(Illustration: Jack Dylan)
Pinot noir is my desert island wine. It’s light and refreshing, and it pairs with just about any food. I adore it. For centuries, Burgundy, with its cool climate and limestone-rich soils, was one of the few places on the planet that could coax great wine from the famously precious, thin-skinned grape. As a result, pinot prices were inflated—one of the world’s most expensive reds is Burgundy’s Domaine Romanee-Conti pinot, which sells for $11,000. In the 1970s, under the disapproving gaze of the French, winemakers started planting pinot in Oregon, New Zealand, California and Ontario. The resulting wines were often exciting, though still expensive. Then 2004’s sleeper hit Sideways chronicled a pinot-swilling novelist’s road trip through California wine country and propelled the wine into the limelight. The heartbreak grape, as it’s known to vintners due to its finnicky nature, is now grown all over the globe and is much more affordable. While some may lament the popularization of the once-elite grape, I’m thrilled it’s more widely available. Here, nine bottles under $25 from Ontario, Australia and everywhere in between.
The upper house of Parliament, apparently finished snuffing out 
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