La Grande Dégustation 2018

La Grande Dégustation de Montréal
8th Edition

November 1 -3, 2018

La Grande Dégustation de Montréal is the largest annual wine and alcoholic beverages gathering in Eastern Canada. This year, 230 wine producers and distillers from 18 countries gather to share their passion with the visitors, connoisseurs and professionals, presenting more than 1,300 products, 800 of which are private imports. The event is expected 13,000 visitors, allowing Quebeckers to meet producers who come from all around the world while enjoying a unique tasting experience.

This year, Italy is the special guest of honour. Their kiosks occupy almost half of the exhibition space and offer a multitude of tasting experiences. The wine that is especially honoured this year is Pinot Gris, or Pinot Grigio in Italian. Look for many regional varieties of this wine, and talk to the produces to discover their specific growing and wine producing methods.

Besides italy, there are many other international wine producers with excellent wines to discover and taste.

Gin is also in the forefront this year and many excellent varieties are offered for a tasting.

And of course, their are food and culinary products to taste as well.

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For more information, visit La Grande Dégustation de Montréal website.

Italian Wines 2018

The Italian Trade Commission
A Tasting of Wines from Italy
23rd Edition

October 31, 2018

The Italian Trade commission organizes the Italian Wine tasting in Montreal each fall. Once again, as in the past years, it took place at the Marché Bonsecours located in Old Montreal, This annual even is extremely popular and attracts great crowds of wine tasters, producers, distributors, agents, and wine connoisseurs not only from Montreal but other Quebec locations as well as from some eastern Ontario regions. Everybody attending took a great interest wines presented this year. Though the event space is very large, nevertheless it was quite densely filled with the attendees who at times had to wait in line to taste some wines and to talk to wine producers.

This year had a record number of participating wine producers - 254 - each presenting their bet products. The variety and shear numbers of different wines available for tasting was truly overwhelming.

There was also plenty of food, mainly Italian cheeses and charcuterie specialities.

The event was a great success, well organized and very enjoyable.

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For more information, visit the Italian Trade Comission Wine Tasting webpage.

Riesling & Co. 2018

Riesling & Co. 2018
German Wines Institute

May 19, 2018

The German Wine Institute (Deutsches Weininstitut) invited wine professionals to discover and taste the diverse, world-class styles wines produced by German vineyards. Mainly on display were Rieslings and Pinots noirs wines. Among other grape wine varieties were also Pinot blanc, Pinot gris, Gewurztraminer and Silvaner.

It was a great pleasure to have the Riesling & Co. once again back in Quebec and Canada this year. This Montreal professional wine tasting event was held at the spacious premisses of SCENA, a French restaurant on Jacques-Cartier Pier in Montreal's Old Port. This is a different location than where the previous two such events were held in Montreal. You can read about the 2015 event here, and the 2016 event here.

20 German producers participated this year. All had an amazing variety and quality of wines to offer for tasting. The pace was abuzz with a great number of wine professional which included wine buyers such as restaurateurs and hoteliers and also those from the SAQ, as well as local wine promoters and sellers, wine connoisseurs, and even wine tasting apprentices.

LEITZ Weinngut vineyard representative was also offering to taste four different non-alcoholic wines all under the trade name Eins Zwei Zero. Many attendees showed a special interest for these non-alcoholic wines, although they were not listed in the event's catalogue and were brought to the show by the producer as a last minute decision. I personally was amazed by how good they all tasted: white and sparkling white, as well as rose and sparkling rose. Unfortunately, only the white one is presently being sold by some SAQ outlets.

Generous food was also offered to those who attended the event and was much appreciated by all.

The German Wine Institute in collaboration with German Wine Canada will be also holding  this year the 31 days across Canada tour of German Riesling Wine between June 1 - 31, 2018. You can find more information about it on the German Wine Canada site here.

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Visit Wines of Germany website.

French Wine Producers 2018

12 French Wine Producers in Montreal
Wine Tasting

May 16, 2018

This event was sponsored by the CIC MONTREAL with the help of CIC EST and CIC OUEST branches of Crédit Industriel et Commercial (a French financial services group) in order to promote French businesses abroad. It was held at the Montreal's Hotel Zero 1. 

All participating vineyards were family ran businesses, some with a several hundreds years of history and a timeline of many generations. The producers came to Montreal in person. All demonstrated love for their land and the real expertise in understanding their soils, their vines, the intricacies of specific wine production, this due to their hard work and France's long history and legacy of wine production.

The following producers participated at the today's event and displayed wine-making mastery that makes French wine famous. Visit their websites to learn more about them and their wines.

Champagne Eric Taillet
Website 
 Domaine Edouard Faller
Website

Champagne Barbier Louvet
Website
Domaine Vin Andre Carl & Fils
Website

Champagne Couvreur Philippart
Website
Champagne Person
Website

Domaine Moulin de la Touche
Website
Domaine G. Metz
Website

Champagne Guy de Chassey
Website

Champagne Brice
Website

Domaine des Sept Vignes
Website

Domaine Plessis Glain
Website

The event was attended by the Montreal's wine professionals who appreciated to discover the new wines and learn about various vintages and the methods they were created.

Generous food was also provided for those attending the event.

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