-bodied but surprisingly smooth, velvety.

The acidity is good and gives the wine enough freshness to stop the generous fruit from feeling heavy.

The tannins are high, as you would expect from Petit Verdot, but they are not harsh. 

There is a nice grip on the palate without the wine becoming drying or aggressive.

The fruit becomes more interesting as you taste. 

Dark berries and cassis are joined by fresh sweet cherry, cherry stone and a slightly bitter, dark-fruited note that reminds me of aronia berries.

There is also a touch of sweetness to the overall impression. Not sweetness that makes the wine feel sugary, but rather a ripe, generous fruit character.

The finish is long, leaving dark fruit and cherry notes behind.

Pleasant even without food.

What surprised me most was how easy this wine was to enjoy on its own.

Petit Verdot can sometimes produce very structured, tannic wines that really need food. 

Here, the ripe fruit and smooth texture make the wine much more approachable. 

The acidity keeps it fresh, while the tannins give it enough structure to prevent it from becoming soft.

That said, this is still a wine that would be very happy beside a steak, grilled lamb, beef short ribs or a rich mushroom dish. 

The tannins would work particularly well with protein, while the ripe cherry and dark berry fruit would complement grilled or roasted flavours.

For me, the Hester Creek Petit Verdot Malbec 2024 is a generous, full-bodied red with dark fruit, fresh cherry and firm but approachable tannins. 

It may not be the most complex wine in the Hester Creek portfolio, but it is pleasant, balanced and surprisingly easy to drink.

And perhaps that is what makes it interesting. 

Behind this straightforward bottle is a story about one of the most challenging winters the Okanagan wine industry has experienced, and how a winery adapted when nature suddenly changed the rules.

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