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This past weekend Paul and Pat travelled to Vancouver to attend the 2012 Winexpert Conference at the Rimrock Casino Resort. What a place - holy cow -such opulence! It was beautiful. Upon arrival late Saturday afternoon, we were all treated to a delicious dinner, and the conference was all day Sunday.Many interesting sessions to choose from, but the theme of the entire day was Winexpert's committment to quality and maintaining its position as producing the best wine and beer...
POSTED June 1st, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT 
When I was a little kid I would often go beachcombing along the shorelines of the Gulf Islands. I had always hoped to find a bottle with a note in it from someone in a far off land across the Pacific. I came across a lot of glass, but never did find a message in a bottle.Decades later, I still love glass bottles. With plastic becoming a more and more common packaging medium, I much prefer the feeling and weight of glass. And, for me, there's still an aspect of romance in a glass wine bottle. But...
POSTED May 31st, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT 
Today I had the pleasure of stabilizing one of the Selection Limited Editions from this season, the German Traminer Spatlese. For those of you that attended the Limited Edition event in November you may remember that the eqivalent wine offered for tasting was a sweet take on a Gewurztraminer. Once the FPack was added to this wine at stabilization today, the aroma and flavors were a little sweet, fruity and fantastic! Last year the Pacifica was so fantastic that it sold out almost as fast as...
POSTED May 31st, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT 
I found a really good Lebanese Pilsner in Damascus, sitting on the balcony overlooking the city. This is the ideal beer for a week that is going to be 32C all week. This beer is very much in the style of the Czech Pilsner, and slightly hoppier than our Candian Pilsner. Although Syria does produce their own wine and beer, there seems to be a much better value with the Lebanese import. My daughters and I will continue with our quest to find some better, locally produced brew.
POSTED May 31st, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT Portuguese Douro Tinto is aging nicely!! 
Out on the deck at Paul's over the long weekend we decided to try one of our 2010 Limited Edition Portuguese Douro Tinto's. It is a deep garnet, ruby red wine and I recall when it was young , there was lots of delicate, floral notes. We noticed as it ages these floral notes have changed into coffee, oak and vanilla notes. It is aging well, with such depth! We found it went great with roast chicken, but also it doesn't need food! It is an excellent patio sipper served slightly chil...
POSTED May 24th, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT 
Great class last night , May 17 /12 at our Airdrie store! It's always fun to meet new people that are so excited about getting started in the wine and beer making hobby.Lots of interesting questions, a few laughs and a lot of knowledge absorbed. We find it so interesting that people are becoming more and more knowledgeable about wine , and especially beer. The real beer enthusiasts know their microbrewery...
POSTED May 18th, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT 
Lime lovers will rejoice when we release our new Lime Mexican Cerveza recipe. Frozen lime concentrate is impossible to find so thanks to one of our beer makers we have found Lakewood organic pure lime juice at Community Natural Foods. The juice from 14 - 16 limes in each 370 ml jar. I have just racked the Cerveza from the primary to the carboy so within a few weeks I will know if the amount of lime I used is correct.
POSTED May 16th, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT 
From the comments that our new wine and beer makers made last night at our class I came to a new realization - other wine making stores sell product with little education. Some guests had made wine for many years, I was amazed at what they didn't know! Simple things like using a wine thief to check the specific gravity, the use of an auto syphon, using only 5 grade plastic for fermenting, the proper removal of CO2 after stabilizing, some...
POSTED May 16th, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT BEERFEST 2012 - BEER GEEK EVENING @ BMO CENTRE 
Beerfest 2012 was, once again, an educational and super fun evening of beer tasting. I must complement the organisers and sponsors, as it seemed as though the normally cavernous BMO Centre was transformed into a friendly, personal tour of the world, one brewery at a time.Lately, Paul has been doing some research into gluten-free beer, so our focus started out with trying to find a favourite amongst the sorghum based suds. But for starters, we really appreciated the presence of the Canadian...
POSTED May 9th, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT AAW Provincial Competition - "WE DID GOOD!" 
Woo hoo!! Results just in from the Alberta Amateur Winemakers Provincial competition. The Home Vintner Wine Guild & customers took another 37 medals in total! The most of any other wine guild that entered the competition! Bonus - again this year we also took the prestigious Wine Maker of the Year Award,( Wayne Thomsen) and Pat, manager of the Airdrie store, received Best of Show for her Selection Okanagan Peach Ice Wine!This now puts our grand total at 575 awards and we expect after...
POSTED May 3rd, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT Wine Guild Spanish Treasures Evening @ Crowfoot Wine & Spirits 
We all enjoyed the Spanish Treasures evening last night @ Crowfoot Wine and Spirits Signature location in Calgary. The evening began with a Cava reception. Cava is the Spanish word for champagne - this is a sparkling wine originating only from 3 regions in Spain. Our sommelier told us it is 1/5 the cost of champagne!The dinner consisted of three courses 1) Duo of Gaspacho - Almond and Grape / Tomato Vegetable. This was paired with the two white wines.
POSTED April 25th, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT La Frenz Naramata Bench 2010 Riesling 
Last night, out at the cabin, Paul & I decided to open up one of the bottles of wine we bought last summer while we were staying in Naramata Bench. We chose the La Frenz 2010 Riesling.This variety is delicate and elegant in structure which can only be achieved with super gentle fruit handling in the winery.The hallmark of a great Riesling is flavours of honey, lime, and even green apple: this vintage is loaded with fruit concentration. The palate is just...
POSTED April 19th, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT 
At this weeks Wine & Beer Making class at our NW store Wayne made our first Gluton free beer. We are using BriesSweet White Sorghum Syrup, gluten free yeast and Cascade Hops to produce our first India Pale Ale. We will soon be introducing a Gluton Free Belgium Wit and then a Gluton Free Fruit Beer. We will be posting a daily update on the progress of this project on our beer page.
POSTED April 12th, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT Airdrie Echo - Home Vintner gears up for 2012 wine awards 
As published in the Airdrie Echo newspaper, March 28th, 2012 By Josh Eberley — For the EchoWith 538 provincial, national, and international medals, The Home Vintner has successfully been helping average folks become expert wine makers since 1993.Paul Sass is the owner of The Home Vintner and has nine separate Alberta locations he travels to and from.Sass is dedicated to the quality of his service and insists his clients hold themselves to a high standard when drinking both wine and beer.“Raising...
POSTED March 28th, 2012 | 0 COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT 
Calgary's best show of all things alcoholic, The Grape Escape spring edition was definitely NOT for the non adventurous taster! As is this intrepid reporter's usual plan of attack for this event, I stuck to my strategy of not sampling anything familiar, or produced by the old standbys I've enjoyed in the past. And, if by chance I do find some hidden gem I'd like to share with friends, I know that anything served at Grape Escape is available at Calgary Co-op liquor stores. On the...
POSTED March 25th, 2012 | 1 COMMENT | POST A COMMENT |
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Hope to see you at the Fall Grape Escape as well...