michelle bouffard

The packaging is stellar and the liquid in the bottle is nothing short of stunning. Based in the Turner Valley in Alberta, Eau Claire Distillery crafts beautiful premium spirits with the very best ingredients. A tribute to generations of local farmers in the valley who have dedicated their lives to growing the finest grains. While each spirit has its own distinct personality, what they all have in common is a smooth texture and precise, delicate aroma. We couldn’t be happier to welcome Eau Claire Distillery to My Wine Canada, the first distillery on our site - AND the host of the free shipping deal this week! Order 2 or more bottles of their spirits and you'll get shipping absolutely free...

For many, this week is truly the beginning of the year: it’s back to school. And for parents, this is usually a stressful time. Life becomes hectic again with a schedule that is filled with a long list of tasks. To alleviate some of the stress, below are three recipes from food guru Jamie Oliver that take just 15 minutes to prepare paired with three lip smacking wines from one of my favourite BC wineries - the Similkameen Valley's Little Farm Winery. A delicious meal and a glass of wine to match will immediately make you feel better and put a smile on your face. I call it gourmand therapy. In addition to being incredibly exclusive (small quantities made and not widely sold), Little Farm Winery also happens to be offering free shipping on 6 or more bottles of wine when you order right here...!

Once again this year I had the privilege of being a judge at the National Wine Awards of Canada hosted by WineAlign. It’s truly exciting to witness the growth of the Canadian wine industry. New wineries are constantly opening, not to mention the overall quality keeps on rising. 13^th Street Winery has been making great wine from day one. If they were solid right from the start, they’ve never been better now. Below are four of my top picks currently available right here at My Wine Canada. Sign up to join the Wine Club, and you'll automatically get these wines sent to you this month. Go Canada Go...

A few weeks ago one of the most highly regarded and well known sommeliers of the US was visiting Montréal. He had his priorities straight: poutine, bagels, smoked salmon and get his hands on a bottle of sparkling wine from Benjamin Bridge. He had read about this producer who supposedly makes stunning sparkling from Nova Scotia. How can this be possible? I could see the skepticism in his eyes. A part of me understood. Another snowstorm (in April!) had just hit the city and Nova Scotia was further east. Wouldn’t it take until the summer for the snow banks to melt? How can vines grow successfully...

Regardless of which part of Canada you live in, the thought that summer is just around the corner is exhilarating. Smelling the first neighbour's BBQ of the season always brings comfort, we associate these aromas with longer days and dinner on the patio. Impromptu social gatherings are likely to increase over the next few months, so here are some great wine picks to stock up on in preparation for sunny times ahead. Enjoy...

About an hour's drive south of Montréal, near the Eastern Townships, Coteau Rougemont produces a line-up of wine that screams spring fever. Starting with their Ice Cider, I immediately think of cocktails. Both the Cidre de Glace NV and the Poire de Glace NV have a refreshing acidity that balances the sugar content of the delicious nectar. Mix either with a dry sparkling wine and you’ve got yourself the perfect aperitif. You can save the last drops of the bottle to serve later with...

At the end of February, My Wine Canada writer Michelle Bouffard offered a quick run-down of the Naramata Bench winery Tightrope. She’s especially fond of Tightrope’s Rieslings – certainly among the best produced in the Okanagan Valley that I’ve tasted so far.

MWC Wine Club members are in luck – this month’s feature winery is none other than Tightrope. And since Michelle highlighted just how great their Riesling is, I thought I’d write about a few of the other Tightrope wines I tasted - wines that will be in your wine club package this month...

I remember tasting the wines from Tightrope for the first time. I was in Whistler to present at Cornucopia, a festival that celebrates food and wine. A friend drew my attention to this bottle with no label on it. It was a lip smacking Riesling not for sale yet. I was impressed by the quality and couldn’t wait to taste more from this new winery, Tightrope...

Just like there are many types of apples, there are thousands of different grape varieties. Each of them belongs to a vine species. Most of the grapes used for the production of the world’s best wine i.e the grapes you know, come from the vitis vinifera species. They are praised for their flavours and the quality of wine they produce. In Canada, we have a longer history with hybrids than we do with vitis vinifera. What’s a hybrid? It is a grape that is created by crossing two grapes from two different species. In regions with harsh climates (O Canada), vitis vinifera can struggle to survive in the winter. Many hybrids were created with a desire to keep the flavours that grapes from vitis vinifera produce but also gain the resistance to winter freeze from other species. Hence why many Canadian winemakers originally planted hybrids...

Back in July of last year, MWC scribe Michelle Bouffard wrote about her favourite wine and taco pairings. Well, it just so happens she and I were in California last week on a media trip to Napa and Sonoma. I stayed on for a couple of days in San Francisco before heading back to Napa (where I am now) for the Professional Wine Writer’s Symposium at the oh-so-picturesque Meadowood Napa Valley.

Over the course of my two days in San Fran, I managed to put back just about as much Mexican/Mexi-inspired fare as one could possibly imagine – tacos, burritos, huarache, tamales... you name it. And in addition to the variety of shapes and sizes of the dishes as well as the contents of each of these delicious dishes, one of the other variants in each was the salsa...