<!--Michele Deluca--><table width="234" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" background="http://static.cnhi.zope.net/flashpromo/niagaragazette/images/byline_234x60.jpg" height="60"><tr><td><div align="center"><font size="3" face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">By Michele Deluca</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><br /></font><font size="1" face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><a href="mailto:michele.deluca@niagara-gazette.com">michele.deluca@niagara-gazette.com</a></font></div></td></tr></table>
John Hailey was a banker until he hit his mid-thirties. Then he took a job cleaning wine barrels.
It was dirty work, but he will swear it was worth every swipe.
“There are very few people
who have the passion I have for wine and it goes back to those early romantic days living in wine country,” said Hailey, a Lewiston resident who has taken his passion for wines and turned it into a club of sorts for Niagara County wine enthusiasts.
Back in those Northern California days, Hailey worked his way up from the cellar to eventually become a tasting room manager. He later became a sommelier and these days, after moving back to Lewiston, is one of only a handful of people with such distinguished wine credentials in the region.
In October Hailey co-founded The Lockport Wine Society with Lockport Restaurateur Peter Calieri, owner of the Village Eatery and Davison Road Banquet House in Lockport.
The men are interested in sharing their excitement about the increasing number of affordable good wines being made throughout the world.
“I love to see a person have that epiphany moment.” said Hailey. “They say, ‘You know I don’t like that type of wine.’ Then they’ll take a taste and you’ll see a smile creep across their face and they’ll say, ‘I never knew.’”
At a recent wine tasting the society held at the Davison Road Banquet House, tasters had the opportunity to examine 12 red wines from around the world. Hailey, who is a wine distributor, selected wines he jokingly called “big, deep, extracted red wines, that are lip smacking and teeth staining.”
Calieri said his biggest surprise at the tasting was a Cabernet from Bulgaria.
“You wouldn’t in your wildest dreams imagine a wine from Bulgaria, but it was absolutely delicious,” he said.
Another surprise, Calieri noted, was the wine that ended the evening — a sparkling red wine. The wine, called Bleasdale Sparkling Shiraz was from the Bleasdale Winery in Australia. “I’d never had a sparkling red wine,” Calieri said. “It was delicious.”
The wine society events typically feature a number of wines at affordable prices, with a brief tutorial about each, and then the tastings. There are “small bites,” at each event, and in January the society hopes to hold its first wine tasting dinner with special wines selected for each course.
For more information visit the Lockport Wine Society website at lockportwinesociety.com. or call the Village Eatery in Lockport at 433-0688.
