A Wine Expert Shares Her Pick of the Year
'wine whisperer' Eveline Chartier gives us the goods on how to source great vintages - and what she'd choose to take on a desert island
“Growing up in a French-Canadian household, wine was always a topic of conversation”.
If, like me, you’ve been obsessed lately with the show Drops of God, you’ll love this week’s guest (Drops of God is the ‘Jamesina Bond’ version of being a sommelier, and a must-see if you haven’t caught it yet). If you haven’t seen the show and like great wine, you’ll also love this week’s guest.
All to say, everyone reading will love what comes next!
Eveline Chartier doesn’t need a Hollywood spin to be impressive in her own right. Eveline turned a passion for fine wine into a second act as a certified wine specialist. Her WSET Diploma in Wine makes her 1 of 13,000 people with the certification globally.
After a successful run in the professional world as an engineer, Eveline began her Substack,
, and works as a self-described ‘wine whisperer’ at her wine consulting business of the same name. To round out this busy schedule, she also consults at Cork, a wine specialty store in the heart of downtown Calgary.Eveline’s weekly newsletter posts are accessible and chatty, a bit like having a favourite friend give you the goods on all the latest grapes.
For a subject some can find intimidating, I can attest that her newsletter is a breath of fresh air.
Over to Eveline to tell us more….
For starters, Heather, I want to thank you for this opportunity to collaborate! I love how Substack has this wonderful community of writers. It is an unexpected pleasure and I appreciate the support that we give each other – including you!
In a nutshell, what do you do and how did you get there?
Through Shades of Grape Wine Company, I am kicking off my second career, this time, as a wine consultant.
Shades of Grape is a two-fold operation. First, there’s my Substack newsletter, where I’m sharing my wine knowledge and passion through storytelling.
“The idea is to drop the snobbery and intimidation factor and establish a language that helps people drink better wine”.
Second is the wine consultancy arm of Shades of Grape. The key is understanding my customer’s palate.
I joke that I am a wine-whisperer, a “gift” allowing me to identify wines my customers love. As a wine consultant, I work for individuals or companies / groups (i.e. Cork Fine Wine, restaurants, special events, clubs etc.) by conducting wine tastings, curating wines, and offering training sessions.
Working at Cork I tell my customers: “The wine world allows us to travel the world except a little piece of the world actually comes to us!”
I was trained as an engineer in the energy sector in the mid 90’s and moved to Alberta from Manitoba.
The energy sector took a hit at the beginning of the pandemic, and my last contract ended early. By then we had left our home in Calgary, and we were working remotely from our vacation condo in the Okanagan Valley, B.C., a Canadian wine region. By late May 2020, I got a job at a winery tasting room to prevent myself from going crazy and to test out the possibility of a new career in wine.
At this stage I had my Level 3 from the Wine Spirits Education Trust (WSET). When I lost my job, I immediately started flirting with the idea of taking the Diploma (Level 4) which is a huge commitment. On average people take 2 to 2.5 years to complete the program, typically while working in the trade.
I landed on a wine school in Austria called Weinakademie Österreich that offered a program that was significantly more immersive than most schools. The school specialized exclusively in wine certification training, including the esteemed Master of Wine (MW) program that only has about 415 graduates worldwide.
During the first two classroom sessions, they took us to different regions of Austria to visit wineries, vineyards, and attend many many wine tastings. The last session was in Tuscany. In addition to class time, we visited Bolgheri – a sub region closer to the Mediterranean, as well as Chianti closer to Florence, and attended VinItaly Wine Show in Verona.
One highlight was visiting Palazzo Antinori and meeting Marchese Piero Antinori himself. The Antinori family is a noble Italian family who has been making wine for over six centuries or 26 generations. The marchese is the current Honorary President of the company while his daughter Albiera is President with the close support of her sisters Allegra and Alessia. They have many wineries and make a full range of wines to be accessible to all pocketbooks.
The whole experience was intense, exciting, nerve racking and thrilling all at the same time. I wrote the last set of exams in May 2023 and found out I passed in August. This makes me one of fewer than 13,000 people worldwide to have the Diploma WSET. One level below Master of Wine.
What’s been your best find this year?
