Kacaba Winery

For a long time Ontario wines got a really bad wrap, but in the last few years I have learned about the amazing wine that is being produced out here.

After my relaxing evening at the St George my Mom and I headed out to Niagara for the remainder of the weekend. She had to stop by Kacaba to pick up her Wine Club wines for the last few months.

Obviously we were going to do a tasting - we aren’t animals!

I started with a really lovely 2016 Sauvignon Blanc, it was light, with a bit of stone fruit, and very little acid. Perfect for the spring, which is going to be here soon right… I’m ready to retire my sweaters for a little while.

The team here at the Kacaba is incredible. They are all so lovely and helpful.

So we moved along to the reds.

We tried the Cabernet Syrah from both 2016 and 2017. Both were nice, but the higher ratio of Syrah in the 2017 was definitely more appealing to my palette.

There is a Terraced Vineyard Syrah that I’d tried previously, it was the wine that came with my Mom’s club shipment sometime last year.

But they were down to the last two cases, so I tried it again, and snagged a bottle for myself!

Finally we strolled through the back tasting room, and finished off our visit with a taste of their 2017 Effervescence Sparking, which is delightful. It’s light and crisp, without being overly dry, and it has a finer bead than you would expect.

After that we had to head home, mostly because we didn’t have my Dad with us to drive! We arrived home and cellared 4 months of Wine Club which included 4 bottles of the 2015 Reserve Syrah, one of which I may have left out of the cellar as a not so subtle hint that we should drinks - I mean taste and make notes on so we can see how it ages!

We settled in and debated the plan for the evening. With snow starting to flutter down outside, and pajama pants tantalizingly within reach we made a plan. Mom when back to the cellar and pulled a 2010 Kacaba Cabernet Franc while I threw together a little feast of snacks.

Appetizers for dinner has been a staple, we put out way too much in a quest to have a great variety, then later pack at least half of it away again.

So I raided the fridge/freezer/groceries I picked up with the intention to take home for a small party I’m throwing this week.

We had the usual suspects - cheese, pate, salami, I had a roasted chicken that we were going to have with some veggies, instead just sliced up the breast and put it on the platter.

I found some frozen wild caught shrimp and some old bay in the pantry, so I filled a small pot with water, half a cup of lemon juice, 3 cloves of garlic, a few bay leaves, and half a cup of old bay and brought it to a boil.

Once the water was boiling a threw the shrimp in, and watched closely until they went pink and pulled them out. I heated some clarified butter with more lemon juice, old bay, and hot sauce, and we had a little viet-cajun style shrimp dip.

As I warmed up some baguette in the oven I found some roasted red pepper that my mom had preserved in the summer, olives, cornichon, and some red pepper jelly to finish off the tray.

You’re not wrong, this is actually food for at least 6 people…