***

When you go into the liquor store, you’re faced with a bewildering selection of wines. So many bottles, so many possibilities. How do you choose a good one?

You could judge the wine by its label, of course, and many do. Which is why wineries try so hard (sometimes a little too hard, if you ask us: Fat Bastard, anyone?) to come up with unique names for their wines, and labels that will stand out on the shelf.

Still, you can put any old plonk in a fancy bottle with a beautiful label, and the wine will still be bad. So how do you get beyond appearances and figure out what to drink when you yourself haven’t tasted a wine?

If you’re knowledgeable enough, you probably already have some idea of what to expect from a given bottle based on its country of origin, the varietal, and the reputation of the winery. But even that can be a moving target as, vintage to vintage, grape-growing conditions vary.

What you really need is advice. And that’s where wine-rating systems come in…

…but guess what? There’s more than one of those, too. Whose ratings do you trust?

Putting the systems to the test

The best way to find out is to take a wine that you already know well, and love, and compare your tasting of it to the reviewers’ take. (Or, alternatively, you could use a wine that you loathe, but it seems a bit masochistic to drink a wine you really hate just to find out if the wine reviewers hate it, too!).

With that in mind, we thought it would be interesting to look at various systems with respect to one of our go-to family dinner wines, Wyndham Shiraz Bin 555.

One rating system you’ll see everywhere is the 100-point system made popular by guru Robert Parker of The Wine Advocate. Similar systems are used by other publications, such Wine Spectator. Scores in this point system are frequently displayed in liquor stores to help you make an informed decision…or at least to encourage you to buy certain wines!

Introduced by Parker in 1978, the strength of these 100-point systems lies in the universal understanding of what a high percentage means. (Although, ironically, Robert Parker never rates a wine below 50 points, so is it really a 100-point system, or…?)

Our Wyndham Shiraz Bin 555 (at least the 2005 vintage) was rated 88/100 by Wine Spectator and, by way of comparison, 91/100 by Australian Gourmet Traveller Wine (um, who?).

But when was the last time you saw a wine rated 23, or even 61? In fact, you never seem to see wines rated below 80…which makes the 100-point system more like a 20-point system.

That being the case, why not use a 20-point system?

The U.C. Davis system

That’s what we usually use when we rate wines ourselves. The one we like was developed by the University of California Davis, the hot-bed of viticultural study and research. It’s been around for a long time: it was established in 1959 to give the university a way to rate the large number of experimental wines produced there.

The simple and straightforward U.C. Davis system allows you to rate the wine based on 10 basic characteristics: appearance, colour, aroma and bouquet, volatile acidity, total acidity, sweetness/sugar, body, flavour, astringency and general quality. A rating of 17 to 20 indicates a wine of outstanding characteristics having no defects; 13 to 16 indicates a standard wine with neither outstanding character or defect; nine to 12 indicates a wine of commercial acceptability with noticeable defects, five to eight indicates a wine below commercial acceptability, and one to five would mean a completely spoiled wine.

Putting our standby wine to the U.C. Davis test gives us a score of 16—right at the top of “a standard wine with neither outstanding character or defect,” which sounds just about right.

There are other rating systems out there as well, all of which can help you choose a good bottle of wine—especially if you put them to the test and find the ones where the assigned ratings match up to your personal taste.

Ultimately, though, all you really need is a two-point system: either you will buy the wine again, or you won’t.

When it comes to the Wyndham Shiraz Bin 555, that one’s easy: yes, we will!

Our readers recommend…

Neil McClughan

Pirramimma Petit Verdot

A favourite wine? What if I don’t have one? Life is too short to limit your wine experience to a handful of wines. For reds, I tend to gravitate to bigger, bolder wines, especially those that are unique in some way or from smaller boutique producers. One example is Pirramimma from the McLaren Vale region of Australia, made from 100-percent Petit Verdot. Petit Verdot is one of the five Bordeaux classic red grapes, though it is seldom used in Bordeaux anymore since it is extremely late-ripening and often subject to frost. However, in Australia it thrives. The Pirramimma Petit Verdot is a huge wine and can be quite overpowering when opened. Give it a few minutes in the glass to breathe, and it will change immensely. It’s great with stronger cheeses or with rich-flavoured braised meats.

Ellen McClughan

Prosecco Di Conegliano

I was introduced to Prosecco 18 years ago and loved it! It is great to see North America picking up on the European trend of this refreshing light sparkling (frizzante) wine with biscuit-like notes. As sparkling wines go, Italian Proseccos range from very dry to slightly sweet, usually with small persistent bubbles. The cheaper ones can be a bit harsher. It is a great aperitif and is wonderful for any occasion, with any food. Prosecco is also great for making Bellini cocktails.  The name is derived from the Veneto-region Italian village where the grape is believed to have originated. One great example available at SLGA stores is Prosecco Di Conegliano by Canella. A regular staple in our cellar as is Villa di Maser Prosecco, available through the Saskatchewan Opimian Wine Society.

