Cava owner Chris MacDonald
Could it have been any hotter this week?
The plus-40 humidex was a bit ill-timed, invited as I was to to two very fine parties this week, the first, a sherry-tasting event at Cava in downtown Toronto at Yonge and St. Clair, and a Toronto Life magazine party, held in celebration of its redesign. At the first, on Tuesday at Cava, I was pretty sure I had never been hotter indoors in my life – the sweat was literally rolling off me as I was politely introduced to Toronto gossip king Shinan Govani. Sadly, that proved to be just a warm up to the Toronto Life party, where not only was I trying to discreetly keep my sopping-wet hair off my neck while fanning out over the CBC’s Matt Galloway, I later got sprayed in oily cream sauce by a clumsy waitress.
However, despite the heat, it was a good week of wine learning. At the Cava event, arranged by owner Chris McDonald and Siren Group owner and founder Susan Willemsen, I found out that sherry is not a type of wine, as I had previously thought, but a region from whence it’s grown. And I also found out that sweeter sherry is not so bad – maybe it’ll be the next big thing to drink. The sherry was much aided by a truly delectable appetizer: cured-meat stuffed, deep fried olives.
Jason Collett performs at the Toronto Life party
And at the Toronto Life party, I had the pleasure of conversing with Toronto Life wine writer David Lawrason. A wine writer for over 25 years, Lawrason has seen wine go from obscurity in the 70s to its haute hipness today. If you’re a writer and ever wondering what “beat” to pick, consider this: Lawrason informed me that due to his in-demand status as a wine expert, he has to taste 900 wines in the next three months. Yep, 900. Right now, he’s tasting up to 60 wines a day. Crazy!
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