Articles tagged with: CCOVI

  • CCOVI connected to award-winning wine tourism book

    As the region prepares to celebrate another year of the popular Niagara Icewine Festival, Carman Cullen and Linda Bramble are reflecting on the event’s history.

    The origin story of the January festival was chronicled by Cullen, Chair of Brock’s Marketing, International Business and Strategy Department (MIBS), and Bramble, author and professional affiliate at Brock’s Cool Climate Oenology and Viticulture Institute (CCOVI), in a chapter within the book Best Practices in Global Wine Tourism.

    That book has been amassing accolades since its publication last year, including Best Wine Tourism Book in the United States. It was more recently honoured with the Best Wine Tourism Book in the World award at the 2017 Yantai China International Gourmand World Cookbook Awards in May.

    Both Cullen and Bramble said it was gratifying to have played a part in bringing the book to fruition, and in sharing the fascinating stories of the local wine industry with the world.

    The Niagara Icewine Festival takes place Jan. 12 to 28 and includes a series of events and activities devoted to one of the country’s most unique products.

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  • East meets west in Great Chardo Swap

    Niagara has been named as the host for the prestigious International Cool Climate Wine Symposium(ICCWS) in 2020, the event’s 10th anniversary. As part of the lead-up to the symposium, 12 Niagara winemakers are using grapes from two specific vineyards to produce an assortment of one-of-a-kind Chardonnays.

    The Great Chardo Swap will see six winemakers from east of the Welland Canal making wine from grapes grown on the west side of the canal, and six winemakers from the west side making wine from chardonnay grapes grown on the east side. Two of those winemakers, Emma Garner (BSc ’04) from Thirty Bench Wine Makers and Shiraz Mottiar (BSc ’00) from Malivoire Wine Company, are graduates of Brock’s Oenology and Viticulture program. All of the fruit to make the Chardonnays is being donated by Inniskillin Wines and Thirty Bench.

    Brock’s Cool Climate Oenology and Viticulture Institute (CCOVI) collaborated with stakeholder organizations across the country to bring the ICCWS to Canada, and it was CCOVI Senior Oenologist Belinda Kemp who came up with the idea for the Great Chardo Swap after hearing about a similar initiative that took place in New Zealand.

    Read the full story here

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  • Lab tech uncorks new career in wine industry

    Heather Bouwhuis has spent the past four years juggling her studies, raising a family and working a full-time job — all while commuting more than two hours each way from her home in Pickering for every lecture, lab and test at Brock University.

    Every moment spent braving traffic and hitting the books was worth it for the 57-year-old wife and mother-of-two, who came to Brock to pursue a second career after decades working as a medical laboratory technologist at a Toronto hospital.

    It was in the fall of 2013, after deciding a career change was needed, that Bouwhuis enrolled in Brock’s Certificate in Grape and Wine Technology program, offered through the Cool Climate Oenology and Viticulture Institute (CCOVI).

    All her hard work will pay off Friday, Oct. 13, when Bouwhuis walks across the stage at Brock’s Fall Convocation ready to retire from her lab position to pursue her second career in the wine industry. Read the full story here

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  • CCOVI receives $960,000 for one-of-a-kind wine consumer research lab

    Imagine being able to shop at a winery or the LCBO while listening to classical music and savouring the aromas of chardonnay and pinot grigio, all without leaving your seat.

    A nearly $1-million funding grant will help Brock University’s Cool Climate Oenology and Viticulture Institute establish the world’s first mediated-reality wine laboratory that will combine sights, smells and sounds to help researchers study the science of consumer choice in the wine industry.

    Brock’s oenology and viticulture researchers are on the forefront of this leading-edge technology thanks to a $960,000 grant from the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) announced Thursday, Oct. 12.

    The Augmented Reality, Virtual Reality and Sensory Reality Consumer Laboratory, to be known as R3CL, will be able to create a variety of environments in which people purchase and consume wines.

    Read the full story here

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  • National interest bubbles for science of sparkling wine

    With 90 local wineries now making sparkling wine, it’s not just fizz-loving consumers that are taking notice of the surging sales of the product. The increasingly popular wine — and related research underway at Brock’s Cool Climate Oenology and Viticulture Institute (CCOVI) — has also attracted the attention of the oldest scientific society in Canada.