For me “best find” implies a very high quality-per-dollar ratio.
In other words, a very good value. I say this because one could take out a second mortgage on their home and get great wines … but I would not call that a great find. Anyone can find amazing super premium priced wine – you don’t need me for that!
Maybe this is recency bias but the Mas Martinet Menut La Tribu wine which I wrote about in early January really gets me excited! I brought it to a dinner party last weekend. It was paired with Boeuf Bourguignon - it was such a hit!
Its quality hits way above its price point for about $30-35 Cdn.
Can you tell us a little bit about natural wines?
Natural wine is not a legally defined term and has many different interpretations. I define natural wines as low intervention wines (the term I will use from now on). Low intervention winemakers do not use any modern winemaking interventions to control temperature, prevent spoilage, ensure an efficient fermentation, or remove of unsightly sediment.
I personally do not like these wines. I find they are too thin (very light in body) and that they have muddled flavors (they lack “clean” precise flavors.) To provide a higher quality wine assessment, I look for clear and well-defined aromas and flavors.
I also don’t like how the term natural was highjacked, misleading the consumer. Is baking and controlling the temperature of my oven in my kitchen “not natural” or using soap to ensure proper cleanliness and avoid bacterial infections “not natural”, not to mention refrigeration?
Another intervention is sulfites which has many functions but also act as a preservative to prevent micro bacterial contamination. Sulfite is produced naturally during the winemaking process; therefore, no wine can be sulfite-free.
In the past, many winemakers were less “discriminant” about the amount of sulfites added to control fermentation, prevent micro-bacterial spoilage or fermentation from starting again. This was not a positive thing. Nowadays, good quality wines have minimal sulfites.
The low intervention wine movement, in my opinion, has also highjacked orange wines; even though these wines can be any color: white, orange, rosé or red. Rosé and white wines have no or minimal grape skin contact with the juice. Orange wines are made with white grapes but use red wine production techniques. In other words, they allow the white grape skins to be in contact with the juice for longer than for white winemaking. Skin contact gives the wine its orange color.
When people come to Cork asking for orange wine, I ask if they want an orange wine or a natural wine that is orange. Most often they do not know and want to hear my spiel. Afterwards, they usually buy a really nice orange wine that is not natural.
Most low intervention wines are made organically, but not all organic wines are low intervention wines.
Organic wine production practices involve processes in the vineyard and the winery. These organic practices’ rules differ significantly depending on the country in which the wine was produced.
In the USA for example, for a wine to be organic, they cannot add any sulfites at any point. This eliminates most American wines from being certified organic, regardless of if they practiced very strict organic practices in the vineyard! This is one of the most extreme examples.
In many countries it is also very expensive and administratively onerous to get and maintain certification.
Many producers will work organically but not get the official certification. Many growers are motivated to practice organic viticulture as vines grown organically appear to be more resistant to extreme weather, pests, viruses, and bacteria and most importantly producing higher quality fruit.
Do you have a secret life hack?
Always add wine to your soups, sauces, and stews and to deglaze pans! I just keep all my leftover wines in the fridge. It adds a nice complexity!
Where is your happy place?
In nature. Whether it be mountains, ocean, desert, or forest, ideally without a cell phone, although I really miss my daily Wordle!
I know that when I have a weekend away without my mobile, I feel much calmer and more focused.
My happy-happy place also includes some kind of sporting equipment – mountain bike, kayak, hiking boots, snowshoe, or skis.
My happy-happy-happy place includes our camper van that can carry a lot of wine! 😊
What’s one wine you’d choose to take on a desert island?
Such a difficult question! Can I bring a mixed half case, maybe – to pair with the different courses?
Then it would be Champagne (for happy hour – to have with plain chips), and Riesling (to go with the spicy Thai during pre-dinner drinks), a Burgundy (which is made with Pinot Noir for the appetizers) and a Priorat (red Spanish for the next course), a Bordeaux red (for the main course). OH! and Sauternes (for dessert pairing!). There!
Thanks for the great interview Eveline!
A camper van with a lot of wines sounds like my happy place too! Only a motor boat with a lot of wines tops that 🤣 and thank you for sharing your journey! Your personable, candid but loving take on wine has been such a breath of fresh air 🥰