Ellen and Neil McClughan (Level 2 Certificate from the International Sommelier Guild) are past Opimian Society representatives for South Saskatchewan. Ellen is a Systems Administrator and Neil is a co-owner of Tice Consulting Inc., a Business and Strategic IT Management Consulting firm. They love gourmet food, meeting fellow wine lovers, and practicing wine sampling as often as possible.

Sharon Scott

Divinus 2005

Aglianico del Vulture DOC

Recently, my partner Brad chose Divinus for me for a blind tasting at home—what a choice! I was intrigued by the lush, deep garnet colour and aromas of chocolate, leather and tobacco. Smooth and dense, the taste was equally intriguing, with flavours of dark fruit, sour cherry, cocoa, vanilla and spice. I was almost certain this was a blend. But in fact, Divinus is a varietal, produced from Italian aglianico (ah-LEE-AH-nee-koe) grapes. I enjoyed it on its own, but I wouldn’t hesitate to serve Divinus with red-meat dishes, cheeses and more. You can find this divine wine at Saskatoon’s new private wine shop, Cava Wines & Spirits (at River Landing near the Farmer’s Market).

Sharon is an enthusiast and student of wine and a communications professional at the University of Saskatchewan.

***

Paul Hill says he’s most known in Regina for three things: his blue 1976 Mercury Marquis, his habit of consuming eight Diet Cokes a day, and his addiction to non-fat frozen yogurt.

Of course, that list leaves out one other minor thing of note: Paul is president and CEO of The Hill Companies and Harvard Developments Inc., companies intimately intertwined with the history of Regina, owning and/or managing more than two million square feet in Regina and five million square feet in Western Canada.

The Hill Companies were born in 1903 as McCallum Hill & Company, formed by Walter H.A. Hill (Paul’s grandfather) and a partner. Walter Hill later sold the land on which the Saskatchewan Legislative Building now stands to the provincial government, and went on to develop the Lakeview residential area. Paul’s father, the late Frederick W. Hill, after completing an MBA at the Harvard Business School, joined the company to work with his father in 1947.

Born in the U.S.A.

Although he’s definitely a Regina boy, growing up in the city and attending Campion College, Paul was born in Cambridge, Mass.

“My father was in the Canadian Air Force,” he explains. “He was discharged because he had a rheumatic fever history, and decided to get an MBA at Harvard.

“During his first term, Pearl Harbor was bombed, and the Americans were ramping up their armed services. He went over to the recruiter and said he wanted to get inducted. So when everyone else was trying to get deferments, he ended up in the U.S. Army Air Force.”

Fred flew as a captain of B-17 and B-24 bombers and received the Distinguished Flying Cross with three oak-leaf clusters. During training exercises, he met Paul’s mother in Washington, D.C. while she was working at the British Embassy. They fell in love right away and after five dates got married.

Fred went on to serve in the U.S. Army Air Force overseas, and was discharged in 1945. He returned to Harvard University, and Paul was born in October of 1945.

The family returned to Regina in 1947, but Paul went back to the U.S. for university, thanks to one of his father’s war-time connections: his co-pilot, Paul’s godfather, was from Washington. “He was a Georgetown guy, and so I ended up going to Georgetown University.”

Paul says he was interested in business from a very early age. (Although he admits that one time in Grade 1 or 2 he expressed an interest in being a fireman).

“My father would always bring his associates back to the house at the end of the day,” he recalls. “I would always have a high level of curiosity, and sit and listen to their conversations.”

When Paul met Carol

Young Paul was interested in more than just business, of course. He was also interested in girls. He met his future wife, Carol Erb, daughter of former provincial cabinet minister Walter Erb, when he was actually dating her best friend.

“I took her best friend home and Carol was there, and that’s how we met,” he recalls.

Paul was at Campion College and Carol was in Grade 12 at Sacred Heart at the time, but their paths hadn’t crossed because until that year she and her best friend had been attending Luther College.

“We got married the same year, December 28, 1963,” Paul says. He already knew he was going to Georgetown University, and “we decided that since I was going away the next four years that we wanted to commit to each other for the rest of our life, and we wouldn’t be able to do that if we lived apart for the next four years.”

Carol joined Paul at Georgetown, and also studied there. From Georgetown they moved to London, Ont., where Paul attended the Richard Ivey School of Business, “the Harvard of Canada,” obtaining his MBA.

Like Harvard, the Ivey School of Business teaches business via “case method,” Paul explains.

“It’s a program that involves hundreds of cases that are written about real-life circumstances in various companies and business,” he says. “The cases are focused on various aspects of the business decision-making process. The goal is to learn how to make a better decisions through a disciplined thought process.

