Dinner Bell

Good food is the number one ingredient for an enjoyable dinner add to this, great company and quality wines, you accomplish a perfect evening. Our dinner guests on Saturday, February 08th were the noted wine author John Schreiner and his wife Marlene. Who are two of the nicest people one would want to meet, not only that both are very knowledgeable about wine.

They brought along amazing vintages of Blackwood Lane's *The Referènce* 06,07 and 08 to sample, we supplied the 09.

The evening started with opening an as yet unreleased sparking wine (a gift from Blackwood Lanes owner Carlos Lee) The wine lacked fizzle but had a raisin pie flavour. I would consider it a good attempt for their first sparkling wine.

Prior to sitting down for dinner we enjoyed a bottle of Kalala Harmony 2012 Blend of Pinot Gris, Riesling, Gewurztraminer and Auxerrois. A nice sipping wine from Tibor Erdelyi winemaker and the Organic vineyards of this West Kelowna winery.

As we settled in to enjoy a wonderful Prime Rib dinner the corks were popped from the
The Referènce 06,07,08. Oh my Gosh SO good! There are all wines that have been previously reveiwed by John on his Blog and my page Robert's Selections. The wines all were scored in the high 90s. It is quite an experience to go back and forth between the wines and determine which on is best. All vintages have some distinctive characteristic. The sad thing is this wine range from $150 to $96.00 a bottle

We never did make it to the 09 nor the icewine we had ready to go with the Baked Pears in Red Wine sauce. After the Blackwood Lane wines "Too much of a Good Thing".

Charles Herrold from White Rock BC was the original winemaker. He currently is part owner and winemaker at Silverback Vineyards

My List of Wineries to Watch in 2014

Well It happen someone kindly took me to task on my list of Wineries to Watch in 2014. He was rather upset that I did not consider any of the Prince Edward County wineries worthy enough to be on the list.

Kindly remember that I have a personal website I’ do not make a  living writing about the wineries or critiquing  the wines of our great nation.  In fact I run a personal non profit website. I don’t even know if the wineries care if they make my list or not.

For the sake of argument  lets just review who and how a winery may make this list. First off every winery in Canada is eligible for this list. You might say “ It’s the Squeaky Wheel that gets the Grease that makes the list. In other words if I hear a great deal of chatter about a winery it has a very good chance of making the list.

If a winery has a good reputation and zooms along with quality wines year after year very one knows about them and they most likely are not going to make the list.  Everyone is already watching them. A good example of this would be Tawse or Inniskillin. An elite  winery would have to do something pretty special to make  my list of Wineries to Watch

Such was the case of Mission Hill in West Kelowna. Mission Hill Family Estate stunned the Wine World by Winning 'World's Best Pinot Noir' at Decanter World Wine Awards 2013. I had a feeling we would be hearing from Mission Hill in 2014 and it did not take long .  In January  the Elite winery CedarCreek Estate Winery was purchased by von Mandl Family Estates, the new holding company of Anthony von Mandl, the owner of Mission Hill Family Estates.

Now getting back to our PEC ambassador. He must remember  I live in British Columbia. Its hard to track the Ontario wineries.  In fact there are now over 700 wineries.  Once again I repeat the phrase  The Squeaky Wheel gets the Grease.  I just did not hear that much about the PEC wineries.

In  2013 we listed Karlo Estates and ten other Ontario wineries .  Some wineries never answer our repeated request for information  That would include eighteen wineries from Prince Edward county.

So in response to my friend in PEC let the wineries inform me about  WHAT IS HAPPING. Send me info on the wineries as does Fred Couch for the Niagara Regions and Robert Murray in Nova Scotia and Dee Newman in the Okanagan and Leanne Frosese of Townhall Brands.

http://www.winesofcanada.com/featured_winery_watch2014.html

Return of the Blog

Back in 1992 I started a wine website called World of Wines. As I began to take a much closer look at the Canadian wines and her wines I release this was just the beginning of something sensational. I changes the website focus to strictly on Canada, purchasing the Domain Winesofcanada.com. Even then I did not realize how big the industry would grow.

I started writing about 28 wineries. I had no understanding of how many small regions there were, where brave winemakers where planting new vineyards. My only wine tasting experience was a  trip to Napa Valley.

Back then I would take the winter month to update and add new material to the website. The summers were mine to enjoy and visit the wineries. Today taking time off is difficult there is so much happening in Canada's wine industry. The website is more popular than ever.

This December I tried to take time off. I decided I would discontinue the blog for a month and find a better design template. I never did find one. I never did get the time off.  So I begin again.

Please take a moment to review our website page which list all the wineries in alphabetical order.
http://winesofcanada.com/listings_alp.html
You will see that some of the wineries have links and some are in black type. Those in back are the wineries we need help fining information on.

See what wines we enjoyed over the holiday season

http://winesofcanada.com/bobs_picks.html

Thank you Have a save and healthy 2014

Bloom The BC VQA Wine Tasting

 

Another beautiful day in Vancouver and the sun was shinning on the wines and wineries of British Columbia. What  an amazing display of outstand wines; from Viognier to Muscat to Gewurztraminer.

