Canadian Wino(s)

I’ll list them – promote them, and try to attend them..

The culmination of the New Vintage Festival is the New Vintage Grille on Saturday, June 20th! Held at the scenic Niagara Culinary Institute, Niagara’s finest wineries will pair their new vintages with local culinary creations. This year featuring three of Food Network Canada’s most celebrated celebrity chefs: Anna Olson of “Fresh with Anna Olson”, Roger Mooking of “Everyday Exotic” and Anthony Sedlak of “The Main”. We look forward to presenting you with local tastes to savour and celebrate as we join together to officially open summer! Catch “Fresh with Anna Olson” Wednesdays and Fridays at 7:30pm ET on Food Network. Call 905-688-0212 ext. 22 to order your tickets now for just $90. A limited number of tickets are available. We recommend placing your order soon.

Exploring the wines of Beamsville Bench & Vineland

Kick off summer 09 with a one-of-a-kind, exclusive VIP wine tour! This unique tour will be exploring one of Ontario’s most renowned and beautiful wine regions: Niagara’s Beamsville Bench, known to locals as “The Bench.”
(Plus two of our favourite wineries right alongside the bench:
Flat Rock Cellars + lunch at Featherstone Winery)

Join Ange & Pax, your Hosts and Expert Tour Guides for the day, and a bunch of other wine enthusiasts as we explore a fantastic selection of Beamsville’s distinctive and award-winning wineries.

We invite you to escape the city and come along for the tour of a lifetime! You’ll experience world-class wines, breathtaking surroundings, memorable views, and a relaxing feeling unlike anything you have ever felt in the city. You have to come on a tour to know what we mean!

BONUS! This is tour also includes a gourmet wine country lunch at Featherstone winery! We hope you can make it!

Join Share a Glass for an evening of Inspiring Italian wines paired with a select menu from Autogrill’s modern Italian cuisine kitchen. Homestyle seating will generate great conversation with fellow wine lovers to compliment Christine’s pairing presentations of the four courses.

Contact Christine at (416) 659-8348 or christine@shareaglass.com for additional information and how to reserve your seat today.

Graze the Bench is an event for Wine and Food lovers to experience the Beamsville Bench wineries as they never have before. It is a week-end of casual and elegant grazing amongst the boutique wineries of the Beamsville Bench. We are offering our guests a chance to visit the lifestyle of the wine people who are passionate about all things wine, food and music.

This small but passionate group of winemakers and winery owners are opening their doors for one week-end a year. This is an opportunity for our guests to have some expertly prepared local cuisine along with a glass of wine in a picturesque vineyard setting whilst listening to the sounds of soulful music—designed to relax and re-invigorate.

www.grazethebench.com (continue reading…)

Drove down to Niagara on the Lake for Lailey‘s event… Tried a little bit of everything.

• 2007 Cabernet Franc (bronze medal winner at Ontario Wine Awards) 30$
• 2007 Cabernet Sauvignon $30
• 2007 Meritage $30
• 2006 Zweigelt $14
• 2007 Counterpoint  $25
• 2008 Chardonnay, Unoaked $16
• 2006 Chardonnay, Niagara River  $25
• 2008 Vidal  $14
• 2007 Vidal Icewine $28

After tasting some more in the tasting room, I ended up buying the 2007 riesling icewine(another ontario wine award winner),  2 bottles of the 2007 Syrah that I had tried at Winecamp Toronto, 1 bottle of 2006 Pinot Noir, 1 bottle of 2007 Pinot noir, and 1 bottle of 2007 Pinot Noir – canadian oak.  Probably should have picked up a couple bottles of the Vidal for 14$ for visitors this summer or for the bbq I’m planning in a couple weeks.

Anyhow..ttyl

P.S. The directions on the web site aren’t as clear as they should be… once you take exit 38b, turn left at the hilton, then right at the first intersection (airport rd), follow that to HWY 55, then their instructions are great from there on.

It is said that you are what you eat, and we are proud to say that we are Ontarians. From Ontario Wine Country to the Holland Marsh, our rich and fertile terrains are bursting with an abundance of incredible wines and foods. sip & Savour Ontario helps award-winning VQA wine and market fresh Ontario foods, make the journey from our fields and farms to your table.

With the Ontario government officially proclaiming the third week in June as ‘Ontario Wine Week’, awards, wine tastings, restaurant promotions, and culinary contests all play a role in the sip & Savour Ontario program.

Check out our events and learn more about how you can participate in the Ontario wine and food experience. We hope to give you a taste of Ontario’s home-grown excellence and inspire your continued enjoyment of Ontario’s best foods and VQA wines for years to come.

Offered at every event, a complimentary shuttle is available between 6:30 pm & 10:00 pm, with pick-up at Union Station by the clock tower – sponsored by Niagara Airbus