Local wine success tastes great

BY WENDY ELLIOTT

Kings County Register

Medals for local winemakers were the result of the first national competition of the Amateur Winemakers of Canada held in Nova Scotia for the first time.

Nova Scotia captured three gold, six silver, 10 bronze and another 10 merit awards.

Wolfville winemaker John Starr brought home gold medals for his red and wine table wines made from local grapes. He also won a bronze medal for a blackberry port made from local fruit.

Another Valley winemaker, Brian McKibbon, won a gold medal with a chardonnay he made from Ontario fruit.

Kit Childs, who grows grapes in Woodside, won a silver medal for his Chardonnay made from local grapes. He took home two silver medals for red and white table wines and a merit award for his Pinot noir, also locally-grown.

Another Woodside grower, Ivan Herbert, won a silver medal for his white table wine made from local grapes, and two bronze medals: one for his late harvest Vidal and the other for his red table wine made from local grapes. “The mention of local grapes is significant,” says Starr, “in that we were competing against wines made from classic vinifera grapes from the Okanagan and Niagara regions.”

Starr, national vice-president for the competition, says he chaired “a very hard-working committee. We worked for many months planning this event.” “Our provincial competition in May was a dry run for our systems and procedures and, although the scale was much larger, everything went smoothly,” he notes. “All of our people worked very well together - particularly our stewards, under Alan Baker, who got the wines poured and in to the judges very efficiently.”

All the judges (from various provinces) worked well together, Starr adds. “There was a very positive atmosphere during the whole event. Afterwards, I think we all looked at each other and said, ‘Wow! We did it!’”

On a personal level, the organizer says, “it is always satisfying when you make a wine that you think is pretty good and you enter it locally and win a medal. When those wines also win medals at the national level, it is even more satisfying. In fact, it’s great!"

A total of 295 entries were received in the competition. Fifteen judges, working in teams of three, spent two days, Aug. 23 and 24, tastetesting at the School of Nutrition and Dietetics at Acadia University.

The national competition has been held since 1971.