Hurry to get your tickets to Vancouver International Wine Festival

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Tickets to all the Vancouver International Wine Festival Dinners went on sale Jan. 3 but will not last long.

All prices include taxes and tips, so what you see is what you pay for.

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These events are the first to sell-out. If you want to spend an evening with a winemaker and some fabulous wines in quality restarts, make your reservations today — details are on the Vanwinefest website.

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• Dine Out Vancouver, Year 22, Canada’s largest food and drink celebration, returns from Jan. 17 to Feb. 4 and boasts more restaurants than ever.

Diners can look forward to a tasty lineup of special menus from local chefs, unique culinary experiences and a full schedule of delicious events over the 19-day celebration.

This year, more than 380 restaurants from the North Shore to downtown Vancouver, through Richmond and beyond, are dishing up menus at fixed prices ranging from $20 to $65 per person.

The festival will also feature special ticketed dining events, including a West Coast to East Coast dining collaboration with Portage Restaurant by L’Abattoir, an art dinner series and a guided exhibition tour through the Vancouver Art Gallery. And a Chinatown Dumpling Masterclass by Historical Chinatown Tours.

Participating downtown Vancouver hotels will offer diners who book an overnight stay a $75 gift card per night (up to three nights) during Dine Out dates. Reservations open Jan. 9, and menus will appear at dineoutvancouver.com.

Value wine of the week

Gérard Bertrand An 806 Grenache — Syrah — Mourvèdre 2019, Corbières, Languedoc, France 

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$21.99 I 90/100

UPC: 35141231078

I take a “value” wine rating very seriously, so you should be assured that this weekly selection is a great tip and top value for money, no matter the price.

Bertrand’s GSM (Grenache, Syrah and Mourvedre) blend from the famed Corbières region is a regular overachiever for the price. The Corbières boasts an incredible geological diversity of schist, limestone and rolled pebbles. All grapes are hand-picked.

Carbonic maceration lasts 10 to 18 days for Syrah, and a traditional maceration with total destemming is carried out for Grenache and Mourvèdre. Post malolactic fermentation, the finished wine is blended and aged in 225-litre Bordeaux barrels for about eight months.

The palate is awash in youthful blackcurrants, plums and cherries dusted with southern France-dried spices or garrigue. The tannins are dense but fine-grained and will easily propel this wine into the next five to seven years. It’s drinkable now with tajines or grilled vegetables.

The 806 references the first traces of the Cathars who built the towering citadels that overlook the vineyard in Corbières.

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