The villages of Burgundy are the focus of this release - and there are some very fine chardonnays and pinot noirs...

> view previous releases

They say that following the "mediterranean diet" - including consuming lots of wine - is good for your health. However, on July 10, the boys at Lifford Wine Agency are putting on another Boys' Night Out in the Distillary District aiming to fight cancer with cash.

The cancer fight will be of specific interest to the "boys": they're raising money for prostate cancer research at Princess Margaret Hospital. Lifford promises "a celebration of guy’s stuff cunningly disguised as a sophisticated wine tasting."

For just $95, you can sample a whole lot of Lifford's fine wines in festive night out and support a cancer fight not talked about much because men don't like to talk about it - but take note: 1 in 7 men will get prostate cancer.

Find out more about Boys' Night Out.

The power of the monopoly will be put to good use for the environment. After launching those annoyingly smaller sized plastic bags a couple of years ago for one- or two-bottle purchases (they couldn't be re-used for anything else) the LCBO has decided to bite the bullet and ban plastic outright.

The LCBO's action will take a hefty 80 million bags out of Canada's six billion plastic bags per year total, and will hopefully encourage other retailers to follow suit and drop the take-3,000-years-to-degrade bags. Read a summary here.

 Niagara Wine Auction Preview @ Jump. April 29

 One of Niagara's most glamorous events will be held over the weekend of June 13-15 at a number of locations offering winemakers' dinners, tastings etc. The auction itself will be held on Saturday the 14th in Niagara-on-the-Lake.

The Black Tie Gala on Saturday night will be hosted by singer Jan Arden and restaurateur Michael Bonacini, and entertainment will be provided by 70s stalwarts The Temptations and disco-trio the Pointer Sisters (whose publicity pics suggest they haven't aged a day...)

For more information, visit the Niagara Wine Auction website.

At the smart preview at Jump Cafe in Commerce Court at the end of April, I spoke with Tom Green, Winemaker for Diamond Estates. He makes the wines of East Dell and Birchwood.

There's nothing like a hot summer to get Niagara winemakers keyed up and, without even mentioning that he meant reds, Green said 2007 is looking like a great vintage: "Some of the  wines are so big we're going to have to sit on them a bit longer". He says this is great news for the merlots and cabernets, and that the pinot noirs are definitely going to be darker and fuller bodied. So yet another winemaker, who ought to know, says that Niagara's 2007 reds are going to be blockbusters.

Big Red Auction
If you're feeling flush and generous and would like to help Sick Kids',  bid on one barrel's worth of wine (225L) from any of these three "big reds" from Niagara:

Thirty Bench Benchmark
I liked this one better than the last time I tried it back in January at the Cuvee Awards. This is the Cuvee Gold Medal winner, and it is definitely the crowd pleaser of the three wines on offer.
There's a rich and bold nose of dark red berry fruit. Rich, smooth and full on the palate, though with somewhat over-extracted fruit that skirts the edge of cough candy. Tannins still very powerful and it'd be nice to see some more secondary notes, but these should develop with time - which whoever wins the bidding on the lot (a barrel's worth of wine!) will certainly have. 88 points.

Delaine Vineyards Cabernet Merlot
Rich nose with great minty and herbal notes and brighter dark red fruit on this more Old World style Bordeaux blend. Smooth on the palate, this is more medium bodied and not as fruity, though red fruit is there. Acidity and tannins are both high and there's enough fruit that it should continue to age well. Nice finish. 87/88 points.

Dan Aykroyd Cabernet Sauvignon
Very rich and powerful nose with great secondary notes of dried herbs and mint. Acidity and tannins are both high and there is some dark berry fruit that could be a little more to the fore. Slightly thin in the middle, but nice finish. 87 points.

All of these will improve with age and indeed this is a marvellous opportunity to track the development of decent quality Niagara reds over time - especially as you'll have, like, five cases of whichever one you get...

This year's New Zealand Wine Fair is on Thursday, May 15th and is once again at the Design Exchange on Bay Street. It's a great opportunity to meet some winemakers and sample a wide range of NZ's new releases and there's usually good food too.

