22
Apr
2010
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Category: On the Road with the Grape Guy
You gotta love the TTC when it works;, when it doesn’t it make you wanna scream – and lately there’s been a lot of screaming here in the big smoke about our transit system. The bus into my neighbourhood never showed, so I had to walk out to my nearest main street to catch a bus and then over to the subway. Thankfully I was only 6 minutes late for lunch, but I did miss the sparkling wine reception.
Guest Speaker …
This afternoon’s keynote was given by Karl D. Wente, the fifth generation winemaker for Wente Vineyards – the oldest family owned winery in California (127 years). The tall 33 year old brought with him the message of good soil, taking care of the soil and how it in turn will allow you to make great wine.
“I’m marginally sick of the green message,” he told us ... (find out what else Karl had to say and of course about the wines)
To read about more interesting adventures thru the world of wine check out the On the Road With the Grape Guy blog.
22
Apr
2010
- Details
-
Category: On the Road with the Grape Guy
My only complaint about the Green Evolution Eco-Friendly Wine Tasting is its apparent lack of organization and its lack of printed material about the wines. Now, I suppose to be Eco-Friendly you would forego the use of paper that folks will eventually throw away (or hopefully recycle) once they get them home and throw on their coffee table for the rest of the month – but there were some catalogues available, but very few, so the choice should be print none (so that everybody has to write on their hands and wash the ink off later) or print more so everyone has the chance to recycle the books at the end of the month (or have them decompose naturally on the coffee table) … but the bottom line here is that I did not have at my disposal all the details of the wines I would normally like to have when writing these reports – and I promise not to print this one off for editing purposes. Write green, Think green.
Alright, so aside from that little glitch in the action I found this tasting to be very interesting. It was held at Earth restaurant (1055 Yonge Street); approximately 21 wines were being poured all from producers who are certified organic, practicing bio-dynamics and/or other sustainable methods of growing grapes and making wine. From these 21 wines, which were all available to order through Vintages (but not in store), I have pared it down to 7 that truly shone. One note about the lone Ontario winery in attendance, Southbrook, reviews of their wines can be found on my website, namely: 2008 Triomphe Merlot and the 2007 Poetica Chardonnay which were all part of their turn to the eco-wine; also look for a review of their 2009 Rosé coming soon … sign up for the newsletter to keep up-to-date. Now enough with the blatant self-promotion, on to the wines …(click here to read about the 7 wines worth your greenbacks)
To read about more interesting adventures thru the world of wine check out the On the Road With the Grape Guy blog.
