Niagara Icewine Festival Part 2

Read part one here where we headed to Niagara College, Chateau des Charmes, Southbrook, and Cattail Creek.

Hillebrand

Next stop on our little winery tour was Hillebrand. We’ve bought some of their wines from the LCBO (ie. the only place you can buy booze in Ontario. Literally.) and enjoyed them, so in addition to the icewine Matt wanted to do a tasting of their Reds. None of them really jumped out at me.

We grabbed a sample of their Vidal Icewine paired with warm chili topped with cocoa nibs. I remember liking the icewine, but loving the chili. Matt claimed it wasn’t as good as my mom’s chili recipe, but I thought it was some stiff competition.

I really liked the quaint atmosphere of this winery. We sat by the fire pit as the sun was starting to poke out for the 3 minutes of sunlight that we got the entire day.

Pillitteri

Pillitteri Estates looks pretty unassuming when you approach it, but it’s definitely a winery you shouldn’t miss. It has, by far, the best selection of icewines, not surprisingly since they are the world’s largest icewine producers. We got a pairing of a shiraz icewine with a cheese tart as well as a tasting of 4 of their higher-end icewines. My favourite, and the best one of the day in my opinion, was the 2007 Chardonnay Icewine. It was really flavourful and sweeter than juice. Matt liked the Vidal Sparkling Icewine, which was my second favourite.

Konzelmann

Last stop was Konzelmann Estate Winery which is located in a fancy stone castle in a beautiful property right on Lake Ontario. Matt wanted to do a tasting here, but we got there just as they were closing up shop. I was a bit disappointed that their icewine sample didn’t actually include icewine. Instead they gave us their Canada Red wine paired with “Trainwrecker Beans” which were a version of baked beans that included bacon, beef, icewine, and red wine. Oh and beans. The trainwrecker beans were to die for and luckily I got the recipe. I hope to make it soon and share the recipe with you guys!

Angel Inn

5 o’clock rolled around and all the wineries were closing up shop so we headed to our hotel to check in. We stayed at the Angel Inn which I picked for 2 reasons: 1) the room was cheap, and 2) the first floor is a bar which I thought would be both fun and convenient.

The hotel room was a bit of a dump. It was clean but run down and not well maintained. It felt like crashing at a friend’s house after a long night of drinking. Luckily Matt and I have low standards.

The bar has live music until 12:30 in the morning, which didn’t matter much to us since we were at the pub downstairs drinking anyway. It would have otherwise been impossible to sleep until after the band stopped.

After walking around the deserted streets (the town basically closed down at 5 and there was nothing to do until dinner) we headed back to the inn for dinner.

The pub itself was really good. There aren’t many places to eat and drink in Niagara-on-the-Lake that are casual, fun, and laid back but the Angel Inn is a classic English pub that fits the criteria. They had a good domestic and imported beer selection on tap and even had their own brews (I liked the Angel Wheat beer).

Also the food was delicious. I’ve been on a pie kick lately (what’s better than a warm pie on a cold winter day?) so I was happy to see a variety of English pies on the menu. I went with the shepherd’s pie which trumped Matt’s steak and guinness pie, but not by much. We followed up dinner with a sticky toffee pudding cake and a too many more beers : P

Shepherd’s Pie

Steak and Guinness Pie

Sticky Toffee Cake

Our friend Nathan who moved to Niagara Falls just last week met up with us for drinks later on which was awesome because I was in Florida when he moved away and didn’t get to see him before. Plus Nathan might be the most knowledgeable person I know which makes any conversation with him very interesting.

Since the Inn didn’t have breakfast we headed up the street for breakfast at Escabeche at the oh-so-swanky Prince of Wales Hotel. I just had some overpriced yoghurt and granola (which was, ya know, just yoghurt and granola) and Matt had eggs benedict with the most delicious Hollandaise sauce I’ve ever had.

We headed back home right after breakfast. I asked Matt if he wanted to hit up any of the Twenty Valley wineries on the way home.
“No”, he said, “we need an excuse to come back.”

As if I need an excuse to drink wine?

Niagara Icewine Festival

My present to Matt for his birthday was to take him to visit some wineries in Niagara-on-the-Lake. Matt loves wine and going to wineries so I thought it would be something that he’d really love. We often visit the Lake Erie North Shore wineries here in Essex County, but we’ve never tried any in Niagara so we were pretty excited.

We hit the road on Saturday morning for the 3 hour drive through snow and sleet. We hit up 7 different wineries. Seven. I know that sounds like a lot, and with normal tastings we would have both been completely shitfaced after visiting seven wineries.

But this wasn’t a normal wine tasting. We got tickets for the icewine festival so at each winery we went to we tasted an icewine that was paired with a dish.

Icewine, if you’re not familiar, is a very sweet dessert wine made from grapes that were picked after they had frozen on the vine. When the grapes freeze the sugars concentrate so the icewine has the most delicious sweetness. It is phenomenal.

