Canadian Wine at The Decanter World Wine Awards If you love wine, you may have heard of Decanter magazine. It is one of the world’s most prestigious wine publications that has been supplying wine reviews and information to oenophiles since 1975. To champion and recognize wine excellence, they sponsor the Decanter World Wine Awards, an annual event for the past…
Wines to make your Father’s Day Celebration Perfect
June has one major celebration to observe – Father’s Day. It doesn’t get as much press as Mother’s Day, but it should include good wine and food too!
This month we’ll take a journey back in time to see who we should thank for the wine we’ll be enjoying this Christmas season. This idea came from a book by wine writer Oz Clarke that proposes the ancient civilization responsible for the “discovery” of wine. The usual suspects are the Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans. There is certainly evidence that…
We continue to focus on local since we have so many amazing Ontario wineries to explore. This month we feature Niagara’s 13th Street. The winery is owned by the Whitty family and their patriarch, Doug, is both the President and the Vineyard Manager. As a 3rd generation grape grower, he takes vineyard management seriously and completely identifies with the philosophy…
Our ongoing series continues to spotlight Ontario wineries that deserve our support not only because they are a local small businesses, but because they produce an excellent, world class product. This month we feature Flat Rock Cellars. Flat Rock was founded by Ed Madronich Sr., and it is operated with his son, Ed Madronich Jr. They are focussed on environmentally…
We heard that you recently received a new wine qualification. Could you tell us about it? Recently, I undertook the Wine and Spirits Education Trust (WSET London) Level 3 Award in Wines, which is an advanced level qualification for wine professionals. After a challenging 84 hours of advanced level study and a 2.5 hour final exam, including written and blind…
We have world class wines in the Niagara region that is just under 2 hours away. So, I visited a few of the smaller boutique wineries in the Beamsville area to check out what’s new. The first stop was Calamus Estate Winery. It is unique since it is the only winery that has an observatory on the top floor. It…
Italy has a fascinating wine producing history. It began with the Etruscans and Greeks (they made wine in Sicily around 800 BC), but the better recorded history of winemaking began with the Romans in 8 BC. In fact, the Romans liked their wine so much that the Emperor had to issue a decree in 92 AD to destroy some vineyards…