Roche, Naramata Bench

Photo: Contributed Join our wine writer, Allison Markin, every week for a wine review complete with food and music pairings. Featuring Okanagan and Canadian wines, with an occasional international bottle, Castanet celebrates the bottles of our Valley and the diversity of the Canadian wine

Hardly Sirius (not a typo)

Photo: Contributed Legend has it that those extra-hot summer days came from the extra heat of Sirius, the brightest star in the sky. The word means “glowing” in Greek, and the ancient Greeks believed that the heat of this star added to the heat of the sun, giving us what we

Quinta Ferreira, Oliver

Photo: Contributed Join our wine writer, Allison Markin, every week for a wine review complete with food and music pairings. Featuring Okanagan and Canadian wines, with an occasional international bottle, Castanet celebrates the bottles of our Valley and the diversity of the Canadian wine

Top 3 campfire snacks

Photo: Contributed With summer in full swing, all the fun that makes up the season is happening every day and night. Days on the beach Picnics in the park Evenings around the campfire. (In British Columbia we improvise a bit with the campfire, but that is perfectly alr

Camelot, East Kelowna

Photo: Contributed Join our wine writer, Allison Markin, every week for a wine review complete with food and music pairings. Featuring Okanagan and Canadian wines, with an occasional international bottle, Castanet celebrates the bottles of our Valley and the diversity of the Canadian wine

An old-fashioned good time

Photo: Contributed Life presents us with opportunities, and, if we are on the ball, we manage to take advantage of them. Earlier this summer, I had a chance encounter with an old friend. It was one of those moments where we had a chance to say we were both thrilled to see each other, a

Melting pot vs. crock pot

Photo: Contributed Everyone has tradition in their lives, and traditional foods are a part of what shapes our family and its legacy. We also talk about the blending or assimilation of cultures, and even in food, there is fusion cuisine. Some of those blended results become a part of

Arrowleaf, Lake Country

Photo: Contributed Join our wine writer, Allison Markin, every week for a wine review complete with food and music pairings. Featuring Okanagan and Canadian wines, with an occasional international bottle, Castanet celebrates the bottles of our Valley and the diversity of the Canadian wine

Who would have thought...

Photo: Contributed You will have to forgive me the frivolity of this week’s column; you might feel it is a bit silly, but I’m afraid my brain is fried. You see, I am usually a bit overwhelmed by this point in the summer as we are working long days catering and then I’

Noble Ridge, OK Falls

Photo: Contributed Join our wine writer, Allison Markin, every week for a wine review complete with food and music pairings. Featuring Okanagan and Canadian wines, with an occasional international bottle, Castanet celebrates the bottles of our Valley and the diversity of the Canadian wine

An embarrassment of riches

Photo: Contributed Well, here we are – in the thick of it. Summer has hit us full force with that wonderful sunshine and heat we all anticipate so impatiently. With the heat comes the tourists, a part of summer many people like not as much. The good news is, the heat also mean

Adegamae, Portugal

Photo: Contributed Join our wine writer, Allison Markin, every week for a wine review complete with food and music pairings. Featuring Okanagan and Canadian wines, with an occasional international bottle, Castanet celebrates the bottles of our Valley and the diversity of the Canadian wine

Marshmallows in firelight

Photo: Contributed Sitting on the deck as the moon rose and the sun set one night this week, I was struck by memories of summers as a kid, when one of the things we did on a Friday night was to have a bonfire. Whether it was camping trips in the interior of B.C. or times visiting my co

Singletree, Naramata

Photo: Contributed Join our wine writer, Allison Markin, every week for a wine review complete with food and music pairings. Featuring Okanagan and Canadian wines, with an occasional international bottle, Castanet celebrates the bottles of our Valley and the diversity of the Canadian wine

Simple summer pleasures

Photo: Contributed It’s so much easier to enjoy yourself in summer, don’t you think? The other seasons have more unpredictable weather, so you need to plan your clothing. Safety can be a consideration, what with storms and snow and ice. The days are shorter, so time mana

Howling Bluff, Naramata

Photo: Contributed Join our wine writer, Allison Markin, every week for a wine review complete with food and music pairings. Featuring Okanagan and Canadian wines, with an occasional international bottle, Castanet celebrates the bottles of our Valley and the diversity of the Canadian wine

The value of time

Photo: Contributed Summer is here, it’s official. You might not have danced around a bonfire at midnight to celebrate the solstice, but I’m sure you have felt the itch of summer approaching. You know that feeling of bliss from the sun and the lake, having cool drink

Liquidity, Okanagan Falls

Photo: Contributed Join our wine writer, Allison Markin, every week for a wine review complete with food and music pairings. Featuring Okanagan and Canadian wines, with an occasional international bottle, Castanet celebrates the bottles of our Valley and the diversity of the Canadian wine

A day for someone special

Photo: Contributed Father’s Day is upon us, so again I’m thinking of family and quality time. My Dad has been gone for more than 10 years now, and my grandfathers are long gone too, but I still think of them as summer gears up. Summer is a time for the fatherly types i

Monte Creek, Kamloops

Photo: Contributed Join our wine writer, Allison Markin, every week for a wine review complete with food and music pairings. Featuring Okanagan and Canadian wines, with an occasional international bottle, Castanet celebrates the bottles of our Valley and the diversity of the Canadian wine