(click on any of the pictures to make them bigger)

Niagara College

The first winery we hit up was the Teaching Winery at Niagara College. I really liked their tasting area and felt slightly jealous of the students who got to go to school there and learn all about growing grapes and producing wines. Sounds way more fun than my math degree.

We didn’t actually have any icewine here but we tasted the 2007 Dean’s List Meritage which was a really good full bodied red. I might have bought a bottle if it weren’t $50(!)

Chateau des Charmes

Next stop was Chateau des Charmes, a huge, classy joint which was definitely the fanciest winery we’ve been to. Here we had an icewine cocktail paired with a New York Cheesecake and a Salted Chocolate Cheesecake. The latter of the two was probably the most delicious cheesecake I’ve ever eaten. I wish they would have served us the icewine straight up so I could have tasted what it was like, but the cocktail was delicious.

Southbrook

Southbrook was a really impressive winery. It was the number one winery that I wanted to visited because it is a biodynamic and organic winery. They don’t use synthetic fertilizers or pesticides in order to maintain the integrity of the soil. They even have chickens and sheep (my favourite animal!) that graze between the vines and naturally fertilize the vineyard. So cool.

We sampled their cab franc icewine paired with an icewine cannoli. I can’t quite remember the flavours of the icewine, but I remember thinking the cannoli shells were really tasty.

Cattail Creek

Next we went to Cattail Creek which is a much smaller winery that reminded me of the smaller scale wineries here in Essex County. They paired their vidal icewine with butter chicken and mango chutney which was cool since I’m used to icewine served with dessert. I found that their vidal icewine wasn’t as sweet as I like my icewine to be, but it was still pretty good.

Essex County Showcase: Summer Produce.

August brings about the absolute best produce in Essex County. Every year, I can’t wait until late summer rolls around so I can get my fill of local peaches, blueberries, zucchini, and my favourite, tomatoes.

This picture is not of the tomatoes that I’ve been eating. Those actually came straight from Matt’s cousin’s garden. Those I actually devoured with sea salt faster than you can say heirloom.  I might have eaten 10 tomatoes in 3 days. . . but who’s counting?

The tomatoes in that picture were crying out to be photographed on Saturday morning at the Downtown Windsor Farmer’s Market. The market has been open since June but it’s the first time that I made it there this season (better late than never right?).

I had only one thing in mind when I headed there. Peaches. Why? Jam.

Sweet, delicious Ontario peaches.

I’ve been dying to make jam for a few weeks now, but when I saw a recipe for Spiced Peach Jam on Christina’s blog, my fate was sealed. Saturday afternoon I was confined to the kitchen with my morning market purchase for some jamming and some canning (but more on that later this week).

Of course, peaches weren’t the only thing I purchased. With so much fresh produce around I could hardly refrain from giving up my wallet to each vendor. I also bought some eggplant, potatoes, hot peppers, and yellow plums.

Another of my favourite Essex County summer crops is blueberries. A couple of weekends ago, my sister and I went  Klassen Blueberries in Colchester to pick our own. Every year I look forward to heading out to Colchester to sit around a blueberry bush and gossip like a teenager while picking a big bucket of delicious bloobs. I usually pick about 5lb of them and this year I actually managed to freeze some before I inhaled them all from the giant bowl I set out on my kitchen countertop.

day 180: back at it

You can’t say no to food when you’re on vacation. Maybe it’s possible, but it’s just wrong. How often am I going to have buttery clam chowder on the Atlantic? or creamy vintage hot chocolate in Montreal? On vacation it’s like every day is a special occasion and each of those 9 special occasions add up to one pimply and bloated Samantha.

Even though I broke up with my scale I confess that did go back to him, and it wasn’t pretty. But I’m not here to dwell on the numbers (almost 6 months of work lost in just over a week, fyi), I’m just here to tell you all that I’m getting back to my normal routine of eating right and exercising.

I had a great workout today with my cousin who’s reason for getting into bikini shape is probably more valid than my own; she’s moving to Grenada in a few weeks. Here’s what we did:

Treadmill: 30 minutes, 3.5 miles

4 sets of 5-8 reps

• Plyometric Pushups
• Incline Dumbbell Press (40 lb)
• Wide Grip Lat Pulldown (180 lb)
• Reverse Flys (90 lb)
• Iso-Lateral Low Rows (160 lb)
• Hammer Bicep Curls (30 lb)
• Machine Tricep Extensions (135 lb)

Last night in celebration of our anniversary I made Matt a very simple bowl of comfort food: Bread Soup. It was the perfect solution to our stale bread, desire to celebrate low key, and craving for something hearty.

Bread Soup

Ingredients

• 1 red onion, sliced
• 3 stalks celery, diced
• 1 large carrot, diced
• 1 white potato, cubed
• 1 enormous zucchini, cubed
• 5 dried shiitake mushrooms, chopped
• 1.5 cups fresh herbs (I used sage, basil, thyme, parsley)
• 4 thick slices of stale Italian bread, soaked briefly in water
• 1 dried hot chili pepper
• salt and pepper to taste

Directions

Add all the veggies to a pot (not herbs) and cover with about 8 cups of cold water. Bring to a boil.

