Cassini Cellars offer some pleasant surprises

Cassini Cellar's Adrian Capeneata at the 2010 SOWA Banée

It was an unlikely encounter. Stacey and I were honoured to be invited to the South Okanagan Wine Association (SOWA) Banée and dinner last April. For us it was one of the year's great pleasures. Heck, anytime we're in the Okanagan mixing it up with wine people it's a pleasure.

After a hectic dinner, morning wine tour and unbelievable lunch with great company, we were asked to do a "speed dating" session with 17 wineries! That's right, five minutes with each winery and sampling, spitting as we go. There were many folks we knew serving, and several we just met. One was Adrian from Cassini Cellars (looking very dapper and proud in the photo above).

The tasting was too frantic for us to really realize the quality of everyone we met. For this reason we are extremely lucky to have had some samples sent to us by Cassini this month. We've rolled a few of them out with our wine loving pals, and we've all been very impressed by the quality of everything we've poured.

What strikes you right away is how ambitious Cassini have been right out of the gate. They barely opened their tasting room last year. But the varietals include meritage blends, a Syrah, Merlot and Pinot Noir, as well as a white blend (Mamma Mia, French Couture) and a highly respectable Chardonnay that received high marks from Stacey's father (the biggest Chardonnay snob we know).

We've been tweeting out our notes as we pour the Cassini wines @BCWineLover. I can say with confidence that we'll be purchasing Cassini in the future, and will mark it as a destination in our next trip to the Golden Mile bench.

Kudos, Adrian! We didn't know what to expect when we began pouring your wine, but it has been a true pleasure for us over the holiday season.

– post by Mike