After having had a break from Thanksgiving, the first regional class we had was on the Loire Valley, one of the areas which our instructor for the week is most passionate about. The Loire is one of the northernmost regions for winemaking in France – and despite what amazing wines come out of the region, it remains the awkward child of France, with Bordeaux and Burgundy persisting as the king and queen, despite the fact that the Loire is the 3rd largest producer of AOC wines in France. It’s interesting that I read about how the Loire is still finding its identity like a young adult, to the point where many of its appellations allow small but substantial maximums of Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon into their whites and reds, respectively.… read more
Category: Life
WSET Diploma – Unit 3 – Week 1
Dear Diary,
Like some sort of academic pregnancy, I will subject the next 9 months of my life to some form of patient growing of what is hopefully my knowledge of wine. And I will subsequently hope that, somewhere, my diploma will be birthed out of a printer in the UK by some person whose accent sounds equally as charming as it is foreign – yet familiar, like fusion cuisine or a fucked up awesome bottle of sparkling Jura.
I can feel it already – I won’t have time to write to you about people for whom my heart beats, and instead I’ll be on my knees begging the Gods to reveal to me why I can’t tell the difference between a Grecian Xinomavro and a Piedmontese Nebbiolo.… read more
Court of Master Sommeliers: The Certified Sommelier Exam
Phew.
The Certified Sommelier exam consists of three parts: a blind tasting exam, the theory exam, and the service exam. Much more intimidating to a guy whose restaurant experience involves washing dishes six years ago – and though the average pass rate isn’t too scary, ~60% is enough to have you doubt everything, because even at this level there’s a lot of material. There are brilliant, brilliant people I met this day who’ve spent oodles more time in the wine industry than I have and didn’t pass.
Balance seemed important – there was one intelligent fellow who already had the WSET Diploma, which requires you to know a VAST amount of information on wine (and it’s something I’m only in the middle of) – yet he didn’t pass. … read more
Wine Bloggers Conference 2014 – The back of the bottle; the odds and ends
This was my first Wine Bloggers Conference – I partially regret not going last year, but at the same time, I justified my absence because my co-worker attended, so I thought work wouldn’t let us both take time off. Ironically, the bulk of us are on vacation in a couple of weeks.
Last year’s conference was in Penticton, i.e. it was literally super close to home, so I really do deserve a slap on the wrist for missing that one. I couldn’t resist not going to attend this year’s conference in Santa Barbara – first, California. Wine. Hi. Second, it would provide me with a fabulous answer for anyone that would ask what I was up to this summer, and I wouldn’t have to come up with a fancy complicated way to say “nothing”.… read more
Wine Bloggers Conference 2014 – First time at a legit vineyard?!
Okay – so day two of the conference – after we’ve finished the breakout session (I went to the one about blends), we have a little break where I assume the bulk of us grab a snack or wash the summer Californian sweat/shame off our skin. We’re told to meet outside at 5PM sharp, and multiple buses would whisk us away to mystery locations. So literally, a couple of buses would show up, n-number of us would hop into one of the buses to somewhere we have no idea about, and then the remainder of us would wait for the next batch of buses. For all I knew this was the part in the horror movie where they would take us somewhere to get murdered, though let’s be real here – if I would’ve died from anything on this trip it would’ve been from a combination of alcohol poisoning and the shitty cliché of dying from how beautiful everything was.… read more
Wine Bloggers Conference 2014 – Blends: 2 + 2 = 5?
Okay! So flashback to Day 2 of the the Wine Bloggers Conference: it’s one of those times where we have to choose between three different seminars. There’s a seminar each on Merlot (hosted by Rutherford Hill and Duckhorn wineries), something on “How Pros Taste” (hosted by Jackson Family Wines), and then one on wine blends (hosted by Winebow), the last seeming like a strangely divergent topic from the former two. And I know – I should probably be basking in the Californian-based seminars (when in Rome etc.), but I couldn’t help but be intrigued by something less specific and more amalgamate in style i.e. the idea, at the time, of trying a row of Napa Merlots in the California heat made me scrunch my face.… read more
Wine Bloggers Conference 2014 – First Impressions
Day 1. First off: intentionally-chosen attire: Brettanomyces shirt. Onwards.
By something like 4AM on the day of my flight, I was excited out of my mind. I was absolutely stoked for the Wine Bloggers Conference, but I also love early morning flights – I love the feeling of escaping while the whole city is asleep (though I hope that this doesn’t say more about my myself than I’d like). There’s also something I find weirdly satisfying about successfully passing the airport security portion. Like, I’m fine – why do I even worry? The metal detector can’t check for bad personalities.
“Sir, can you please step over here? We looked at the scanner and we noticed that you enjoy puns. Can you Gew over there for a pat down, please?”… read more
Wine Bloggers Conference 2014 (in Santa Barbara!) – Scholarship Recipient
My knowledge of any sort of Wine Bloggers Conference begun in 2013. It took place in Penticton (so close to home!) and so it was a bit of a bummer that I couldn’t make it. The knowledge of the next one rolled around and a friend stirred up my excitement – I was eventually convinced to go, leading to eager registration during a tight schedule, i.e. attempting to apply for the WBC scholarship on an iPad during a movie night with friends. (For the record, we watched “The Purge”, which would have paired nicely with a smoky and gamey Pinotage reminiscent of gunpowder and revenge.)
Obviously I was thrilled when I found out that I had earned the scholarship, and thusly I immediately had a 5-minute Madonna dance party where I replaced all instances of “Holiday” with “Chardonnay”.… read more
2014 Vancouver International Wine Festival – Wine Tour de France Seminar
This year’s wine fest kicked off with me doing the blind tasting challenge on the Wednesday – the rest of my day consisted of lunch with colleagues, errands involving heavy lifting, and then seeing the new Lego movie. I didn’t get as much sleep as I wanted, which is an obvious call for trouble: the next day started off with a France-themed tasting at 9:30AM; the big, busy, and irritating trade tasting at 2:30PM; and an exciting Bourgogne-themed tasting at 5PM. A day full of constant mouth stimuli.
Since this was one of the trade tastings (opposed to a consumer one), there were lots of familiar faces. But I shamelessly admit that any human interaction is personally difficult and gruelling before 11AM (or maybe I’m just a naturally horrible human being), and so I sat down on one of the seats, smiled at the 12 glasses in front of me, got my notebook ready, and did my best not to spill anything.… read more
I suck at wine: 2014 VIWF Blind Tasting Challenge
My 2014 Vancouver International Wine Festival activities begun on Wednesday! Insert majestic trumpet sounds here.
I was really scared for the Blind Tasting Challenge (at the Pacific Culinary Institute of Arts) on said morning . This mostly meant barely being able to keep my breakfast in my stomach, listening to Glee’s rendition of “Don’t Rain on My Parade” on repeat for high energy (do you hate me yet?), and then thinking that coffee was a bad idea. A classmate saw me looking at the water as I was listening to music and taking refreshing winter breaths of Granville Island air – she was just as nervous as I, but another classmate told us we were more jittery and nervous than we needed to be.… read more