Wines from Benjamin Bridge, Château des Charmes, Coyote's Run, Creekside Estate, Flatrock Cellars, Inniskillin Wines, Mission Hill Family Estate, Nk'Mip Cellars, Osoyoos Larose, Pelee Island Winery, Poplar Grove, Quail's Gate, St. Hubertus, Summerhill Pyramid Winery, Tawse Winery and Tinhorn Creek Vineyards were chosen to promote and celebrate Canada during the Games.

BENJAMIN BRIDGE SPARKLING HEADS TO LONDON'S 2012 OLYMPICS

July 24, 2012 (Gaspereau Valley, Nova Scotia) – Benjamin Bridge is delighted to announce that its 2008 Benjamin Bridge Méthode Classique Rosé was selected as one of two Canadian sparkling wines to promote and celebrate Canada's best at the London 2012 Summer Olympics.

Canada's High Commissioner in London England will be hosting Olympic receptions and dinners throughout the Summer Games to showcase the best of Canada. About 20 wines, and only two sparkling wines, were selected by Janet Dorozynski, Ph.D., Global Practice Lead with the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade who oversees a program which assists Canadian Embassies to serve and promote Canadian wine, and works with companies to develop export market strategies. She explained:

"London is an important market for Canadian wine and is particularly important in terms of exposure to world-renowned authorities in the global wine industry like Jancis Robinson, Master of Wine, and Tom Stevenson, the world's leading authority on Champagne...We want to showcase our very best, and Benjamin Bridge is clearly one of our very best...to promote investment in Canada."

Founder and co-owner of the winery, Gerry McConnell, said:

"We're excited and honoured to be selected as one of only two sparkling wines from Canada to be served during the Olympics...it's truly a testament to the quality of the wines we've been producing at Benjamin Bridge since we began just a little over ten years ago. And the exposure this brings for not only Benjamin Bridge but also the emerging reputation for Nova Scotia wines overall...is terrific."

Benjamin Bridge completed the bottling of its 2011 vintage sparkling wines last week. McConnell said: "Of the 16,000 bottles we cellared last week, all of which were produced from 100% vinifera grapes, about half are sparkling rosé and of exceptional quality according to Raphaël..." Raphaël Brisbois, former chef de cave for the legendary Piper Heidsieck, who together with lead wine consultant, Peter J. Gamble, and resident winemaker, Jean-Benoit Deslauriers are responsible for crafting Benjamin Bridge's nationally acclaimed Méthode Classique sparklings.

A very limited supply of the 2008 Benjamin Bridge Méthode Classique Rosé remains available for sale at private wine stores and select NSLC stores.

Today we thought that we would let our website visitors speak for us

Shelly says it all:
The Wines of Canada website was a delight to discover! Listing all the Wine Regions across Canada, it offers insight into wine terms, Grapes, Wine standards, Ice Wines, Mead Wines, the history of wine in Canada dating back to prohibition, Early Pioneers and "the beginning." An In-depth Tourism section; Where to Dine, Stay, and play Golf! It offers an FAQ section, Wine 101, Wine and your Health, Cooking with Wine, Enjoying Wine and Cheese and Wine. Types of Wine from Organic, Kosher, Fruit, Meads (Honey Wine), Sparkling, Icewine and more. Read about the Scoring System for Wines and what the numbers mean! Check out the Winemaking Calendar! WOC has renowned writers; John Schreiner, Fred Couch, and Robert Bell the developer of WOC. If that isn't enough, Wines of Canada website includes Wine Towns, Winery links, Maps, Tourism links, Awards, a list of cellared wines, constellation wines, a gallery and yes, a Sitemap! Has anyone tried Gimli Goose Sparkling Wine? I just had to "slide" that in. What is truly refreshing about WOC? It is not sponsored by the Gov of Canada, or any wineries or wine associations. Page sponsoring is available and I would strongly suggest it as it will increase your sales. It is a demanding task maintaining the WOC website with over 500 wineries, it is timely and costly. I have written this to bring this to the attention for all my " wine loving" friends and a big thank you to Robert Bell. Happy wine tasting! 

Author and researcher  Robert Murray wrote
Wines of Canada is a great site to promote provincial wines to the world and to acknowledge special individuals connected to the wine industry.


