Tidings Magazine

I always thought that Scotch whisky was an ancient tipple. If I’m right, how come so many of my favourite distilleries claim to have been established only in the mid-to-late 1800s?

It depends on your definition of both ancient and Scotch. I’m no spring chicken, but anything coming on line in the middle of the nineteenth century seems pretty darn ancient to me. Now, before you get your Braveheart face on and start rallying the troops for battle, let me say that I do get your point. Surely the Scots were mixing up a little moonshine to ward off the cold winters (not to mention the oh-so-warm summers) of their not-so-forgiving home and native land well before the date shown on the labels at your local booze shop.

They were — some claim whisky came to Scotland from Ireland back in the fifth century, and many were having a gay old time selling it to their friends and relatives. Problem is (and here comes the government-conspiracy part, Agent Mulder), anything that makes life more tolerable is worth taxing.

Every emerging wine region needs a magnet. Something to draw us city folk into wine country. In British Columbia’s Okanagan Valley, it is the magnificent temple to Dionysus that Anthony von Mandl built at Mission Hill. In Quebec, it’s the Chapelle Ste. Agnès Vineyard, a tiny piece of the Rhône in the Sutton Mountains of southern Quebec, established in 1997 by Montreal antique dealer Henrietta Antony. In Ontario, it could have been the proposed Frank Gehry winery for Le Clos Jordanne, until Constellation put the project on the back burner after they purchased Vincor. Currently in Niagara, the draw is such architectural eye-openers like the ones of Stratus, Tawse, Flat Rock Cellars and Jackson-Triggs.

For Nova Scotia I predict that the crowd-puller will be a new winery in the Gaspereau Valley called Benjamin Bridge that is set to open in an interim building early next year. In keeping with the new wave of Canadian wineries Benjamin Bridge’s owner Gerry McConnell made his fortune in another field (mining) before getting his feet into the vat, so to speak.

When my husband brings home a bottle of red wine, he won’t let a corkscrew near it until it’s had a few hours to reach room temperature. Do we really have to wait that long?

Your husband must be a real history buff, because his wine-serving techniques are right out of the 1900s. That said, let’s give him a bit of a break because, like so many old wine tales, there is a hint of truth lying somewhere between the past and the present.

Back in the day, upper-crust English people were big drinkers living in large manor houses, ventilated like modern-day wood sheds. Their idea of “room temperature” was actually pretty close to the ideal serving temperature for their favourite tipple — reds from Bordeaux.

Is it me or does every has-been celebrity seem to have a line of wines named after them nowadays?

Why so surprised? Celebrities are as good as superheroes — able to leap onto any marketing opportunity in a single bound. Surely if they can blend their own cologne, design clothes and create salad dressing, then thinking they can slap their name on a wine bottle should come without any burden of guilt, right?

That said, it might surprise you to hear that, what with all the new famed-named labels on liquor-store shelves, celeb-endorsed vino isn’t a current trend. Major and minor stars from music, sports and Hollywood have been involved in the industry (at different levels of intensity) for decades.