D’Amato & Szabo: Wine Thieves

Send us Fan Mail The Wine Thieves make their way to the south of France to the country’s most productive IGP, the Pays d’Oc. This long coastal strip spanning 240 kilometres across the Mediterranean Sea from just east of Nîmes to the Spanish border is a multi-faceted region with endless sunshine, benevolent winds and variations in elevation that make it possible to successfully grow no fewer than 5...

Send us Fan Mail This week we're back in Armenia focusing more deeply on the origins and proliferation of Armenia’s autochthonous grape varieties. Indigenous and autochthonous seem to be used interchangeably, but as we've learned, in the scientific community, autochthonous is the preferred term for grape varieties that were born, so to speak, in a certain place.  So, get ready for a very...

Send us Fan Mail (Previously aired 07/21) In this important episode, we connect with two of the many women who make up the fabric of Napa Valley's wine trade.  We speak with Megan Baccitich, a Healdsburg native and winemaker at the forward-thinking Geodesy Winery, and Ana Diogo-Draper, born raised and educated in Portugal but in Napa for the last 15 years, and now  Director of winemaking at A...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, the Thieves explore one of the most important and timely topics in the wine world today: Regenerative Agriculture. “Regen Ag”, or simply RA as it’s often called, has become THE buzzword of the year not just in the wine industry, but in the agri-food sector at large. What is regen ag? It’s a simple question but the answer is anything but.  In very basic terms, it’s...

Send us Fan Mail (Previously aired July 2021) This is not an episode about Napa's “icon wines” or “icon wineries” whose labels, rarity, and high cost cause a frenzy among consumers resulting in exclusive waitlists for the privilege of purchasing a bottle. No, today we’re talking about the “star” vineyards that, in some cases, have become brands in their own right. In Part One, we spoke with A...

Send us Fan Mail In this third episode focused on the re-nascent wine industry in Armenia, the Wine Thieves get into a deep and detailed conversation about ancient and recent techniques applied to the wealth of autochthonous grapes in the country. Joined by guests Artak Gabrielyan, chief winemaker at the Armenian National Agrarian University and lecturer at the EVN Wine Academy, and Jean-Paul Berg...

Send us Fan Mail (Previously aired 07/15) Join the Wine Thieves in Napa Valley this week for the first of a special two-part series on the "grand crus" of Napa Valley, that is, the very best vineyards, the historic and more recently famous sites that produce Napa's finest wines. Today we're going straight to the source to talk to the Napa Valley’s, and probably all of Californi...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode we take a deeper look at VQA Ontario wines, and more specifically the Niagara Peninsula and its 10 sub-appellations. We begin to unravel the mystery of the cru, those single parcels of vineyard that have, or yet may rise, to the top of the heap of Ontario VQA wines. What features do they share? What makes them unique? With grapegrowing experience stretching back to...

Send us Fan Mail Today we're exploring viticulture on top of the world, the wines of Mendoza which is the most prolific wine-growing region of Argentina. In fact, Mendoza holds 75% of the total vineyards in Argentina and the largest number of wineries in the country. In this episode, we’ll be talking about the diversity within Mendoza in all its corners from Lavalle to San Rafael so you’ll be...

Send us Fan Mail Way back in episode 41 entitled Armenia: Stepping Back Through Time, the Wine Thieves introduced listeners to this fascinating country with 6100 years (at least) of winemaking history. Armenia is the site of the oldest known winemaking facility, the Areni-1 cave discovered in 2007 in the Armenian highlands in the region called Vayots Dzor. Be sure to listen for the full backstory....

Send us Fan Mail What do a British diplomat, a Paris wine shop owner, and a Mosel winegrower have to do with Ontario wine? Listen in to find out - they all defined or shaped Ontario's wine industry in some way.  In this rich episode on the history of the Ontario wine industry, you'll also hear many more legends, tales and genuine anecdotes archived from the mists of distant times in the...

Send us Fan Mail This week the Wine Thieves embark upon the all-important discussion of riesling grown in Ontario, Canada. Ontario’s cool-climate wine growing regions enjoy special status as one of the few areas outside of northern Europe where Riesling is a signature grape variety. It is home to vineyards that are now over 40 years old and as of this year, riesling makes up 15% of all VQA Ontario...

