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I get to speak with Joanne Pratt and Craig MacMillan, the owners of Stonehouse Vineyard in Lochiel, Ontario. Unless you’ve read either of my two Sipsters Pocket Guides to 50 Must-Try Ontario Wines, there is little chance that you could have even heard of Stonehouse before. 

The winery is in a converted barn and the whole property is perched on the top of a beautiful ridge in far eastern Ontario - the first vineyard operating in the area - just before the Quebec border in Glengarry county. 

If you’ve ever driven the 401 between Montreal and Toronto or the 417 between Montreal and Ottawa, then you have passed through Glengarry County. Drive away from either of those highways and you’ll be in some of the most beautiful farmland in the province, if not the country. 

Joanne and Craig have really done their homework. They know that making great wine is only one step to a successful winery. They’ve also been carefully building their brand, creating associations with other cold climate wineries, and encouraging academic research with Concordia University to help literally break ground and pioneer a wine industry in a new region. It was really exciting for me to witness this first hand and I’m so glad that I was able to connect with them when I was in the area this past November. 

Thank you for continuing to listen to the Sipster’s Podcast. I know I haven’t done as many episodes this past year as I’d hoped but I am hoping to continue producing more podcasts in 2025. I love podcasts and this is truly a labour of love. Thank you so much for your support. I wish you all a Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and all the best for in the new year. 

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This week’s guest is Anne Du Bois who own Savon Du Bois in Picton, Prince Edward County, Ontario. I’ve always wanted to do an episode like this because it is not directly about wine but rather, about aromas almost exclusively. Anne Du Bois is an aromatherapist and perfumer who extracts her own scents and essential elements from botanicals to create a huge array of products from perfumes, essential oils, soaps, lotions, and salts, which is only a small amount of the things that Anne offers in her store. She oversees the production of all of it personally and is passionate about how aromas, and the ingredients that go into producing them, can impact our lives and our health. 

 I have been to the County many times in the past few years and only noticed her store on Main Street this past November on my last visit. I was walking down the street when suddenly I smelled the most amazing things walking past the door to one of the shops. Walking into her store is like immersing yourself in beauty. I probably spent about a half hour there just smelling everything I could as well as reading the stories on some of the packaging, part of some amazing marketing that she’s created on the packaging of her carefully crafted scented products. Thankfully, Anne had time to meet me the next morning - the last morning that I was going to be in Picton - to record this conversation.

Visit Savon Du Bois online at savondubois.com. 

Welcome to the Sipsters Podcast!

Thank you for listening to the Sipster's Podcast. Find us online at sipsters.ca. 

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Thank you so much for listening!

Purchase copies of “The Sipsters Pocket Guides” here!

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This is going to be controversial. After a bad couple of winters, some BC wineries have imported grapes outside of BC to make wine. Some BC wineries have refused to do that. Will they be labelled the same? Are they going to cost less? In this podcast, Jess and I discuss what we think should happen to these wines. 

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It's more about Nova Scotia this week! Jess and I taste through a couple more wines from her trip, including wines from L'Acadie and Luckett vineyards. We discuss our Tidal Bay experiences and offer suggestions for donair pairings. It's an east coast feast.

Find Jess at Farm to Glass Wine Tours.

Find me at my computer trying to remember all of the things I'm supposed to type into the show notes for podcasts. Does anybody even read these things?

Welcome to the Sipsters Podcast!

Thank you for listening to the Sipster's Podcast. Find us online at sipsters.ca. 

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Thank you so much for listening!

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Can grapes be grown in a greenhouse? Apparently yes. I get to taste a couple wines in this episode with Marc Desaulnier and Annabelle Harper, winemaker and assistant winemaker respectively at Vins Zyromski in Rivière-Rouge, Quebec. https://vinszyromski.com/  

Welcome to the Sipsters Podcast!

Thank you for listening to the Sipster's Podcast. Find us online at sipsters.ca. 

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Jess is back! In this episode, we talk about the value of wines in Nova Scotia, why disagreeing makes for a better podcast, and if there really is a difference between Adirondak and Muskoka chairs. We also recap our summer and some of the most amazing wines that we tasted recently.

Wines featured in this podcast:
Beausoleil Vineyards Framboise Artisanal Wine and Cider, Nova Scotia

Other wines we talked about:
Hugging Tree - Keremeos, BC
Lakeboat Winery - SS Wanderer and Carmenere - Kaleden, BC

Join Jess on Farm to Glass Wine Tours. 

Welcome to the Sipsters Podcast!

Thank you for listening to the Sipster's Podcast. Find us online at sipsters.ca. 

Support the show

Thank you so much for listening!

Purchase copies of “The Sipsters Pocket Guides” here!

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Text us your wine questions, craziest wine experiences, or if you just have a comment for us. .

Whatever innovations have happened in the BC wine industry in the past 30 years, Sandra Oldfield has been a part of it. The first wine club in British Columbia - The Crush Club at Tinhorn Creek - happened on her watch. In a world of industry followers, she is a leader. I've been trying to get her to record a podcast with me for years, which is almost the same amount of time that we've been seeing each other at school plays and parent-teacher interviews.

Find Sandra online at Elysian Projects Inc. 

Fortify Conference

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Tim Watts, co-owner of Kettle Valley Winery in Naramata, was an early mentor in my wine career. I worked at several wineries in production and I worked at Kettle Valley in 2008. Tim and Bob Ferguson were hands-on owners, working at every aspect of their business themselves, which meant that when I worked there, I got to try out all kinds of different things too. I loved that about working there because every day was different and every day meant that I could be learning something new. In addition to all of the normal cellar tasks, I also learned how to prune grapevines, shoot thin, tuck, cluster thin, cut tops, install bird netting, and drive very old pickup trucks. I also got really good at installing PVC irrigation pipe, wires, hoses, and emitters. It was all hands-on and Tim was the one that showed me how it was done. 

Before wine, Tim worked as a geologist. Our conversations about geology as we worked on the bottling line inspired me to dig deeper into the topic. Ultimately, that lead to writing a chapter about it in my first book. I also took the Wine Sales program at Okanagan College that same year and had my first experiences selling wine in their garage wine shop. Of all of the things that I've done in my wine career, the majority of it can be traced back to my experiences at Kettle Valley with Tim Watts. My heart goes out to his family. Rest in peace Tim. Cheers to you. 

~~~

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This is one of those super-sized podcasts with a lot of info in a great conversation with Shay Code, owner and winemaker at his winery Code Wines in Okanagan Falls, BC. Perched at the base of Peach Cliff above the town, Code Wines occupies an extraordinarily unique vineyard site. Shay tells about how he got into wine and what led him to plant the grapes on this amazing piece of land.

**PLEASE NOTE** This podcast was recorded before the fire that burned through a portion of their vineyard in early June 2024. There will be more about this tragic event in an upcoming podcast. 

Welcome to the Sipsters Podcast!

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Text us your wine questions, craziest wine experiences, or if you just have a comment for us. .

Jennifer Carleton joins me on the podcast this week. She has a unique perspective on Canadian wine because she travels regularly between Ontario and BC and hears all about what each provinces says about the other's wines. Jenn is extremely well-spoken and enthusiastic about wine. Find her online at her website Jenn's Wine Crush. 

Welcome to the Sipsters Podcast!

Thank you for listening to the Sipster's Podcast. Find us online at sipsters.ca. 

Support the show

Thank you so much for listening!

Purchase copies of “The Sipsters Pocket Guides” here!

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Find me online at sipsters.ca or lukewhittall.com

Thanks again for listening!