Spring in the Okanagan brings many things: daffodils, fruit tree blossoms – and the occasional freakish cold snap. They usually hit mid-April, and this one came with hail / snow / rain and gale-force winds. The kind of wind that makes me think of battening down the hatches. Whatever hatches are.

After a depressingly cold spring day (those words so don’t look right together), I like to think about being sometime else – it’s being at a different time, but in the same spot. Got it? Hope so. It was on a cold spring day that I tasted wine from an Okanagan winery I hadn’t tried. Shocking, I know. Hey, I can’t drink 24/7. Although it has worked well for other writers…

There was a bottle of ’06 Reserve Merlot from Hillside Estate Winery hanging around the house, and I needed to take the chill off the day. Hello, corkscrew – meet bottle.

Snide Sideways comments aside (you know who you are), merlot does fairly well in the okanagan and Hillside definitely makes an easy drinker out of it. Take a bag of overripe cherries, sit down on a hay bale that’s baked all afternoon in the hot August sun, then open the bag of cherries and inhale. Repeat. Yeah. That’s this wine. It’s ready to drink now, so don’t wait.

Hillside is, not surprisingly, built up the actual hillside along the Naramata Bench. They’ve got a sweet little bistro-type eating spot with a killer patio that’s aching to be crammed with people laughing, drinking and doing all that fun summer stuff you do on a patio.

On the day I tried the bistro it wasn’t yet warm enough for patio action, so my friend Allison and I sat by the gigantic windows and took in what view we could from the inside – which was a lot. Then the wine came. And the food. Hell yeah.

Their new executive chef Robert Cordonier has lots of wine-bistro-y food on the menu. From duck confit to mussels, they’ve got it. I tried the daily special – always try a daily special; it’s special for a reason. Penne, sautéed mushrooms and bits of caramelized onion with just enough garlic. Pasta perfection, enjoyed with a (recommended) glass of their ’09 Muscat Ottonel. Fresh. I need to do dinner at Hillside with my fella this summer.

Oh – one more thing: I asked, and Chef Rob emailed me the how-to on making this dish. What a sweetie. Thanks.

So Allison and I sat. And ate. And chatted for over two hours. Lunching over good food with pretty wine and a new friend is a great way to un*wine*d, no matter what the weather.

Cheers!

Jeannette

Tags: BC wine, Hillside Estate Winery, merlot, Muscat Ottonel, Naramata, Okanagan wine, Robert Cordonier, Winery Restaurants