Garagiste

These Okanagan wineries are so micro you’ve probably never heard of them before.

They all have limited production of under 2,000 cases a year and have names like Bottega Wine Studio, Nagging Doubt, Black Market, Forgotten Hill, Lariana, Off the Grid, Pipe Dreams, Tall Tale, Origin and Saxon.

As such, they qualify as garagiste, a French term for a rebel or maverick small-scale winery, possibly diminutive enough to run out of a garage.

To celebrate the bitty-in-size, but big-in-quality nature of the movement in the Okanagan, the Garagiste North Wine Festival returns to Penticton Aug. 27.

From 3 p.m. to 5:30 p.m., dozens of these artisan commercial producers will pour their wines in the garden market area of the Canadian Tire store on Railway Street.

It’s a fitting locale because Canadian Tire is, after all, the biggest garage of them all.

The $49 ticket also includes a grilled-cheese sandwich or smokie tasting from the Peter Ze German food truck and live music by Luke Whittall.

Because all these wines have limited production and distribution, the festival also had the ingenious idea of an on-site pop-up store so you can buy your favourite bottles.

In 2015, the London Financial Times named Garagiste North as one of the best five wine fests in the world

Tickets at GaragisteNorth.com.