Ange Aiello: So hey everybody I am here with Lawrence Buhler and we are at the beautiful Peller Estates Winery in Niagara in the lake, and what a gorgeous day today.
Lawrence Buhler: Stunning.
Ange Aiello: The sun is shining and it is very nice to see the summer weather coming out.
Lawrence Buhler: Finally with all that snow and that beautiful winter and we’re off to a beautiful spring, so I am looking forward to it.
Ange Aiello: How are the vineyards come along, what do you think for the summer, what’s going to happen.
Lawrence Buhler: Fantastic. We key to the fantastic, we just finished our pruning out here in our merlot, cask bourbon, cabarnet franc here at Peller. I hope for this vintage. 2007 look great and again looking forward to 2008.
Ange Aiello: That’s great. What brought you into wine making? I know we went to school together.
Lawrence Buhler: Yeah, I started out getting into wine and food, taking an engineering degree at University of 00:00:50 and I spent a couple of years doing that, love the science, love the wine so I thought I can combine the two and come down to Brock University and take Technology in Agriculture Program.
Ange Aiello: And how long was that program there?
Lawrence Buhler: It’s four years. It’s a great program, it’s the concentration in biotechnology and further on with the knowledge and agriculture concentration after that. So it’s a really in depth program but gets you off the races when you’re ready to doing making things.
Ange Aiello: And you kept everything local which is nice.
Lawrence Buhler: Yeah.
Ange Aiello: When you went to Brock and now you're back here sort of Niagara contributing to the booming Niagara wine region you know.
Lawrence Buhler: Yeah, I know it’s a beautiful region, I don’t think I could make wine anywhere else so I really do love this place.
Ange Aiello: That’s great. So, may be you could tell us little about—I mean obviously, you went to school in Niagara, you're wine making in Niagara, what is so special about Niagara and from the 00:01:39, the climate—I mean what from a wine making perspective just makes you go, wow I really want to work here.
Lawrence Buhler: Well first the age of the industry. The industry itself is very young so it’s a great time to be part of it, it’s growing, winery after winery, vineyard after vineyard, so it’s just on the incline exponentially so that’s what’s probably first and foremost the excitement to be part right at the ground level and make our way through and really pave the road first in grape wines coming out.
Niagara also is offering a variety different microclimates right from the 00:02:13 to the Niagara Lake. I mean every vineyard spot has got something to offer and as we learn more about what vines grow well in certain areas we’re again increasing the quality of our wines year after year, and I am learning from that. And again I love to learn more about wine, so that’s what keeps me in it.
Ange Aiello: I know loving to drink it and to loving to make it are two great things right.
Lawrence Buhler: You bet right.
Ange Aiello: I mean from the 00:02:38 perspective what does a Niagara offer from a 00:02:41 that’s say different from Bordeaux or different from Prince Edward County per se
Lawrence Buhler: Well, I mean for us we’ve got a—I mean as much as Ontario and people think it’s a cooler climate. It’s definitely warm here, so we grow a different variety of different grapes, you know right from Reisling which is a very cool climate so great variety to cabernet frac, cabernet sauvignon that are the latest ripening varieties that we have here in Ontario. I mean it’s that breath of wines that allows the wine consumer and our great costumers to come down, taste and find something that they are going to love Niagara no matter what’s the case are. Whether it’s off dry white sau, big ball chardonnays to light reds to really big ball tonic long age reds to sparkling wine I mean this area can do it all which is exciting.
Ange Aiello: Yeah and you guys are just releasing your Rose sparkling Ice Cuvée, aren’t you?
Lawrence Buhler: Yeah, we’re pretty excited. It’s about four years in the making. Many trials and you know many glasses of sparkling wines so to figure out the best combination of great price so it’s Pinot noir, Chardonnay, and some Cabernet franc that makes that nice Rose red color, and then an ice wine dosage to top it all off to add that complexity.
Ange Aiello: Yeah, for those of you that don’t know what’s a Ice Cuvée is basically it’s sparkling wine made here in Niagara. It’s done with as Lawrence said a Pinot noir, and a Chardonnay, as made with a dosage of ice wine, so it’s a little bit more sweet and almost palatable I guess for the average consumer to get a sparkling wine and really enjoy it. And if you haven’t had any I would advice you to check it out.
Honestly, I think a Peller makes a lot of their wine spectacular. What would be there flagship wine or your flagship wine that you really enjoy making. I mean what goes into making a Reisling or sauvignon blanc and what does that say out from Peller?
Lawrence Buhler: Sure, we make a wide variety of great varieties, again as you said Riesling sauvignon blanc. Riesling, it’s one of my favorite great varieties, you can make it from a bone dry austere table wine to a sweet dessert wine to into sparkling, whatever you want to make into it, it’s such a versatile grape, and I do enjoy the taste.
Ane Aiello: Yes, it’s gorgeous.
Lawrence Buhler: Yes this beautiful sunny day. No, it’s such a versatile great variety I do love it.
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