Feb
16
2012
Have you thought about travelling to Chile and Argentina, to try their wonderful wines, see the beautiful Andes Mountains, sample their cuisine, but not know how to arrange it all? Why not sign up to attend the FREE MyWinePal seminar on Feb 23 to taste some South American wines and learn about an upcoming Wine [...]
Jul
16
2011
In Part 1 of my Tasting at M. Chapoutier, I introduced you to the winery and my view standing on the Hermitage hill overlooking other surround appellations. It was an excellent tour of the Hermitage vineyard, followed by an extensive tasting of their wines. In Part 1, I gave you my tasting notes about Chapoutier’s [...]
Jul
11
2011
One of my overall favourite wineries in the world is M. Chapoutier. Like Domaine Huet, that I wrote about earlier, M. Chapoutier, is also a biodynamic winery. I arrived at the winery around 10:30am. Already hot and sunny in the Rhone Valley. I was met by Mr. Samuel “Sam” Boissy. To better understand the wines [...]
Oct
24
2010
It was my pleasure to have a serious sit down tasting of the wines from D’Angelo Estate Winery. I’ve tasted their wines before at various tastings, the latest being the Naramata Bench “Simply Red” tasting in September. Sal D’Angelo has been making wine for nearly 25 years. He started with a winery in Amherstburg, ON [...]
Sep
26
2010
In Part 1 of my attendance at the Vancouver Playhouse International Wine Fair, I reviewed wines of New Zealand and Argentina. Here in Part 2, I’ll cover the rest of the world (or at least parts that I had a chance to taste)! If you like Italian wines, Altesino is a nice coice. I particularly [...]
Sep
26
2010
Most of you probably know little about Portuguese wine other than the bottles of the slightly sweet, sparkly Mateus that were so prevalent in Canada 30 years ago. But then you moved on to the classical French varietals, like Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon. Well I would like to suggest you take a chance on both [...]
Sep
25
2010
In April 2008, MyWinePal was able to spend almost a week touring Sonoma and Napa Valleys. The weather was unusually warm; almost 20 degrees Farenheit above the normal temperature. Workers were in the fields actively managing the trellising. Some of the wineries,and brief notes on the wineries follow. The first visits were at J Vineyards [...]
Sep
25
2010
The California Wine Fair visited Vancouver on April 2. There was a wide range of wines from cheap and cheerful, up to collectible wines for special occasions to sample. There were at least 120 different wineries, each with several wines to sample. Just not enough time to visit them all! A few personal observations. I [...]
Sep
25
2010
2006 saw the start of a new winery in the Okanagan – Meyer Family Vineyards. A small 3.1acre vineyard on the Naramata Bench was purchased by JAK Meyer and his wife Janice Stevens which contained 10 year old Chardonnay vines. Their goal is to produce some of the best single vineyard Chardonnay in Canada. To [...]
Sep
24
2010
As promised this is Part 2 of my trip to visit some of the wineries in the Fraser Valley. On this trip I visited Lotusland, Blackwood Lane, and Mt. Lehman wineries. The first winery visited was Lotusland Winery. This winery produces wines from grapes that are 100% grown in the Fraser Valley. The grapes are [...]