Going Home... and finding better wine than when I left

You know wine must be in the forefront of consciousness when you go home to the sleepy suburbia where you grew up  to find, between the hardware store and fish and chips joint, a stylish winebar like gudrun. Or maybe home isn't the low-key burg it used to be. Or both. Anyway, we found gudrun in Steveston--a once-fishing village in Richmond, B.C.--ventured into the unlikely atmosphere and ordered a couple glasses from their largely organic/BD wine list. Claus Preisinger blend of zweigelt, blaufrankisch and st. laurent that had plenty of vibrant fruit and a touch of tomato plant (in a good, blaufrankisch-y way) and Mark Tempe pinot gris of huge concentration, making me wonder if this type of vigor could ever be realized in the Okanagan. (photos by Gillian Lindsay)