“You can’t study for it. It’s a very intense program that goes right up until the last day of class. The next day you go into two sets of four-hour exams. There’s nothing you could ever study for. It was all learning how to make decisions, recognize opportunities, and anticipate problems, learning how to solve them before they occur.”

From school, Paul went into the investment banking business in Toronto with the predecessor of what is now Nesbitt Burns, working as an analyst. From Toronto he went to Winnipeg, where he managed the company’s retail and institutional operation.

Back in Regina

Then, in 1976, he returned home to work with his father. (That was when he bought the Mercury Marquis.) In 1978 he was appointed president of The Hill Companies, the position he’s held ever since.

Paul believes he put his stamp on the companies early, not through any grand strategic planning, but simply by being “entrepreneurial and opportunistic.” One of the first things he oversaw was the acquisition of the local CTV television station, followed by the growth of Harvard Broadcasting Inc. radio stations 620 CKRM and Lite 92 FM and 104.9 The WOLF. “We are a strong regional radio broadcaster today,” Paul notes, the company having extended its media holdings to Yorkton, Saskatoon, Calgary, Red Deer, Edmonton and Fort McMurray.

“The second thing that happened was putting together a team of experienced real estate professionals to fulfill the redevelopment plan for downtown Regina,” Paul continues. “This included the demolition of the old McCallum-Hill building, built by my grandfather in 1912. It was replaced with the Hill Centre Towers I & II.”

(An interesting side note: the Hill Centre Towers I & II were designed by the Chicago architectural firm Skidmore Owings and Merrill, which was just in the news again as the architects of the world’s new tallest building, the Burj Dubai. “You can go to any international city in the world, and you will find a Skidmore Owings building which will stand out as unique to that total environment,” Paul notes. “We went to Skidmore to give us a unique design that will only be in Regina and nowhere else in the world. That’s the difference they make. Our design will never be duplicated. It’s served the city well, and we have that connection on the world stage.”)

The company followed that up with several more distinctive downtown buildings, including the Bank of Montreal Building, the Crown Life (now Canada Life) Building, and the FCC Tower/Agriculture Place Building, and spearheaded the linkage of all those buildings via climate-controlled pedestrian walkways.

The Hill Companies started out focused on real estate and insurance, and that’s still the core business, Paul says. “Today, that includes Harvard Western Insurance, the general insurance company, Western Surety Company, the contract-bonding company, and Harvard Developments Inc., a full service real estate company.”

Diversification into the U.S.

Another big change during Paul’s stewardship has been diversification into the United States. “We made a decision to diversify into the United States, and opportunistically had acquired the Canadian assets of Tenneco Oil of Canada Ltd., with an American partner. It’s now called Harvard Energy.

“That was a big change that was motivated by what was happening in Ottawa. In 1979 to 1981, when Pierre Elliot Trudeau was prime minister, it became clear that Canada might be in for some long-term problems as a result of fiscal irresponsibility and massive government intrusion into the economy, such as the National Energy Program. It really stemmed from my background in the investment banking industry. I was aware of the penalty Canada was going to have to pay over the next 20 years, which is exactly the same set of circumstances that is now occurring in the United States under the Obama administration.”

Another major diversification move was the acquisition, with partners, of a bankrupt company, UFR Urban Forest Recyclers Inc. of Swift Current. The company developed a manufacturing business making molded fiber products, and now has more than 40 percent of the North American egg tray market.

In 1990, The Hill Companies made national news by acquiring the controlling interest in Crown Life and moving it to Regina from Toronto. “That brought 1,200 jobs to Regina and expanded the GDP of the province by two percent and of the city by 10 percent,” Paul notes. “I became Chairman and it prospered for a number of years. It’s now owned by Canada Life and remains a significant presence in the City.”

“Our western Canadian real estate company continues to grow,” he adds.  “Under the leadership of our talented senior management team, we have under development a major retail urban center in Regina called ‘Grasslands’ at Harbour Landing, as well as ‘Preston Crossing,’ located on the University of Saskatchewan lands in Saskatoon, the ‘Eau Claire’ redevelopment in Calgary and ‘The Currents of Windermere‘ in Edmonton. These are major multi-year developments which include large national retailers. The projects are in the 20- to 100-acre size and range from $50 million to $800 million. This is the next 10 years of our company. It will literally change these cities.”

Green technology is another focus. “We owned a U.S. software company which developed programs for health and safety and environmental management,” Paul says. “The customer base included many Fortune 500 companies and many foreign companies operating out of Asia, the Middle East and Europe. We’re very focused on reducing the costs associated with the production of energy and eliminating, as much as possible, the excessive consumption of products that produce emissions.”

Harvard Developments is the first organization in Saskatchewan operating under private-public partnership to obtain LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Silver Accreditation, on the redeveloped Century Plaza building located in downtown Regina.

Though Regina has always been, and continues to be, home base, “Saskatchewan has had a history of not having continuous growth, which has encouraged us to diversify into other geographic areas, and also to be entrepreneurial and opportunistic with regard to other industries,” Paul says.

