Native Grape Odyssey: From Europe To Canada with (Wine) Love

On July 10th, 2019, Toronto, Canada, will host the next press conference for the Native Grape Odyssey (NGO) project. The event has been set up to introduce the new educational program on European quality wines (the NGO Maestro Course), that will take place in September, also in Toronto. The conference and subsequent tasting will be hosted at the Grand Cru Deli, a renowned wine bar on Richmond Street, in the heart of Toronto city center. Grand Cru Deli is also the home of the Sommelier Factory, a well-known wine school in Toronto and the perfect venue to launch the NGO program. Stevie Kim, General Coordinator of NGO, will introduce the program to participants, while Bruce Wallner, Master Sommelier and Founder of the Sommelier Factory, will lead guests in the tasting portion of the afternoon.

Bruce Wallner Master Sommelier, founder of the wine school Sommelier Factory, will guide the tasting that will follow the NGO press event.

After the press event that took place on June 18th, 2019, in Moscow, Russia, the Native Grape Odyssey team are ready to embark on another journey to Canada, one of their three target countries. The press event has been organized in Toronto on July 10th, since the metropolis is one of the most multicultural cities in the world. The Sommelier Factory, the wine school connected to Grand Cru Deli, was founded by Master Sommelier Bruce Wallner with a dual purpose: on the one hand to train wine professionals for world competitions, and on the other hand to offer courses for wine lovers including also beginners.

The philosophy of Wallner’s wine school aligns with NGO’s mission. Funded by the European Union, the NGO project will open its courses to wine professionals, but also to fans of European wine production. NGO features three partner countries—Canada, Japan, and Russia—and aims at providing in-depth education on European wines and its denominations through a three-year training program consisting of the delivery of NGO Maestro Courses which will combine theory lectures with walk-around tastings.

Toronto’s press event on July 10th will be dedicated to the presentation of the project in its entirety as well as to the dissemination of information about the NGO Maestro Course scheduled in Toronto from September 15th to 19th, 2019. As a preview of the course, after the press conference Bruce Wallner will lead a tasting on “Italian Wines of the Northwest”. These Italian territories offer quality products recognized throughout the world: for instance, the Piedmont region is covered with hectares of vineyards which extend both in the hills and in the Alpine and pre-alpine areas where human labor plays a fundamental role and yields are high-quality. In addition, Piedmont also boasts iconic agricultural landscapes: as is well known, the hilly landscapes of the Langhe, Roero, and Monferrato areas have been recently recognized by UNESCO as a world heritage site. The other regions that will be considered during this tasting are Lombardy and Liguria. As in the case of Piedmont, these regions are also home to centuries-old autochthonous vines, which have always been parents of wines recognized both abroad and within their native territory.

Although several people outside Italy may know Franciacorta DOCG and Vermentino DOC, more often it is only the name of the vine that is remembered and recognized and not the denomination that goes with it. According to NGO research through interviews with Canadian, Japanese, and Russian participants to the program, these names are as meaningful as they are unknown to most, especially outside Italy. Thus, the primary aim of the project is precisely to make them comprehensible and to unmask the meaning of terminology such as DOCG, DOC, and IGT. On July 10th in Toronto, the tasting guided by Bruce Wallner will serve as the perfect introduction to the topic, giving particular importance to the territories in which the chosen wines originated: from the vines to the climate, to the surrounding soils and viticultural techniques, Wallner will show that each quality product fully reflects the regional wine tradition in which it developed.
The application for the NGO Maestro Course in Canada is available on the official website as well as additional information on forthcoming press events and courses in Japan and Russia.

About: Native Grape Odyssey is a project financed by the European Union and managed by Unione Italiana Vini and Zante Agricultural Cooperatives Union for the promotion of PDO and PGI European wines abroad, in particular in three countries: Japan, Canada and Russia. In order to achieve this, the Native Grape Odyssey educational program will organize wine seminars, workshops and b2b meetings both in these countries and in Verona, Italy, inviting wine experts and influencers from these countries. These events, realized in the span of three years (2019-21) aim at creating awareness about European native wines abroad, in particular Italian and Greek wines, which share a long tradition and a high standard of quality.