The next chapter: Sipsters

Sipsters represents a new way to communicate about wine that is freed of the limited and technical vocabulary of wine education ("medium acid", "aromas of berries and tar"), the cliches of wine sales ("patio sipper", "pizza wine"), or the manipulative spin of marketers.

Support “Local”

Readers (or listeners, if you go way back like that...) of Wine Country BC will know that supporting our local wine industry has been at the foundation of what I've been talking about on this blog. In the 11 years that has past since I started this site, B.C. wine has both increased in quality …

A Sip of History: BC’s First Winery

One of the first questions that I am asked when talking about the history of British Columbia's wine industry is, "Which winery was the first?" I can think of at least 3 wine shops that I've been to where they claim to be the first winery, oldest vineyard, or the first to use this or …

The Okanagan Wine Tour Guide, 6th Edition is now out

There are times in one's life when  things go sideways. Oftentimes, other good things come from it. In my case, this is one of them. John Schreiner asked me in the spring of 2017 to contribute to the next edition of the Okanagan Wine Tour Guide. For me personally, the spring of 2017 could be …

Valleys of Wine

Hello BC wine lovers in BC Wine-Lover Land! This is my first post in over a year and a half. Writing this seems a little bit weird given all of the changes that have happened to me over the past few years. Aside from some significant personal changes, my book, "Valleys of Wine" has now …

Back at it

  Hi BC wine folks, It has been too long since I've posted anything even somewhat resembling a blog post. There are many, many reasons for that but the big one is that I was working on the book about the history of the wine industry is this province. I can say that the manuscript is now …

This year’s BC book harvest

I originally started this post back in early August because it was the first time that I could actually sit down and do some proper writing here. Jobs and other large projects had occupied my time up until that point.  And then the fires started and priorities changed pretty quick. Since then of course, more books …

Book review: Canadian Wineries by Tony Aspler

Expectations will play a big part in how highly you rate "Canadian Wineries" by Tony Aspler and Jean-François Bergeron. Expect a researched, academic treatise on the current state of the Canadian wine industry and you will be sorely dissapointed. Looking for a light reading, coffee-table book that introduces you to the wine regions and significant …

Book Review – Wine Wars by Mike Veseth

I recently put up a post about the wine book that I had started reading at the time and it dawned on me that I should probably put up a short review of it and the ideas contained within it. I tried to do all of that but completely left out the word "short." So …

Wine books I’m reading right now

I love wine books from all different perspectives and though this is not the first book on the wine business, I'm hoping that it will be better than the last one I read a few years ago. "Wine: The 8,000 Year-Old Story of the Wine Trade" by Thomas Pellechia didn't cut it at all and …