“My grandfather struggled and survived through the two world wars and the 1930s. The company Walter Hill founded is the only real estate business in Canada that has survived a full 100 years: it celebrated its centennial in 2003.”

Now, says Paul, “Saskatchewan is again growing. The Hill Companies have developed an excellent, experienced team with capabilities second-to-none in Saskatchewan. They are dedicated to assisting and helping to bring the province’s growth opportunities into reality.” The cities of Saskatchewan, Paul says, deserve to enjoy the finest facilities and services of any jurisdiction in the country.

Inspired by Mother Teresa

Making Regina and Saskatchewan better places to live is very important to both Paul and Carol. Paul notes that he and his wife had the opportunity to visit Mother Theresa in India with other CEOs and their spouses in the 1980s.

“She really mesmerized the group we were with,” Paul remembers. “Many wanted to help her initiatives around the world. But her response to us was, ‘Go back to your own community, identify the needs, and give both of yourself and your resources to help those people.’”

Paul and Carol have always been interested in helping students become leaders in society. They support Athol Murray College of Notre Dame in Wilcox, attended by students from all over Western Canada and other parts of the world.

A major new initiative emanating from Mother Teresa’s message is now at the feasibility stage, as Paul works to establish a Nativity Miguel School in Regina.

“What this network of schools in the United States have done is entered into the inner cities, taken kids from Grade 6, 7 and 8, from diversified backgrounds, and developed their educational and motivational skills to the point where they have been able to change a 90-percent drop-out rate for these students in high school to a 90-percent pass rate.

“The school takes 15 to 20 kids per class at a time, and works with them for extended hours and days for three years, giving them the foundation for success in high school and beyond. We’ve been working on it for two years. We hope to be up and running next year.”

Alongside that initiative, the Hills have set up a foundation called “One Life Makes a Difference” to select one student at a time to be given an opportunity to get out of the environment they are in and attend a school such as Notre Dame to obtain a complete educational experience that can take them on to university.

Other education initiatives have included the evolution of the University of Regina’s Faculty of Business Administration into the Paul J. Hill School of Business. The business school has always been reputable, Paul says, but “there was an opportunity to take it to the next level in terms of quality and recognition.”

The Paul J. Hill School of Business is now partnered with the Richard Ivey School of Business, where Paul received his MBA, “recognized as one of the top schools in the world.” The school is implementing the full case-method program used at Ivey and Harvard, and also includes a student exchange program and Ph.D. development. As well, business cases from Western Canada are now being written and distributed on a worldwide basis under the Hill-Ivey brand name. The program includes a specific emphasis on business ethics.

Paul and Carol have also helped initiate a Catholic studies program at Campion College.

Five children

Their own children have all attended Jesuit-run universities in the United States. “We wanted them to experience American culture, and to go to schools that require a minimum amount of philosophy and theology,” Paul says.

Eldest daughter Rosanne Hill Blaisdell, who like her father obtained an MBA, is working with Harvard Developments and is responsible for the company’s office portfolio in Regina and in Calgary.

Their second daughter, Shannon, got a law degree and now at age 42 has gone back to school, after having three children, for a medical degree.

Their only son, Matthew, married a girl from Michigan and has founded a technology-related company is Los Angeles. Their second-youngest daughter, January, is in early childhood education in Calgary, and their youngest, Kathryn, is a practicing psychologist in Calgary.

Paul and Carol continue to call Regina home, although, Paul notes, “When it gets cold, we go south. I commute back and forth and the rest is done by phone, fax and email.”

In the summer, they enjoy a cottage at the Lake of the Woods in northwestern Ontario (the Winnipeg connection) but still keep the family cottage in the Qu’Appelle Valley. “I grew up going to Katepwa Lake in the summertime and worked at a local beach and boat club,” Paul says.

They play a little bit of golf and enjoy the social amenities at the Wascana Country Club. Both keep physically active. “We were joggers,” Paul says. “Well, Carol still is. My knees have gone.”

Culturally, they enjoy shows at Globe Theatre and the Conexus Arts Centre, and going to the movies. “Mostly, we just like being with family,” Paul says.

Oh, and football. “We as a family have had a lifelong commitment to the Saskatchewan Roughriders. Carol was Miss Saskatchewan Roughrider in 1963! We’ve attended every Grey Cup since then together, along with most of our children.

“Harvard’s 620 CKRM has the broadcasting rights for the Roughrider games,” Paul continues. “I am currently honoured to be on the board of the club. Also, several employees and business associates have and continue to be actively involved in supporting the club.”

Favorite restaurants include Earl’s, the Lakeshore Steak House, Golf’s and Memories (and TCBY, of course, thanks to Paul’s addiction to frozen yogurt).