    Belinda Kemp, CCOVI senior oenologist, gave a presentation for the prestigious Royal Canadian Institute for Science (RCIS) in Toronto Sept. 14 on the science of sparkling wine. The RCIS works to enhance public awareness and understanding of science, while creating an environment in which science can flourish and contribute to all aspects of Canadian life and society.

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  • Five Brock alumni featured in wine magazine

    When LCBO Vintages magazine wanted to run a feature showcasing the labour of love involved in crafting local wine, they turned to five Brock graduates-turned winemakers to share their insights on the process.

    Emma Garner (BSc, ’04), Thirty Bench Wine Makers; Shiraz Mottiar (BSc, ’00), Malivoire Wine Company; Rob Power (BSc ’00), Creekside Estate Winery; and Ilya Senchuk (BSc, ’03) and his wife Nadia Senchuk (MBA’07), Leaning Post, were all featured in the September edition of the publication. With the exception of Nadia, all of the featured winemakers are graduates of the Oenology and Viticulture program in Brock’s Cool Climate Oenology and Viticulture Institute (CCOVI).

    Read the full article here

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  • Brock’s CCOVI helps Grape and Wine crowd educate its senses

    Brock’s Cool Climate Oenology and Viticulture Institute (CCOVI) raised a glass to celebrate its 20th year partnering with the Niagara Grape and Wine Festival on Saturday, Sept. 16. Continuing the long-standing tradition, CCOVI hosted three of its popular Educate your Senses wine and cheese seminars in Montebello Park in downtown St. Catharines, with some of the sold-out sessions attracting wine lovers from across Ontario, the U.S. and even Australia.

    CCOVI will offer three more seminars at the festival on Saturday, Sept. 23.

    Educate your Senses Schedule, Saturday, Sept. 23:

    2 p.m. Chris Protonentis, Coyote’s Run

    3 p.m. Brock alumni Richie Roberts, Fielding Estate

    4 p.m. Marc Bradshaw, Strewn

    Location: Roy T. Adams Bandshell, Montebello Park, St. Catharines

    Cost: $3.50 per token, two tokens per seminar. Brock alumni will receive a free wine glass with registration and receive half off the seminar cost. Tokens are available for purchase at Montebello Park throughout each weekend. Registration for seminars will be at the Roy T. Adams Bandshell only. Seminars run rain or shine.

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  • Brock scientists helping growers closely track ripening grapes

    As harvest season quickly approaches, Niagara’s grape growers and winemakers are keeping a steady eye on the grapes ripening in their vineyards. They can now also turn to scientists at Brock University’s Cool Climate Oenology and Viticulture Institute (CCOVI) to help them make informed harvest decisions. Read the full story here

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  • With students and research to support, Cuvée is back for 2018

    With the 2017 grape harvest just weeks away, the time has also come to make plans for attending the 30th annual Cuvée Grand Tasting.

    The 2018 event will be held Friday, March 23 at the Scotiabank Convention Centre in Niagara Falls. Online tickets will be available at cuvee.ca on Oct. 1, when wine afficianados can take advantage of early-bird prices.

    This marks the fourth year that Brock University’s Cool Climate Oenology and Viticulture Institute (CCOVI) has taken the lead in organizing Cuvée, a weekend-long celebration of VQA wines and local cuisine in the heart of Ontario wine country.  Brock, through CCOVI, produces the Cuvée program to support the future of the grape and wine industry. Read more here

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  • Record turnout as national lecture series turns 10

    The Triggs International Premium Vinifera Lecture Series marked its 10th event of sharing industry insight by bringing together a record crowd to learn between the grape vines. Grape growers and wine industry professionals rang in the 10th instalment of the series in the heart of Ontario wine country on Aug. 3 and 4, and in British Columbia’s Okanagan Valley on Aug. 8 and 9. More than 200 people attended over the four days, making this one of the most successful years for the series since it began in 2004.

    Organized by Brock University’s Cool Climate Oenology and Viticulture Institute (CCOVI), this year’s instalment featured Stefano Poni, Professor of Viticulture and Chair of the Instituto of Frutti-Viticoltura of the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Piacenza, Italy. Read the full story here

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