Reduce to medium low. Add 1 cup of the herbs (reserve the rest for garnish) to the soup and let simmer for 25 minutes or until the potatoes are tender.

Add the chile pepper and salt and pepper to taste. Crumble the soaked bread into the soup and stir until the bread thickens the soup (about 10 minutes).

Serve with herbs and drizzled with olive oil.

We finished off the night by watching Couples Retreat (Did anyone else see that and wonder why it wasn’t very funny?) and drinking the Muscedere ice wine that I bought at the Sip Into Summer wine tasting.

Liquid Gold.

day 132: sip into summer

I’m a sucker for a good wine tasting and lucky enough to live in a great wine-making region of Ontario. The wineries often host open houses (like the Icewine festival this past winter). This event involved food tastings too, showcasing local produce. I’m already stoked for any event that involves some tasty vino, give me food too and I’m in heaven.

My family and Matt’s family toured together hitting up 4 local wineries: Aleksander, Viewpointe, Sprucewood, and Muscedere.

Aleksander Estate Winery in Ruthven had some really great tasting sipping reds. Matt and I came home with a bottle of Cabernet Franc that I’m excited to open. They also make a Chambourcin, which I really liked. I had never before heard of Chambourcin, but apparently the grapes aren’t too common in Essex County– it is a very pleasant, light red wine.

Viewpointe Estates in Harrow gave us 4 tastings, including this Cab Merlot:

It’s by far my favourite local red wine. It’s a velvety, spicy full-bodied wine– just what I like in a red. But it’s a bit out of my price range. We came home with a Riesling from Viewpointe instead.

After Viewpointe, we headed up the street to Sprucewood Shores. I didn’t have too many samples here since I was pacing myself, knowing what was to come at Muscedere. We brought home a bottle of Sprucewood’s Late Harvest Vidal which is surprisingly refreshing and not too sweet for a late harvest wine.

When did these wind turbines pop up in Harrow? I swear there weren’t that many in the winter.

Muscedere Vineyards in Harrow is probably my favourite, not only because the wines are great but also because their winemakers are the most personable, down-to-earth guys you’ll meet. …plus they give generous tastings of almost all their wines! I was definitely light-headed after leaving this place

We got a bottle of their Riesling (I really like riesling, by the way) and since I was feeling drunk and generous I decided to splurge for a bottle of their ice wine. Knowing that my wedding anniversary is coming up, I thought that a bottle of this liquid gold would be the perfect way to celebrate

The fridge is officially stocked. Nothing makes me happier!

It was a perfect day.

Of course I got up early to head to the gym this morning and burn off some of that alcohol. It’s all about a healthy balance, right?

Day 12: festival of ice

One of the things I won’t do for the Bikini Birthday is stop drinking alcohol. While I don’t drink often, yesterday I got my fair share of one of my favourites: Icewine.

Matt and I went with my dad and his friends to 5 different wineries in Essex County to sample icewines (among others) as part of the Southwestern Ontario Vintner’s Association Festival of Ice. I had this event in my calendar for weeks now because I absolutely love ice wine! It’s so expensive to buy too, so I wasn’t going to miss out on some free tastings.

The development of icewine is often attributed to Inniskillin winery in the Niagara region, but it actually has roots in Germany. In any case, it’s truly a Canadian product because Canadian winters in Niagara, Essex County, and the Okanagan Valley provide ideal conditions– the grapes have to be hard frozen at below -8 deg C before they are picked.

We hit up 5 different wineries and I was buzzing after the first, Muscedere, who gave really generous tastings. Here were my favourites from each winery:

Favourites:

Muscedere: I fell in love with their 2008 Rosé because it was crisp and not as sweet as a typical Rosé. I also liked the 2006 Cab Franc Icewine because of its bolder caramel flavours, although everyone else preferred the Vidal.

Colchester Ridge Estate Winery (CREW): The 2007 Riesling was my favourite. I also liked the 2006 Cab Sauv Reserve.

Erie Shores: Erie Shores’ 2006 Vidal Icewine is the best icewine I’ve ever had. Period.

Sprucewood Shores: 2007 Late Harvest Riesling Traminer Vidal; umm… what? I had to ask the guy to repeat the name because I didn’t know what it was. Did he say Vidal, or Gewurtztraminer? Whatever he said, it translated to delicious. It was not super sweet like most late harvest wines. Also, they made a fantastic mulled wine! It was one the the best things I sampled all day!

Viewpointe Estate: They weren’t taking part in the festival but we stopped by for some tastings anyway (because evidently we weren’t drunk enough). The girl serving us was kind enough to open a pricey bottle of the amazing 2002 Cab Merlot (called Balance Pointe) . Man, it was good. Full-bodied, but smooth. We even bought a couple bottles. My favourite red wine of the day.