A love of travel

The Hills love Regina, but they also like to travel. They founded the Canadian Chapter of The Patrons of the Arts in the Vatican Museum, a select group dedicated to the preservation and perpetuation of the collection of art contained in the Vatican Museums. Money raised by the organization is used for restoration projects, such as the four-year restoration of the Raphael tapestry, St. Paul in Prison.

“Now we are restoring a necropolis under the Vatican parking lot that has perfectly preserved tombs going back to the period from 200 BC to 400 AD,” Paul says. “There are stories about persons, one of whom ran the chariot races for Emperor Nero. Other stories include a description of the daily lives of ordinary people of their times. It’s fascinating. Every two years we take the Canadian chapter to Rome for a full agenda at the Vatican.

“We like Hawaii, of course, everybody does,” Paul continues. “The last three or four years we’ve gone to southern Spain. We’ve learned very little Spanish, but we’ve taken in the history and culture of Spain as well as spending some time with its former president. We developed an interest in Spain and its history and culture.

“We’ve been most places in the world, but there’s one place that we’ve not been to that we will be going to this year, and that’s Russia. We’ll be in St. Petersburg and Moscow for the first time.”

Saskatchewan: A land of opportunity

The Hill Companies were created by entrepreneurs taking advantage of an opportunity that presented itself. Does Paul feel there are still opportunities in Saskatchewan?

“Absolutely,” he says. In fact, he thinks the opportunities are greater now than they have ever been in his lifetime, because at various times in Saskatchewan’s history, “it was very difficult for a company to start and survive during various points in its history,” he notes.

“The wars and the ’30s were very difficult economic times. After the war, in the 1950s, business faced the challenge of the Tommy Douglas government and the CCF manifesto, which called for the total eradication of capitalism. Many companies either left the province or were taken over by the government. One of those companies was ours, Saskatchewan Guaranty and Fidelity, the predecessor to Western Surety Company, which was managed by the predecessor to Harvard Western Insurance. In spite of this we stayed and remained committed.”

But, he says, “The negative aspects of the socialist environment have slowly been removed over time. Successive governments of the province have moved toward encouraging the private sector to grow and develop as well as encouraging the expansion and exploration of the resource sector toward its full potential. It is also becoming a more competitive jurisdiction to attract business and jobs.

“The province is moving in the right direction. The Hill Companies hope to continue contributing to the growth of this great province and at the same time focus on improving the lives of the people who live here. We will maintain our entrepreneurial philosophy, while practicing our principles and values within the context of lessons learned from the past.

“I am optimistic and have great faith in the future of The Hill Companies and our province. I believe our enterprise will continue to enjoy the success brought about by dedicated employees and partners.”

Fortunately for my sanity, Fine Homes and Fine Weddings only come out twice a year…

Fine Lifestyles Saskatoon is the sister publication to Fine Lifestyles Regina, and will be appearing quarterly (the next issue will be out in July, pretty much concurrently with the next Fine Lifestyles Regina), while Fine Weddings Regina will run twice a year.

Coming soon: Fine Homes Regina.

And eventually, I’m told, Fine Weddings Saskatoon and Fine Homes Saskatoon.

Whether I can edit all of them or not, we’ll have to wait and see.

On the cover of this one: Paul and Carol Hill. Paul Hill’s company, which is over a century old, has been an integral part of Regina’s development from the beginning, when his grandfather and an associate sold the government the land on which the Legislative Building now sits. Interestingly, I portrayed Saskatchewan’s first premiere, Walter Scott, at centennial events for the Hill Companies in both Regina and Calgary (which I remember mainly because I got to poke a little fun at Alberta with Premiere Ralph Klein sitting behind me on the dais).

Coming soon: the premiere issue of Fine Lifestyles Saskatoon. Yep, I’m editing that one, too.

***

It seems like cooking dinner these days is a high-wire balancing act. You’re expected to perfectly balance protein, veggies and carbohydrates while also serving up fresh (preferably local) ingredients, delectable tastes, and tantalizing textures.

Throw in the expectation of a perfect wine match, and the whole act may end in disaster (there’s no safety net for dinner-party hosts!).

If your personal knowledge of wine is limited to the fact that some of it is red and some of it is white, then maybe it’s time you got some expert advice.

There are lots of wine reference books, but one of our favorites is Harmony on the Plate by Shari Darling (no, really, that’s her name!). Her advice can be summed up by two basic tips, either of which can lead to an excellent food/wine match: 1) match like flavours with like (but make sure the wine’s flavor characteristics are stronger than the food’s), or 2) when in doubt, remember that opposites attract.

Sometimes, though, you don’t have the time or energy to worry about the perfect match. When we feel that way, we reach for one of our reliable standbys. If we’re in the mood for a white, that’s likely to be a Viognier. The floral aromas and fruity peach and apricot flavors marry well with almost any food, and Viogniers are much easier to find than they once were. Our go-to choice? The Clay Station Viognier from the Lodi foothills of California’s Sierra Nevada.

