Gewurztraminer - you can drink it even if you can't say it!

I love gewurztraminer - but it intimidates some wine drinkers - from the hard to pronounce and spell name to the unusual style.

My advice?  Try a bottle of the 2009 Pfaffenheim Gewurztraminer at your local BC Liquor Store - you will be glad you did.


Gewurztraminer - pronounced Guh-wurtz-tra-meener - is a wine grape grown first of all in the Alsace region of France and in Germany.  But BC also has good gewurz - for short - from several Okanagan wineries, including Sumac Ridge, See Ya Later Ranch and more.


Pfaffenheim - pronounced Pfahf-n-hime - is a winery in Alsace that I particularly like - and the reason is in the bottle.  This wine is fragrant, with spiciness and tropical fruit notes.  Like most gewurz, this wine can stand up to spicy Thai, Chinese, Mexican or other foods with a chile kick.


There are 2800 bottles available all over BC at $19.99, so pick one up and let me know what you think. 

Two 90 point wines under $20 in BC - both from Chile's Concha Y Toro

You have to love Concha Y Toro wines - two 90 point wines - one Cabernet Sauvignon and one Chardonnay - both under $20!

And I do - one of my regular favourites - the 2008 Concha Y Toro Puente Alto Marques de Casa Concha Cabernet Sauvignon - has recently been joined by the 2009 Concha Y Toro Limari Valley Marques de Casa Concha Chardonnay - Limari Valley - as a 90 pointer from the Wine Spectator magazine.

The Cabernet is huge - and a fantastic value wine year after year, a perennial 90 point winner.  Blackberry, fig, raspberry, cherry, cocoa - everything you want in a cab and usually can't find for less that $40!  I suspect it will age well but don't wait - it's drinking well right now and would be hard to put away in the cellar.

The Chardonnay is conversely lean and restrained - but delicious and what the Spectator calls "superfresh" with tangerine and apple notes. The winery alternatively suggests pear, fig and hazelnut.  I'll take any of the above.

Both retail in BC Liquor Stores for $19.99 and are quite available - 826 bottles of Cabernet across the province and 548 bottles of Chardonnay around BC.  Both are also available for $19.95 in Ontario Liquor Stores.

Their baby siblings are also worth trying for a lower dollar - Concha Y Toro Casillero del Diablo - cellar of the devil - Cabernet and Chardonnay - for just $13.99 each - a reliable wine but just don't compare the two levels.

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Wine Barbarian is back at last - and with a Wine Spectator Top 100 wine available in BC for under $30!

The Return of the Wine Barbarian!

Fellow wine lovers, winos and wine rookies, foodies, restaurant hounds, amateur cooks and more - I'm back!

Unfortunately this blog has been very neglected due to a series of reasons but.....I hope to make amends and more importantly, make this a useful blog for wine drinkers, restaurant goers and food fiends in BC and everywhere else.

You will find wine reviews and recommendations, restaurant reviews and travel reports - all of which happened here before but very infrequently.

I've turned over a new leaf - and it's a grape leaf!

Here's my first new post in quite a while - about one of my absolute favourite wines available in BC and other locations.

Vina Mayor Reserva 2004 is not just a great wine at a very reasonable price - $28.99 in BC - but it was also chosen as #38 in the Wine Spectator magazine's Top 100 Wines of 2010!

The Wine Spectator scored it 93 points out of 100 - and I heartily agree. They note it has: "black cherry, mineral, tobacco and tar notes. Offers an excellent balance of firm, well-integrated tannins and clean acidity" and suggest drinking it through 2016.

Vina Mayor is from the Ribera del Duero region of Spain, which I was fortunate enough to visit in 2007, and is one of the wineries of the Hijos de Antonio Barcelo group.

This is just a great tempranillo - more powerful and layered than the average Spanish bottle which you and I enjoy in the under $20 range. And I can attest to the fact that finding a Wine Spectator 93 point rated wine for under $50 to $100 is really, really difficult.

Now the good news - there are still 845 bottles available throughout the BC Liquor Stores network.

Better news for those of us in Metro Vancouver - the 39th and Cambie flagship store reports having 107 bottles left in stock.

The best thing to do before you race there though is to check through the BC Liquor Stores website through its "Search for Products" section in the upper right hand corner to see which stores have stock - and then CALL FIRST.

Unfortunately the website is often woefully out of date, so don't race to a faraway store only to find it all gone.

Fortunately the helpful staff are always willing to put some bottles aside for you for a day.

UPDATE - for my Ontario friends - the Vina Mayor Reserva 2004 is listed by the Liquor Control Board of Ontario [LCBO] at an even cheaper $25.95 BUT - I can't find any stores in Toronto with availability.  Worth a call to LCBO HQ to see if they can bring some in from another store for you!

See you back here soon - I intend to post at least one item a week!

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