About Ben MacPhee-Sigurdson

When he wasn't bashing on a drum kit in local punk rock bands, Ben spent the mid '90s hucking cases of wine around to pay for two English degrees. Now he's a wine columnist, blogger, judge, educator and explorer.

Ben came to the wine world by chance - he knew nothing about wine when he first got a job at a local wine shop. Eighteen months later, he was running the wine education program. Over the next six years Ben absorbed all he could about wine while churning out papers for his BA and MA in English (from the Universities of Winnipeg and Manitoba, respectively).

Ben became the Winnipeg Free Press' weekly wine columnist in November 2005, and two years later joined Wine Access as a contributor, a member of their national tasting panel and a judge at the Canadian Wine Awards and International Value Wine Awards. In addition to doing wine education/consulting/etc., Ben is a copywriter at Manlab, a Winnipeg-based interactive design studio. He meekly presents his own new/bare-bones website, The Grape Nut, for your consideration.