On the lighter end, check out Rieslings. Their crisp taste and light body make them good matches with a variety of foods, from fish to fowl to smoked pork. They can even go well with strongly flavored and scented spicy foods with lots of acid and heat.

While you can find Rieslings from Australia, the U.S. and Canada, start with wines from the country most famous for the variety, Germany.  Even if you find their wines too sweet for your taste when drunk alone, you may find they’re just the thing to match with food.

For a red, we more and more often turn to the Spanish section of the liquor store. Many Spanish wines feature a great balance of fruit and earthiness that goes well with the rich, flavorful cuts of meat we place on our plates today. You’ll find many of the vintners have already aged the wine for you, so that you can pick up a 2001 vintage right off the shelf. The Marqués de Cáceres reds, from Crianza to Reserva to Gran Reserva, are ready to go when you are.

With the festive season approaching, the need to find a great wine to match great food will grow. Surely, with all the varied flavours at the Christmas table—especially that scrumptious turkey!—a big Chardonnay or maybe one of those Rieslings we just recommended would be the way to go?

Our advice? Forget everything we just said. Holiday flavours are so complex that matching them is a terrific challenge. Many a fine bottle of wine has crashed and burned alongside our turkey or ham dinners.

But don’t give up! There is a grape that offers a way out of the holiday wine-matching dilemma: the finicky, hard-to-produce heartbreak grape known as Pinot Noir. The challenge here is finding a Pinot that tastes like it’s worth the money.

Here are two choices to consider, both fruit-forward New World-style wines: Greg Norman’s Pinot Noir from Santa Barbara, California, and the Prospect Pinot from the Okanagan. As a bonus, both will also go great with salmon if you’re planning a non-traditional Christmas dinner.

Right after Christmas, of course, comes New Year’s. Champagne, Cava, Sekt…whatever you call it, sparkling wine is a tradition well worth keeping as the old year gives way to the new. Although our recommendation is French, it’s not Champagne: it’s the Saint Odile Cremant from Alsace. Not as hard on the holiday-depleted wallet, and with many more nuances of toasty yeast and fresh lemon than its counterparts at this price point can boast.

Try it! And not just on its own: its fizzy freshness effectively counters the typically salty seasoning of New Year’s appetizers. It even goes with salt and vinegar potato chips!

You don’t have to spend a fortune to get your high-wire food-and-wine act together, at the holidays or any other time. There’s more wonderful wine available in Regina than ever before, something for every taste, every budget—and every recipe you attempt.

And with every issue of Fine Lifestyles Regina, we’ll be here to point you toward more of it.

Cheers!

Edward and Margaret Anne Willett drink wine, buy wine, taste wine, write about wine, conduct wine tastings, belong to three different wine clubs, and have more corkscrews than they can count.

Our readers recommend…

Leah McDonald

Terre Dei Volsci Velletri Rosso Riserva

A crackling fire, a good book and a glass of wine make Regina’s cold winter nights enjoyable. Terre Dei Volsci Velletri Rosso Riserva is an Italian blend of Cesanese, Sangiovese, Montepulciano and Merlot grapes. It has a rich, dark colour, with complex tastes and a good nose (more Merlot than anything else.) Good by itself, it also complements a roast, steaks, lasagne, or spaghetti with a rich red sauce. Regina’s new Willow Park Wines & Spirits will special-order it from Alberta.

Leah McDonald is a Regina schoolteacher and past president of the German Wine Society.

Charles Eisbrenner

Ex Nihilo Riesling

The Okanagan creates great wines! Two Okanagan Rieslings won gold medals at recent Riesling Du Monde competitions. The judges’ comments: “Beautiful colour, rich aromas and superb complexity, a Riesling of pleasure!” Even more of a pleasure: you can actually purchase one of these winners, the Ex Nihilo 2007 Riesling, here in Saskatchewan. This fall, I tasted the 2006 and 2007 vintages at the Ex Nihilo Winery. I preferred the 2006; the 2007 needs more time in the bottle.

Charles Eisbrenner is a Regina IT consultant, gourmet cook, and passionate oenophile.

***

Mike Sillinger holds the National Hockey League record for playing with the most teams—12 in all. He was traded nine times, another record.

All of which means that in 17 years as a professional hockey player, he moved around—a lot.

In fact, the list of teams he played for after being drafted from the Regina Pats by the Detroit Red Wings back in 1990 sounds like that old Geoff Mack song, “I’ve Been Everywhere.”

Mike could sing, “I’ve been to Detroit, Anaheim, Vancouver, Philadelphia, Tampa Bay, Florida, Ottawa, Columbus, Phoenix, St. Louis, Nashville, New York…I’ve been everywhere, man!”

When he retired in August, Mike could easily have moved back to any of those places—or, indeed, anywhere at all. It says something about both him and Regina that he and his family chose instead to come back here.

