Category: pinot noir

Australia is a big country, from east to west covering 4000 km, which in Canadian terms would be about the distance from Calgary to Quebec City.  As with Canada’s east and west coasts, there is a difference in climate, there is also in Australia.  This dinner, this evening we discovered the regional differences between Australia’s west coast – Margaret River…

BC Pinot Noir is well known to some wine drinkers, but maybe not enough.  Probably most people think of Burgundy, or Oregon, or New Zealand. But we do produce some decent Pinots here in BC.  I recently received a bottle of Haywire Canyonview Pinot Noir 2012 to review.  It comes with a screw cap but that doesn’t mean it cannot…

Dine Out Vancouver starts treating us to fantastic food starting this Friday, January 16 till February 1st. There are so many choices from the $18-$28-$38 fixed price meals.  New restaurants are always coming into our food scene, so there are always wonderful surprises each year.  This year, one of our new restaurants is Morocco West located at Jervis and Robson….

Trying to think of an exceptional quality wine to buy for someone in your family or a special friend?  I have a few suggestions from the wines that I tasted over this past year.  These wines cover all regions of the world, and have different price points.  There should be something for everyone to love.  16 white and sparkling wines,…

I am privileged to try so many wines from around the world each year, here in Vancouver.  Sparkling, rose, red, white, and fortified wines have all passed my lips.  And for some instances there is a wine that stops you in your tracks, all your senses become heightened as they focus on the spectacular wine in your glass.  I would…

SpierHead Wines in Kelowna has been producing some quality wines since the first vintage I tasted a few years ago.  At the 2014 National Wine Awards of Canada their 2012 Riesling, Chardonnay, and Pinot Noir Gentleman Farmer all won Silver Medals.  Their 2013 vintage wines have come out now, and I was lucky to receive a bottle of their Chardonnay,…

Sitting down in a private room at Joe Fortes Seafood & Chop Shop, myself and a few other wine media had a chance to try some fantastic Pinot Noirs and Chardonnays from Hahn Family Wines, a California-based winery, with vineyards in the Santa Lucia Highlands in Monterey County.  I pulled wine maker Paul Clifton aside for a few minutes to…

The Christmas holidays and New Years Eve are fast approaching, and with that, you will probably be invited to parties, or invite people over to your party.  But what wines to serve?  I always like to have at least one sparkling wine at my parties, usually served at the start of the evening.  There are a ton of choices of…

The first biodynamic wine I tasted was at a wine tasting at the South World Wine Society.  The topic was not biodynamic wines at all.  I do not remember the topic, other than it was red wines from Australia, and it happened that one of the bottles was from a biodynamic winery.  That wine tasted more alive and vibrant than…

I first posted this article 2 years ago, and the styles of wines that I described then, still hold for your turkey or ham Thanksgiving dinner this year.  The wine vintages from the wineries below will have changed, but these are all quality wines from quality wineries here in BC, and you should feel comfortable purchasing them at your local…