By Mymi Myriam On a beautiful, warm and sunny fall day, I rode my bicycle to the Ritz Carlton for the extraordinary opportunity to sit down with Mr. Eduardo Chadwick, the President of Vina Errazuriz and iconic ambassador of premium Chilean wines. I walked into the Ritz’s sumptuous, modern lobby and headed up a staircase towards TOCA, one of the hotel’s restaurants where our luncheon was taking place. Mr. Chadwick stood in a magnificent dining room and welcomed me with a warm smile and handshake. I joined the few selected guests at the dining room table and kept […]
Chile Wine
Holiday Wine Team Tasting: Your Wines for Gift Giving and Entertaining
On Sunday, 22 wine-loving, football-sacrificing souls (it was Grey Cup) gathered to taste more than 70 spectacular wines. Click on the arrow above to hear about Jennifer’s favourite wine from the tasting, a Chilean Carmenere with bright acidity, nice little spice, great for a wide variety of foods. Jennifer MacDonald Havers Wine Columnist, Ottawa Citizen Monique explains her reasons for picking Taittinger Champagne to toast her celebration events. Monique Ippolito Wine Columnist, Ottawa Living Magazine Craig’s take on Beringer Quantum […]
Jane’s Gems: Tuscan and Chilean Treats > 90 Point Wines in the LCBO Vintages October 31
By Jane Staples The October 31 release from Vintages features sophisticated Tuscan wines. A food lover’s paradise with centuries of winemaking tradition, Tuscany is a favourite travel destination and the darling of the wine lover’s world. Tuscan wines are diverse, from the well-known Chianti to Vino Nobile di Montepulciano and Sassicaia. Tuscany is blessed with a temperate warm Mediterranean climate that provides ideal growing conditions for a wide range of varietals. The signature grape is Sangiovese, but Cabernet Sauvignon has been grown there since the 18th century. Super Tuscans such as the Sangiovese and Cabernet-based Tignanello celebrate this delicious blend. […]
Tasting from the Tank: Barrel Samples and Wine Reviews
Most of the wines that I taste are bottled and on the liquor store shelves, or about to be there. However, when I attend a tasting with a winemaker who is visiting my city or when I travel to wine regions, I am often tasting tank or barrel samples. Sometimes, these samples get sent to my office in a generic wine bottle with a hand-written sticker telling me when the wine will be bottled, which is a future date. This is because the winemaker is keen to show you his or her new baby, even if that child is still […]
LCBO Wines on Sale: Bargains and Best Buys April 2015
Sponsored Post by Philippe Dandurand Wine Agency You can get the complete shopping list of these wines in your closest liquor stores here. Trapiche Broquel Malbec 2012 Mendoza, Argentina Regular Price: $14.95 Sale Price: $12.95 April 1 to April 30 Yellow Tail Merlot 2013 South Australia Regular Price: $11.95 Sale Price: $10.95 April 1 to April 30 35 South Cabernet Sauvignon Merlot 2012 Chile Regular Price: $12.95 Sale Price: $10.95 April 1 to April 30 Errazuriz Max Reserva Sauvignon Blanc 2013 Valle de Aconcagua, […]
Peppercorn Roasted Beef Tenderloin Recipe Paired with Carmenere
Peppercorn Roasted Beef Tenderloin Prep: 5 min Inactive: 10 min Cook: 25 min Ingredients: 1 whole beef tenderloin, trimmed of all visible fat Salt 2 teaspoons sugar ½ cup tri-color peppercorns, crushed with a rolling pin 1 stick butter 2 cloves garlic, crushed Directions: Preheat the oven to 475 degrees F. Place the tenderloin on a roasting rack. Sprinkle generously with salt and sugar, which will deepen the savory flavors. Press the crushed peppercorns all over the surface of the meat. Insert a meat thermometer and place in the oven until the beef registers 120 to 125 degrees F for […]
Argentina’s Wine Visionary Sees the Future Rooted in the Past
Continued from Part 4 of Argentine Wine The 1982 Falklands War with Britain also didn’t help the economy or exports. Then there was hyper-inflation that exceeded 3,000 percent a month, which discouraged foreign investment. Vintners made up for the lost revenue by producing high volumes of poor-quality wines that smelled like bananas rotting in an attic. Meanwhile, neighboring Chile’s economy was much more stable and the country was already producing more wine than it could consume, so it was focused on export in the 1980s. Chile took advantage of this to position itself at the very low end of the […]
Cool Climate Chardonnay: LCBO Vintages Release July 19
You can access the 87 wines that I reviewed for July 19 as a text wine list with my complete tasting notes, scores, food matches and the stock for each bottle in their closest LCBO stores. You can also see my wine reviews for July 5. You can add my wine picks to their custom shopping list with one click and access that list on their smartphone. This is one of the benefits of becoming a Paid Member. Inventory stock numbers are usually posted online a day or two before the release based on the LCBO doing so. Here […]
10 Best Carmenère Wines to Buy Now + 5 Surprising Facts about Carmenère
Carmenère is most widely planted in Chile, however, Carmenère did not get its start in Chile. You’ll find my Top 10 Carmenère reviews and ratings here. 5 Surprising Facts about Carmenère: 1. Carmenère originated in the Medoc region of Bordeaux, France. 2. Used in France initially as a blending wine, or to produce deep dark wines, it disappeared from Europe in the mid 19th Century and showed up in Chile a hundred years later and has since become Chile’s premium grape. 3. Carmenère, a member of the Cabernet family of grapes, is the French word for Crimson (carmin), and is known as […]
High on Wine: Argentina and Chile Magic Mountain LCBO Vintages May 10
The wines of Argentina and Chile hit the spotlight in the May 10 LCBO Vintages Release. The premium wine region for Argentina is Mendoza, 650 miles southwest of Buenos Aires. Many of us have only a vague notion of this South American country that’s five times the size of Spain. It spans more than a million square miles from the sub-tropical jungles and parrots in the north, near the equatorial Tropic of Capricorn, to the Antarctic ice fields and penguins of Patagonia in the south. To the east, lie the expansive cattle-grazing grass-fields of the pampas; to the west, the […]