The best wine of the event may belong to ( let us remember with over 100 wineries you cannot taste them all) Dirty Laundry’s Woo Woo Vines Gewurztraminer. It had amazing powerful fruity flavours.

Fairview Cellars 1 Concast was the best of the reds by a ver slim margin over numerous contenders, including their own C-2 2011. Other outstanding wines included Kraze Legz Vineyard and Winery for their All that Jazz 2010.

 Little Straw vineyards Cuvee Noir and their Tapestry 2012 were Five Star wines.  Platinum Bench Estate Winery Benchmark Red also earned Five Stars. 

Other wines that gather my attention were  Quails Gate Chen Blanc 2012, Recline Ridges Kerner 2012, River Stones Corner Stone, Time Estates Meritage Red and White.

New comer Tyler Harlton Cabernet Merlot 2011 was amazing, look for this winery!   Also Volcanic Hills Estate  Five stars for their Reds.

From the Fraser Valley  you must try Vista D”oro’s Murphy Law 2009 and Blackwood Lane’s The Reference . Also check out Blackwood’s new Merlot.

Here are some of the wineries whose complete range of wines will always make them a sure bet.
Blackwood Lane, Painted Rock, Tinhorn Creek, Baillie-Grohman Estate (Their Gewurztraminer Wow), Church and State, Clos Du Soleil, D’angelo, Fairview, Hillside, Little Straw and Riverstone.

Finally, I found a Rose I realy liked.. Hillsides

Over all It was an amazing experience we met so many nice people and tasted outstand BC wines that rank with the world’s best.

 

 

 

Putting Vancouver Island on the Map


Winemaker Susan Vandermolen  of  Beaufort Estate Winery  stand up and take a bow.
Your putting Vancouver Island on  the world map of outstanding wineries.

You managed to bring 27 medals home to the Comox Valley from the International Wine Challenge (IWC) in London, England, the All Canadian Wine Championships (ACWC), and the NorthWest Wine Summit (NWWS)!

 

Located 8km north of Courtenay the winery has a great view of Beaufort mountain range.
The wineries logo is the Moai statues of Easter Island. Owners Susan and Jeff Vandermolen sought out a local carver, Stan Skuse (X-Dream Sculptures) from Campbell River, and commissioned him to carve their Moai

The winery was licensed in 2007 and is the first in the Comox Valley. They produce about 2,000 cases on 3.2 hectares.

 

New Zealand Wine Tasting
A grand time was had at the recent New Zealand WIne tasting event held at VAncouver's Roundhouse.
Approxiamely 30 of New Zealands best wineries were there to present their wines.
From agents to princiaplas hospitality was at its finest.
We also ran into some friends from the wonderful wine.

I concentrated msotly on the Whites while Barabar enjoyed sampling the Reds.

Breifly here are some of the wineries that impressed us
Yealands Estate- Pinot Gris and Sauvignon Blanc
Astrolabe Province Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc
Brancott B Letter Series Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc
Brancott Letter Series T Marlborough Pinot Noir
Stoneleigh Lattitude Pinot Noir
Villa Maria Cellar Pinot Noir Marborough 2010
Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc 2012
Kumeu River Wines Pinot Gris

A great future at many of the wineries was a business card faeturing their wines. If you like that wine simply pick up a business card with name of the wine and winery on it

Connecting with the Wineries

Connecting with the Wineries

With over seven hundred wineries in Canada It’s a difficult task keeping track of all the changes happening with the wineries. In recent years social media has made it easy to stay connected. But there are wineries that simply ignore me.

Perhaps with TV and radio stations now paying more attention to our wines and so many (too many bloggers) jumping on the band wagon a website than has  been supporting our wineries for twenty years is not that important.

Last week at the IslandWineries Annual Spring tasting I came across a winery that has never answered my e-mails or returned my phone calls that would be Domaine Rochette  in Saanich I questioned them about the lack of contact and received an accuse. They gave me a card with an e-mail address and promised they would respond. Sorry Domaine Rocette but that e-mail came bounching back three times I tried. I then looked up your website and used that e-mail connection. I have not heard from you.

There are others that do not answer. Most of the Quebec wineries do not respond. Maybe they prefer I e-mail then in French but sorry my junior high French I have long forgotten. But Ontario wineries like Fielding Estate Winery, Alvento, Angels Estate. Between the Lines   and Andrew Pellers Ltd are among the non responders.

There are even some wine associations that do not respond. Over the years the Nova Scotia Wine association use to be a good resource however today it is run by a new group who do not respond.

Back in BC where I live Bonaparte Bend, Chase and Warren, Desert Hills, Fairview Cellars, Young & Wyse Collection and Thornhaven Estate Winery are among those who never respond. If you place contact information on your website have the decency to respond please.

It is a times extremely frustrating especially when you meet some owners face to face and they promise to send the information you ask . But it never comes.  I  re ask and yet they do not respond. I still freely list the winery I still support them no one is left out  I seek out the information..  I do not get paid to do this

Andy Gebert of St Hubertus Winery said to me at the VQA Tasting event.  You and your website are a God Sent to Canadian wineries. Wineries should be bending over backwards thanking you.

If only Andy If only

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