“We had a taste of living on the Atlantic Ocean, the Pacific Ocean, in the desert, the Midwest, but we never got a chance to dig our heels really good into any of those places,” says Mike’s wife, Karla, who, like Mike, was born and raised here.

“The last five years we were tossing the idea back and forth, ‘Where were we going to end up?’” But, she says, “We’d come home in the summertime and it seemed we were happiest here.

“A great place to raise a family”

“It’s a great place to grow up and a great place to raise a family,” she adds, and that’s an important consideration, since the Sillingers have three boys, Owen, 12, Lukas, nine, and Cole, six.

The boys have wanted to come back to Regina in the winter ever since the family spent Christmas here in 2004—made possible because of the NHL lockout that year. “The kids loved it,” Mike says. “They’d never seen Regina with snow. This is what they’ve asked for every year, and they have it now!”

All three boys are now enjoying their first full year at Jack MacKenzie School, and (of course) playing hockey.  “Owen plays Tier 1 Pee Wee, Lukas plays Tier 1 Atom, and Cole thinks he should play both,” Mike says with a laugh.

Mike and Karla, of course, have seen plenty of snow in Regina, having both grown up in the city’s north end.

They met while Mike was playing for the Regina Pats, recording three consecutive seasons as the Pats’ top scorer. “I was thumbing through the newspaper, and was intrigued by this hockey player,” Karla says. “We met through a mutual friend, and I said, ‘This is the guy I’m going to marry.’ That’s how it happened.”

But although she might have been thinking marriage right from the beginning, Mike wasn’t. “I thought she was a beautiful girl and we got along, but that’s not what was on my mind at age 17 or 18 years old, while I was playing with the Pats,” he says. “It wasn’t until a couple of years later, when I went and played in the Detroit organization, and we had a long-distance relationship, that I think I realized I had a good girl back in Regina. The following year we got engaged.”

They were married in 1994, and even though they only made it back to Regina during the summers for the next few years, they bought their first home in the city in 1997. They’ve had one ever since.

“We lived in a home in the summer time for 10 years in Westhill, then we bought a home in Lakeridge and owned it for two years,” Mike says. Now they’re in Windsor Park. “We thought we’d try the East End. This end of town I really enjoy.”

Injuries end career

Still, it wasn’t a foregone conclusion that they’d return to Regina at the end of Mike’s career. The way his career ended influenced things.

Mike’s final team was the New York Islanders; he played the 1,000th game of his NHL Career with the Islanders against the Tampa Bay Lighting on November 1, 2007, his family joining him on the ice for a special pre-gamer ceremony. But that season was cut short by a hip injury that required surgery in February, 2008. The following season, he had further hip problems, undergoing surgery again last February and missing the rest of the season. On August 26, he announced his retirement.

It was a “difficult way” to end his career, Mike says, and helped him make up his mind to get out of New York. “While I was having my last surgery, Karla and I decided, ‘Let’s put the house up for sale’—in the worst possible market ever.” Despite the poor market, the house sold by June, and Mike and Karla headed for Regina.

Not only would Mike have felt awkward remaining in New York after the way his career ended, they’d never felt comfortable there. “New York was a big change,” he remembers. “We’ve always enjoyed living in the Midwest. Easy going, easy living, no rush, no hustle. We always envisioned ourselves living in a Columbus or Saint Louis. It reminded us of back home.”

But instead of just moving someplace that reminded them of “back home,” they actually moved back home

“Everyone thought we were crazy,” Mike admits. “But when I have buddies come to town and take them up to my place at Pasqua Lake, they’re in awe. They never envisioned a place like that so close to Regina. They just think it is beautiful.”

“It may seem glamorous to have lived in all of those places, but we can never call any of those places home,” is how Karla puts it. “It’s a comfortable feeling when you can go to the grocery store and wave at people…You take for granted the friendliness that you’re accustomed to when you come back to small city like this.

“We’ve been in some cutthroat places, where you don’t get the please and thank you…some really stressful places,” she continues. “They’re great to be in for a bit, but we have three kids involved in hockey, we’ll be involved in minor hockey for a lot of years. You take for granted here that you don’t have to travel for half an hour or an hour and take a flight to a hockey tournament.”

Mike’s new job

That’s not to say that all the travel has ended for Mike—far from it. Almost immediately upon his retirement, he took on a new job as director of player development for the Edmonton Oilers.

“I probably travel the same amount as if I were playing the game,” he says, noting he’d just come back from Sweden. “It takes up a lot of my weekends. My job is, I’m in charge of the drafted players in the organization. They range anywhere from 18 to 22, 23 years old. A lot of college kids. I have good reads on these players, and I have to mentor them, teach them how to be an ultimate pro. I’m a player who’s been there, done that, been in all different situations.

“There’s such a variety of them,” he goes on. “My main focus is the 22 or 25 players who are going to be top prospects. There’s such a small window of opportunity for these players to make it. After I was drafted I didn’t know what I was doing, good or bad. Fortunately I had lots of great teammates.

