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Culinary Championship Winners
Lanny Martiniuk, Proprietor, Julie Martiniuk, Proprietor, Mark McCrowe, Winner of the People's choice award (St. John's- Aqua Kitchen Bar) Alison Moyes, WinemakerTim Martiniuk, GM
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Photo by Kirsten Wakal
People’s Choice Awards
Judging at the People’s Choice Awards at the Canadian Culinary Championships.
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Photo by Kirsten Wakal
Pouring the Mystery Wine
You know you’ve got something special when your wine is chosen to be the Mystery Wine at the People’s Choice Awards at the Canadian Culinary Championships.
Held earlier this year at the Kelowna Delta Grand Hotel, more than 400 guests tasted dishes from 11 chefs – all winners of Gold Medal Plates – and then decided which dish paired best with the wine. No one, not even the chefs, knew what the wine was or where it came from. The winning chef that evening was Mark McCrowe of St. John's Aqua Kitchen Bar.
Tim Martiniuk, General Manager of Stoneboat Vineyards remembers the day they found out their 2012 Pinotage was chosen as the mystery wine. “We were very excited! Stoneboat is a small winery and we do very little in the way of advertising, so this was a great opportunity. All in all, being chosen as the mystery wine was a great opportunity for the winery, and a victory for the variety itself!”
The Pinotage variety is not well known in North America, but is a favourite in South Africa, where the grape was developed as a cross between Pinot Noir and Cinsaut in the early 1900s. Pinotage is very rarely grown outside of South Africa.
In the mid 1990s, Martiniuk discovered Pinotage when the owner of another Okanagan winery brought him cuttings to propagate into vines. “I wanted to experiment with the variety, as it was totally new to Canada at that point. I asked to keep a few vines for myself to see how they would grow,” he said. “Once the vines were mature, I was so impressed by the fruit's flavours and the vine's growing habits that I decided to plant more. I wasn't able to access cuttings so I took tissue samples from the two vines that I did have, and had them cultured in Saanichton at the Plant Research Centre.”
Stoneboat submitted their 2011 Pinotage to the WineAlign National Wine Awards of Canada competition, and it received a gold medal. While there, Martiniuk met David Lawrason, who organizes the wine side of the Canadian Culinary Championships. He thought Pinotage would be a great mystery wine that would keep people guessing. He also thought the chefs would be intrigued by its flavour profile.
Although they had to supply the wine at below cost to the not-for-profit Canadian Culinary Championships, Martiniuk says it was still a great experience. “We have been contacted by several of the chefs that competed in the competition who would like to carry our Pinotage in their restaurants. It will be available in Ontario soon, and is already on the list at the Westin Hotel in Edmonton. The wine was received very well by the chefs, and considering their calibre, their interest in the wine is the best kind of compliment.”
For more information on Pinotage visit www.stoneboatvineyards.com
For information on Gold Medal Plates and the Canadian Culinary Championship visit
www.goldmedalplates.com.