Notable producers displaying this year include Kim Crawford, Oyster Bay and Spy Valley. Tickets are $55. For more information and to register, visit the New Zealand Wine Events site.

Santé, the annual Bloor-Yorkville wine festival is on from May 5-10, and it's the tenth anniversary. Its new "official" name - Santé: The Toronto International Wine Festival - is clearly inspired by another Bloor-Yorkville event.

42 wineries are participating, so it's a great winetasting opportunity. It's educational too - there are all sorts of seminars and region-specific tastings. Australia, California and New Zealand are among the choices for tutored tastings this year.

There'll lots of good food from 22 chefs at the tasting sessions and participating restaurants and retail stores. Grand winemaker's dinners will be held at restaurants including Pangeau, Truffles, Holt's Café and The Fifth.

Check out the website for more info.

The Terroir festival is on Victoria Day weekend in Prince Edward County. It's an annual celebration of the County's wine industry in picturesque Picton at the no doubt quaint Crystal Palace Fairgrounds.

County winemakers will release their 2007 whites and rosés and local chefs will take care of the food pairings. According to Angela Braun of the Winegrowers Assocation, there was a "record harvest of high quality grapes" in 07 and she says it's a "great vintage."

Given the poor retail distribution of the County's products - not to mention the limited quantities of some of the wines - there's no better way to try them and buy them than in the County itself. Some of the better whites being made in Ontario right now come from the county - especially Huff Estates and Norman Hardie.

Picton's not that far from Toronto or Ottawa, but you'd really probably rather not drive back the same day...

For more info, visit the winegrowers association website.

Here's the Vins de Bordeaux vintage summary, including detailed weather analysis.

Alas, now that the Man from Maryland has spoken, the upbeat word from the Vins de Bordeaux folk may be eclipsed. Read a report on Robert Parker's opinion of the vintage. Interestingly, the wines that got the highest marks from RP and his super-taster sidekick Neal Martin were the Sauternes...

Like so many good things, Bordeaux's en primeur program was ruined when it got too popular. It was great for consumers up until a few years ago and it was possible to make genuine and sometimes substantial savings on very fine wines. Now, the chateaux of Bordeux charge pretty much standard retail price, only three years in advance. Who needs that? That said, there are still some good reasons to consider an en primeur investment.

En primeur worked for many years as an insurance policy/cash flow thing for the chateaux. They would agree to sell loyal customers X number of bottles at a low price in order to get the cash up front and deliver the wines in the future. This way, the chateaux got money regardless of how the wine turned out. All through the 1990s, however, people who bought in advance made a lot of money: retail prices were often double or more the en primeur price by the time they hit the shelves three years later. In the UK, the secondary market for fine Bordeaux became so developed, there was an index that went up and down like the stock market.

Key reasons for this include the boom at the top end of the market, so more wealthy buyers were chasing the same small number of well-known labels, and improvements in winemaking technique. Bordeaux never actually has a really "bad" year anymore - some years are less good than others, that's all. The chateaux have now realized this and are charging top dollar from the word go. To get a flavour of how it used to be (and to see how much you could've made/saved in the 90s), read my article on the subject in 2003.

The principal benefit now is to get hold of sought-after wines at more or less retail prices. This is worth doing as there's a good chance they'll sell out within days of being released on the market. Most of the mid and lower range bottles will be available at the same price retail in 3-4 years - so let the chateau take care of both the cost and the risk until then. But if you must have the Lafite or you're collecting a particular chateau and don't want to take a chance on missing out on a small retail allotment in a few years, then en primeur would work for you.

Vintages runs a Bordeux Futures program every year and will be releasing a catalogue later this year. Have a look, be appalled at the prices, but bear in mind that for certain sought-after chateaux, this may be your best bet for securing some product.

To help you with your research, the talented team at Decanter magazine are blogging Bordeaux. Follow them as they barrel taste the latest Bordeaux vintage and get a jump on what's "hot" in the 07 vintage. It's all about the wine of course, but market perception is important, and what London thinks is particularly important.