Chris Hawes winemaker Bear River Winery Nova Scotia
"Your site is the "go to" spot for Canadian Winery information.
You have done a great job promoting wineries coast to coast."
Midge Wyse
Burrowing Owl Estate Winery
Your web site gets better all the time and thanks for sending new updates and reminding us to have a look. I must really commend your efforts to identify the different viticultural areas (Black Sage, Golden Mile etc.) and you have done a great job of including everyone. I'm also very impressed with your updates on sub regions and your descriptions of the corresponding terroir.

WinesOfCanada.com - Bob Bell's Wines of Canada is a unique information source for almost all Canadian wineries, including the lesser known gems in Quebec, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland. It also has lots of stories about his "wine country" trips and articles of interest related to the Canadian wine industry.
I-wine Review

I'm a freelance writer, writing an article on organic wines for a popular magazine. I found your website to be very informative and accessible, more so than any other website I have found regarding organic winemaking in Canada .
Kate Zimmerman

Hi Bob,
Your web site is really lovely, I still can't get that you are allowing free advertizing, for these companies that are making a bomb, and you are assisting them, with your unique way of showing THIER PRODUCTS. YOU WILL HAVE TO EXPLAIN THAT TO ME AT
With great respect for all your work,
Regards Jean xxx

what do you thin visit us at www.winesofcanada.com
Almost twenty years ago we began boasting about Canada's wines and our winemakers keep proving us correct.

Its the Attitude that Counts

It is easier to get a customer to enter your store the first time, than it is to get them to return
The number one reasons customer fail to return is not the companies product. Its the attitude of the  individual dealing with the customer. Yes the number one reason people fail to purchase or fail to return is a poor attitude display by the person they dealt with.

Recently my wife and  I drove a friend to the airport for 6 Am. We decided to visit a once popular restaurant for breakfast.  Upon parking in fron of the resturant we were suprised how few cars were in the parking lot.  Upon entering the  dinning room it did not take long to realize why.

There was no restaurant person in sight. We waited about four minutes before calling out.
Three times I called before a sleepy waitress appeared she spoke not a word as she walked slowly towards us.  Upon reaching us she said "two"  then lead us to a booth. Not  a smile or a pleasant word, just a bored I don't want to be here look. I want to leave.

The next day we found ourself been taken out for lunch and having a simliar experience in a very popular  restuarant chain.  This time it was a member of the management team.  Thankfully the waitress was bright and cheerful.
We have on too many occasions experience the I don't give a dam that your here attitude from staff at wineries. So many wineries depend upon the tourist business and sells generated by having a tasting room. Better make sure the person tending your business has an attitude that will impress the customer. One that invites them to return.

A Celebration of 30-40-50 at Grey Monk Winery

We are sending congratulations Trudy and George Heiss, founders of Gray Monk Winery.  Fifty years ago they got married, forty years ago they moved from Alberta to
British Columbia’s Okanagan Valley to grow grapes and thirty years ago they opened their winery.  Trudy and George were among the leaders in establishing the rules
and regulations for establishing a winery in BC, resulting in the Estate Winery Program.  Their wines have won more awards than can possibly be listed here.

One of the Okanagan’s original estate wineries, Gray Monk has evolved over the 30 years from a small winery with a modest footprint to a grand winery styled like a European Château.  Today they produce over 80,000 cases of wine a year

The Heiss family has had a profound impact on Okanagan wine growing. They were the first to import clones of Pinot Gris, Gewürztraminer and Auxerrois from Alsace.
They facilitated the Becker Project, an eight-year trial of German vines that, by its conclusion in 1985, proved the viability of varieties now among the most important in the Okanagan. Among all the wine producers in North America, they alone nurtured the hard-to-grow Rotberger grape to make a notable rosé.

Gray Monk built its reputation with unoaked white wines that are expressive, fruit-driven and juicy on the palate. They have also produced a 150 bottles of a sparkling white wine that was served exclusively at the anniversary celebrations last week.