Send us Fan Mail The world’s most ancient wine-producing region, with 6,000 years of history, is just beginning  a modern winemaking renaissance. Why haven't you heard about Armenian wine?  Unlike neighbouring Georgia, whose wine production has continued unbroken for millennia, Armenia’s ill-fated wine culture was drowned by successive waves of troubled historical events. But thanks to the co...

Send us Fan Mail In our ongoing series featuring Femmes du Vin, we speak with Madeline Puckette, author, co-founder and wine education content creator of the wildly popular Wine Folly.  Stemming from her own experience with formal wine education, Madeline  decided to take a rather radical departure from formalized pedagogy, working instead within a visual framework to better communicate informatio...

Send us Fan Mail We’re back in the Napa Valley with stories about the early days of the re-birth of the Napa Valley from the 1970s and 1980s. We’ll hear about the hard work, the physical labour of establishing a vineyard, the uncertainty that hung over wineries at the time, and certainly the financial drain. John and Sara speak with two second-generation winemakers from the Napa Valley who both ha...

Send us Fan Mail This is not an episode about Napa's “icon wines” or “icon wineries” whose labels, rarity, and high cost cause a frenzy among consumers resulting in exclusive waitlists for the privilege of purchasing a bottle. No, today we’re talking about the “star” vineyards that, in some cases, have become brands in their own right. In Part One, we spoke with Andy Beckstoffer, the winegrow...

Send us Fan Mail In this important episode we connect with two of the many women who make up the fabric of Napa Valley's wine trade.  We speak with Megan Baccitich, a Healdsburg native and winemaker at the forward-thinking Geodesy Winery, and Ana Diogo-Draper, born raised, and educated in Portugal but in Napa for the last 15 years, and now  Director of winemaking at Artesa. We explore why dis...

Send us Fan Mail Join the Wine Thieves in Napa Valley this week for the first of a special two-part series on the "grand crus" of Napa Valley, that is, the very best vineyards, the historic and more recently famous sites that produce Napa's finest wines. Today we're going straight to the source to talk to the Napa Valley’s, and probably all of California’s, most famous grape gr...

Send us Fan Mail The Man, The Myth, The Legend. On occasion, the Thieves feature conversations with sommeliers and wine industry leaders with unique perspectives, who are great storytellers, and whose work they admire. In this episode, John and Sara speak with the one and only Paul Grieco, 'General and Manager' of Tribeca's Terroir wine bar in New York City, one of the finest not on...

Send us Fan Mail Drink Chenin! In honour of Drink Chenin Day, June 18th 2021, the Wine Thieves make a special trip to South Africa, a global leader in Chenin Blanc production with 55% of the world's plantings. It’s the #1 most planted grape of any colour in the Cape Winelands, accounting for 17.5% of national acreage. The grape has a complicated history but is likely to have been established...

Send us Fan Mail The Wine Thieves are thrilled to be back on home soil in beautiful southern Ontario investigating what might just be Ontario's finest and most reliable grape variety, Chardonnay. Of the 51 varieties authorized for VQA production, chardonnay is number one by volume accounting for 13% of total VQA production. This episode gives you an overview of Ontario appellations and sub-ap...

Send us Fan Mail An episode devoted to a few lesser known topics relations to New York Wines including growing in the Hudson River Region, Lake Erie and the burgeoning urban winery scene. An historic growing region, the Hudson River Region is one of the oldest established AVAs in the US having received the designation in 1982. It's also home to the oldest commercial vineyard and the oldest co...

Send us Fan Mail The Wine Thieves are back in Europe this spring, the ideal time of year to rediscover Portugal's Vinho Verde. Crisp, delicately perfumed, dry to off-dry, low in alcohol and sometimes with the merest prickle of effervescence, these are classic descriptors of this northern Portuguese specialty (and mostly white, but there are rosé and red versions, too). But as we'll disco...

Send us Fan Mail Continuing their journey through New York, John and Sara take a deeper dive into the red wines grown across the state in search of an elusive flagship variety. The Thieves make the call that New York's signature red grape must surely be cabernet franc, even if their wine producing friends are reluctant to say it themselves. Merlot may be more widely planted but it remains a L...

Send us Fan Mail May 7th is Sauvignon Blanc day but we'll be celebrating all week! Join the Wine Thieves at ground zero for new world sauvignon blanc, Marlborough, New Zealand. John and Sara explore its rise to prominence from the first plantings in the 1970s, through to its explosion on the international scene in the 1990s, and now to the current ‘third wave’ (a good third wave, that is) of...