“It’s my job to be these guys’ mentor and follow them along. Our scouting staff still watches these guys, but I want to make sure they have the opportunity to make it to the National Hockey League. If you’re drafted into the organization, you’re drafted for a reason.”

Mike didn’t expect to go straight to work after retiring. “I never planned to do anything,” he says. “I was just going to kick back. When the Oilers approached me—and I retired and I had this job all within a week—I had  people call me from the media, saying, ‘I thought you weren’t going to do anything!’

“And I wasn’t! I was going to hang out in Regina and coach my kids’ hockey and watch them grow. But when this opportunity presented itself, Karla and I both thought that if I was to pass it up and it was November and December, we’d be wondering what the Oilers wanted me to do.

“It almost seemed too good to be true. I wasn’t expecting to be hired that quick. But pretty much my interview the end of August was, ‘Now that you’re retired, I’m going to offer you a deal, and I need you in Edmonton next week!’”

“That’s what you wanted,” puts in Karla. “You didn’t want to find something, you wanted something to find you.”

Mike agrees.

“I was flattered to be contacted by the Oilers,” he says.” It’s a team I never played on, but here I am working for the Oilers, seven or eight hours down the road. It’s almost like it was meant to be.

“I figured I won’t know if I’m going to like it unless I try it,” he continues, and so far, “the Oilers have been nothing but first-class. I can work out of Regina, and still stay connected to the NHL. They’re very understanding that I have a family. They want me to do my job and do it correctly, but if my son has a tournament, they’ll say, ‘Go ahead, go with your boy to his tournament.’”

Family comes first

It’s important to Mike to be able to spend time with his boys, even if he isn’t coaching them as he thought he might be this winter. “It’s not about coaching minor hockey, it’s their lives I don’t want to miss!”

With three boys playing hockey, the family spends a lot of time at rinks. The boys are very “sports-oriented,” Mike says, not only playing hockey and lacrosse but enjoying watching Roughrider games and Regina Pats games. “Every time I have to go to a Pats game, they always says, ‘Can I come? Can I come?”

Mike and Carla both work out at Level 10 Fitness. They like to dine out at places like Crave, Rock Creek and the Roof Top. Mike mentions The Tap and the Press Box as two pubs he favours if he’s going off to watch football or hockey. The Keg and Earl’s rate a mention, too. But, says Mike, “We’re mostly home bodies.”

And that, ultimately, is why Mike and Karla Sillinger have chosen Regina over all the other places they could be living.

“We’re back here,” says Mike, “because home is home!”

Here’s the release I’ve been sending out today seeking additional writers for the magazines I edit, Fine Lifestyles Regina and the about-to-launch Fine Lifestyles Saskatoon:

***

Edward Willett, editor of Fine Lifestyles Regina, continues to seek freelance writers to work on the magazine, and is now also seeking writers for Fine Lifestyles Saskatoon, a sister publication launching this spring.

He’s looking for two kinds of writing: features (longer stories not tied to a particular advertiser) and advertorial (typically business profiles; these are part of a an advertising package purchased by a client and subject to the client’s approval).

On the feature side, he’ll be looking for or assigning lead articles for each of these sections:

• Wheels
• Style
• Dining, Entertainment and Arts
• Sports, Recreation and Leisure
• Health and Wellness
• House, Home and Property
• Business, Financial and Legal

Feature articles are typically about 1,275 words. Advertorial can vary, but typically runs either 425 words (one page) or 850 (two pages) with only a few going longer.

Rates start at 10 cents a word, but can rise with experience. The magazine also pays $25 per photo used.

For features, the magazines buy one-time print rights and non-exclusive web rights (the magazine appears in facsimile online). Although most stories will be specific to one of the two cities, those with a more general focus may run in both magazines. Advertorial is work-for-hire: the magazine buys all rights.

Past issues of Fine Lifestyles Regina can be viewed at http://www.finelifestylesregina.com/keyword/Magazine/.

***

If you’re interested, you can contact me at edward(at)edwardwillett.com.

I recommend pages 124 and 125, which is where you’ll find the new wine column my wife and I are co-writing, “The Willetts on Wine.”

I’m also going to be editing the new sister publication, Fine Lifestyles Saskatoon, launching this spring.

(As we approach the release of the next issue, I’ll post “The Willetts on Wine” and my cover-story interview with ex-NHL player Mike Sillinger on this blog, as well.)

Also included in this issue: the first ever wine column by my wife and I, called “The Willetts on Wine.” (And, yes, that is the name of our sadly inactive wine blog, but now that we’ve got this column, I’ll have to see about firing that up again on its own site.)

The magazine is being delivered this week to various locations around the city. Keep your eyes open for it! At some point, it will also show up in facsimile form at the Fine Lifestyles Regina website.