A pair of University of British Columbia scientists have identified chemical compounds previously unknown in wine and in grape seeds of the kind that give red wine its distinctive flavour profile and aging characteristics.
The researchers say their breakthrough could be a big step forward for winemakers who rely on extensive tasting alone to monitor balance and structure in fermenting and aging wines, but who do so virtually blind to the levels of important chemical flavour compounds.
The 14 phenolic compounds isolated and described by post-doctoral researcher Adeline Delcambre and chemistry professor Cedric Saucier at UBC’s Okanagan campus help form complex chemical compounds called tannins.
Winemakers control and develop the tannin content of red wines to create subtle flavours, dryness, astringency and rich colour. Tannins also affect how a wine changes during the aging process, affecting the flavour and hence the value of the wine, said Saucier.
Saucier hopes the discovery will lead to the creation of new tools that will help winemakers to measure the tannin content of grapes, their skins and seeds in the vineyard to determine when the fruit should be harvested and to monitor the development of tannins in wine as the freshly crushed grape juice “steeps” in its skins and seeds.
Phenols are particularly abundant in the skins and seeds of red wine grapes such as Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah and Merlot

“That’s why you can make pretty good white wine from grape juice alone, but for red wine you really must have the whole grape,” said Saucier. “When you make red wine you macerate everything, the grape, the skins and seeds, and make an infusion.”
Winemakers must rely mainly on their sense of taste to determine when a grape is ready to be picked and to decide on the moment when the tannin content of grape juice stewing with its skins and seeds — a slurry called the must —is just right and it needs to be strained.
“You want to extract some of these compounds, perhaps half of them, but not all of them,” he explained.
Winemakers try to taste for the balance of phenols in grapes and in the wine, which is based more on art and experience than science



Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/health/scientists+discover+flavour+compounds+wine+grape+seeds/6777950/story.html#ixzz1xmvSplbU

Time is Everything


One day with my wife's encouragement I decided to start a website, the subject being the wines and wineries of Canada.. A rather easy task I thought (the pamphlet at the local government liquor store listed 25 wineries) not too difficult to accomplish.

First step learn to build a website, second step purchase a domain name and website hosting. It was a learn as I go process that did not take too much of my time, about three days consisting of twenty to twenty five hours, after all there were only 25 wineries according to the pamphlet.

Including wineries in British Columbia and Ontario the website would consist three pages, the Home Page, British Columbia page and an Ontario page. It would be just a matter of time before I would be done and the site up and running.. but then I decided to do some indepth research into Canada's wineries. Information on the internet was very limited, the year was 1992.

I came across a book called "Vintage Canada" by Tony Aspler in 1993, oh my gosh there were wineries in Quebec and Nova Scotia, there were wineries in regions of Ontario other than the popular Niagara Penninsula. There was so much more to the wines of Canada I was now in a race against time to catch up and make my website current. Robert Orben said "Time flies. It's up to you to be the navigator" and so the years passed and the website grew larger and larger.

New pages were added regularly I had the time to deal with it all; The nineties came and went, a new millennium had begun Canada's wine industry grew, her wines became more popular. Her icewines became world renowned and time became my enemy.
The number of wineries increased soon I was boasting about the five hundred wineries based in Canada. The website had over a million visitors in 2009 and had grown to over 150 pages. In 2010 the list of new winery licenses was amazing; We were going to surpass 700 wineries.

Rapid changes were taking place. New brands were added, wineries changed their names, and were opening in regions where no one thought grapes could grow, virtual wineries opened. Wine companies were forming, buying out smaller wineries. Restaurants and guestrooms were being added it was all happening so fast!

I thought about this yesterday as I realized I had spent over six hours communicating with just one winery; one owner. I do not regret this time. The website is my passion I just don't know how I am going to find the time to remain Canada's number one wine website supporting not only the wines of Canada but the tourism industry as well.

Time is money... www.winesofcanada is taking my time but unfortunatly not providing the money. It's an old cliche that we all know and understand, but to what extent do you really apply it in your life. Time is our most precious resource, because it is the only one that is truly scarce.

As the wine industry grows  .. I would appreciate some time from the wineries of Canada. I would like them to take the time and provide information about their winery, give me the information and I will tell the world.
I have had marketing and hospitality managers from the big wineries telling me they don't have time to answer my questions. My response is get off facebook, get off twitter and take time to answer the questionaire I send to each winery. I'm promoting your winery for free and it would give me time to make sure your information is current. There is always someone with the time to point out to me that certain things they deem important are missing.

Why did we start a second website www.winesofwoi.com simple we live within a few blocks of the border and have a cabin in the US. We have had the operortunity to taste many Washington wines. We first discovered the wonderful world of wines on our honeymoon when by chance we ended up in Napa Valley....the rest as they say is history.