Canada Berries: Wine tasting
My friends and I are alcoholics who down bottles of wine during the weekend, so when Canada Berries invited me and my friends for a complimentary wine tasting, we were looking forward to it.
Canada Berries is a winery located in Richmond, BC. Ranging from Sparkling Wines, Table Wines, Icewines and others, Canada Berries focuses on the production, development and expansion of fruit table wine in particular.
Interior + Host
Their winery is like a big wooden lodge or cabin. The parking lot is huge and they sit on a large plot of land that also grows blueberries. The wine tasting is done across the main front bar.
Our host, Mynor is very welcoming and friendly. He talks to us about the history of the company and their philosophy when it comes to wine-making.
My friends and I like to drink wine, but know very little about it. I, especially, feel super awkward whenever someone pours me wine and waits for me to taste it. I don’t know why I swirl the wine first, but I do it. I don’t know why I need to smell the wine first, but I do that too.
Mynor explains everything about wine-tasting – why we do all these things and what kinds of things to look for, which will tell us if a wine has more sugar or has been fermented in a special way. He makes all this information fun and depending on how active you are with him, the presentation can go anywhere from 30 minutes to 1 hour.
Wines
We taste 9 wines in total during our wine-tasting session with Mynor:
- Angel’s kiss sparkling wine ($39 per bottle)
- Blueberry ($30)
- Cranberry ($30)
- Gooseberry ($30)
- Blackberry ($30)
- Raspberry ($30)
- Blackcurrant ($30)
- Cherry port wine ($10)
- Blackberry dessert wine ($10)
They also have a strawberry dessert wine ($10) that we didn’t try. We also did not get to try any of their ice wines or their royal line (blue queen, blue queen gold, blue king). But they do offer these ones as well.
As part of the wine tasting, they prepared some cheese and crackers for us.
Berry good wines
We progressed through the tasting, starting from the most dry to the sweetest.
The Angel’s kiss sparkling wine was very refreshing. It smells like a mixture of peach, grape and blueberries.
Our favourite berry wines are the blueberry (blue queen special), raspberry and gooseberry. The blueberry wine is a very classic easy-to-drink and everyone-will-enjoy type of wine. The raspberry wine is slightly more sour. The gooseberry wine is unique because it gives off a smoky aroma.
We also really liked the port wines because they are sweeter and have a higher alcohol content (around 16%). Also, they have a special sale at $10 per bottle.
Final thoughts
100% Honesty
Some of you may know that I don’t do sponsored posts. Our wine tasting was complimentary but it would have costed $5 per person, which is not a lot anyways and is pretty standard. We also bought 5 bottles of wine at the end of our tasting, so I’m being transparent here and telling you that we did buy these bottles with our own money because we enjoyed the wines we tasted.
Two notes on the experience in general that I want to be honest about:
Amount
The wine tasting pouring amount is lower than at other wineries I’ve visited. On average, I would say it is just barely 2 sips per wine we tasted. However, a normal wine tasting would only be 4 wines. Here we tried 9.
Drinking area/lounge
The drinking area is limited. You might see on social media other people and influencers posting pictures about Canada Berries outside but they don’t actually have a patio outside and in fact, you are not allowed to drink outside so don’t let those pictures fool you.
You are allowed to drink inside the building – there are 2 corners where you can sit and enjoy the wines you buy. Both of these are high chairs/stools and a table. The staff helped improve the experience by putting some music on for us, but I have to say in general the drinking area isn’t as comfortable as some of the other wineries I’ve been to. If they had their outside patio (drinking allowed) with patio furniture (sofas, comfy chairs), it would make a really big difference.
Perfect for your first wine tasting
I kind of wish I came to Canada Berries for my first wine tasting because the real value in this experience was our conversations with Mynor and all the things we learned from him about wines and wine tasting. The education we got is the number 1 reason why I recommend any of you to visit. No longer will you feel awkward or a phony when you drink wine.
Of course, their wine is also very good and at an average price of $30 per bottle, it is a very nice bottle of wine. It’s obvious they care a lot about the way they treat their berries and wine and the price is a fair and reasonable representation of that. Also FYI their wines are not only locally sourced, but also vegan friendly (for all you vegans out there).
If you are interested, you can check out their website (https://canada-berries.com) to book a wine tasting or take a look at their Groupon deal here.