Tag: merlot

Are you a lover of Pinots?  Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris, I am sure will be front and centre at the Vintage Oregon, all-Oregon wine tasting in Portland on April 28, 2013.  Along with these well known varietal wines, you should also get to taste some Chardonnay, Riesling, Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah, Merlot, and Viognier, and more. A quotation about Portland…

Year of the Snake February 10, 2013 is a new Chinese New Year.  This new year will be the Year of the Water Snake. It begins on the first day of the first lunar month (usually in late January or early February) and ends on the 15th day of the first lunar month (Lantern Festival). According to Chinese Horoscopes, “Ancient…

This is not a New Years Resolution. It is too late in January for that.  What this is, is a suggested list of wines, or styles of wines, that you may want to consider trying.  Maybe you have never tried wines from Argentina? Why not?  With my list below, I give some reasons you may want to try these wines. …

Recently I received two new red wines from Spierhead Winery; Vanguard 2010, and Pursuit 2010.  If you have not heard of Spierhead before, they are a relatively new winery, located in Kelowna, BC.  They were named BEST NEW WINERY at the  2012 B.C. Wine Awards. The first wines I tried from Spierhead was a Pinot Noir and a Riesling (Read my tasting notes…

With the changing seasons we have changes in menus at our restaurants.  Last week Dianne Chow and I went to Beachside Forno in West Vancouver to have a sample of items from their new fall menu.  We were greeted by manager, Andy, as well as Chef Jason Harris.  This evening we were treated to 3 of the new fall items,…

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure to interview Ezra Cipes, CEO of Summerhill Pyramid Winery, located in Kelowna, BC.  One of the things Ezra told me about was a new line of BC VQA wines that they are producing called “Alive“, making both a red and a white wine.  The wine labels really look alive too with pictures…

BC wines are continuing to make strides around the world.  Last year BC wineries won more than 2000 medals in national and international competition according to the BC Wine Institute.  BC has over 208 wineries today.  We grow over 75 different grape varieties!  Merlot is the most planted grape in BC, and Pinot Gris is the most planted white grape…

When you talk with visitors to the Okanagan, most will say they want to visit Summerhill Winery and see their pyramid, where they partially age all their wines. Some may say they also want to visit because it uses biodynamic farming methods.  I sat down with Ezra Cipes, CEO of Summerhill, and son of the founder, Stephen Cipes, at a restaurant…

I was happy to be invited for the second year in a row to the Select Wines & Spirits’ Annual Portfolio Tasting, held at the Shaughnessy Golf and Country Club.  Last year I found several gems that I passed along to you, and you will read about my latest wine recommendations.  You may want to compare to my last year’s…

I always appreciate seminars held with winemakers and winery principals to discuss their wines.  In this case, it was with winemaker Severine Pinte and General Manager Rasoul Salehi from Le Vieux Pin in the Chateau Belair Boardroom of the Sutton Place Hotel. Le Vieux Pin is one of my favourite wineries in the Okanagan.  They consistently deliver high quality red…