Category: Pinot Blanc

Okanagan Falls, located between Penticton and Oliver, holds, I think, a sweet spot for growing grapes and making wine.  It has long warm days and cool nights, which allow the grapes to reach full ripeness as well as keep their acidity.  The Okanagan Falls Skaha Winery Association, consisting of 14 wineries, with 32 vineyards, held a tasting recently, which I attended.  In…

This was my first portfolio tasting for Amo Vino Distributors, a small boutique wine agency co-founded by Marisa Varas and Jessica Luongo.  Their wines are primarily from Europe, but there are also some California and BC wines to be found.  The wines from Greece and Portugal figure prominently, along with their country’s indigenous grapes.  You won’t find a huge list…

From BC’s winemakers, the consensus seems to be that 2017 was a more normal growing season compared to the two previous seasons.  Although there were horrible wildfires, the fires occurred in early summer, not later in the summer when veraison occurs.  Smoke seems to be more problematic for grapes at veraison.  The smoke earlier in the summer filtered the sunshine…

With all the calamities around us lately, it is an appropriate time to give thanks for what we have, and to celebrate Thanksgiving with family and friends in Canada.  Whether you enjoy a traditional turkey with stuffing gravy, potatoes, brussel sprouts, and pumpkin pie for dessert, or a ham, or a vegan main dish, there should be a BC wine to…

It is almost the end of summer, but the sun is still shining and we should get out onto the patio and enjoy fresh wine.  I received a box of wines to try from Evolve Cellars in Summerland, and inside there were two bottles of bubble, three white aromatics, a rose, and a silky red.  Okanagan white wines show off…

In my previous article, Lunessence Winery Winemaker’s Cut and More, I introduced you to one of our newer wineries Lunessence Winery & Vineyard.  They sent me 9 wines in total to try.  I wrote about 5 of their wines in the first article, and now the remaining 4 wines here for you to enjoy. I am amazed that there is…

Who is Pedro Parra? A French-educated Chilean, who looks at the definition of terroir through the use of modern scientific techniques.  The Old World has many hundreds of years to experiment, but in the New World, we do not have luxury.  From my interview at the Vancouver International Wine Festival, find out how Pedro determines terroir and the best grapes to…

When I get a shipment of wines to try from a winery, sometimes a bottle does not make it into the tasting notes.  It may be because of the varietal not matching up with the other wines, or the topic of that particular article. These two white wines had to wait for the appropriate moment to be tasted and presented…

BC bubble is growing.  Before we only talked about Blue Mountain, Sumac Ridge and Summerhill, but now there are Bella, Stoneboat, Encore Vineyards, and many more.  I recently received a white and a rose sparkling wine to taste from Encore Vineyards and their winery Evolve Cellars. The bottle labels are lightly coloured and appear to be bubbles in wine.  Nothing too formal,…

Harry McWatters is a leader in the British Columbia wine industry for the past 40+ years. In 1980, he founded BC’s first estate winery, Sumac Ridge Estate Winery, and later started See Ya Later Ranch Estate Winery in 1995.  He purchased and planted vines on his Sundial Vineyard on Black Sage Road in 1993. Harry is the owner of TIME Estate…