NOMAD | The Cannabis Sommelier

The Cannabis Sommelier

I’ve never liked working for other people. I always knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur, but seeing many failed examples in my life made being an entrepreneur way scarier than the first time I smoked cannabis. I was 13, I didn’t get “high” like everyone else. I went back to my friend’s house and won a game of scrabble against his mom and her friend. I only won because of a well deployed con. Fake word, fake definition, triple word score, winner. I hope she reads this story. Cannabis was an opportunity to focus for the first time in my life. It took my spinning carousel from 100 to 50 and I was finally able to pick some of my thoughts. Cannabis also gave me the opportunity to escape my stress.

I started my first job when I was 12, never looking back. This gave me the opportunity to have bosses, gain experience, have money and fuck up. Every job I’ve had, and there’s been lots, has helped make me the person I have become, each skill a block in creating my destiny. Find something you are passionate about and something you are good at. Combine those two things and figure out how to add value to the world, and there is no stopping you. I’ve always been able to think about cannabis differently than my peers.

I knew I loved cannabis and in turn cannabis had a special relationship with me. This was my destiny. I had never considered alcohol a passion, more of a life ruining substance to be frank. I have seen firsthand the destruction alcohol creates and I really never imagined it being part of my life. And yet alcohol is what brought me here. The path that led to The Cannabis Sommelier began when I was shown a documentary titled SOMM. This eye-opening documentary was about the journey of sommeliers in an attempt to earn the title of Master Sommelier, a near impossible feat. Once I saw these dapper gentlemen sipping, swirling and telling you the exact lineage, time and place the wine came from, I knew this is what cannabis needed.

I booked a wine course in the first five minutes of that documentary for the following Friday. Wine class started with the question, “What other agricultural product has over 1500 different varietals and is specific to the region it’s grown in?” The class fell silent. I raised my hand and proclaimed “Cannabis!” to some chuckles and an odd look from the teacher. When the teacher told me after class that I was right and she would stop asking that question, I knew I was onto something.

One month later I was living on an estate vineyard on the picturesque Naramata Bench overlooking Lake Okanagan in British Columbia. It was there I started to truly understand the relationship between cannabis and wine, and how the two of these products are the exact same. I was lucky to find a job within a local company, operating on a large scale with a small team gave me the insight into how the distribution of liquor works. I became a Canadian Wine Scholar in order to better understand Canadian wine law and become an expert in Canadian wine growing regions.

As I consulted wine for restaurants, I went to school for wine, garnering the knowledge to be an expert blind taster. Relying on my senses to guide me through my limited years of knowledge of wine, I was joyfully surprised when I would guess blind tastings correctly more often than not. As my experience with wine grew, I continued to consider how to apply those skills to cannabis. I do believe we can blind taste cannabis, it will just take more practice. I started my YouTube channel The Cannabis Sommelier on January 1st of 2018. The concept of the channel is to create a more educated and concise dialogue and vocabulary around cannabis consumption and cannabis tasting. It has been an amazing year to see what the channel has evolved into. The channel now features well over 150 videos of cannabis and wine pairings, cannabis and craft beer pairings, cocktails with cannabis and my most recent adventure doing cannabis reviews with a proprietary 100 point system to grading cannabis I have developed.

Find something you are passionate about and something you are good at. Combine those two things and figure out how to add value to the world, and there is no stopping you.

I left my job to pursue The Cannabis Sommelier full-time and focus on creating content and throwing popup events across the country to teach people about cannabis and wine pairings. I have also had the opportunity to work with some of North America’s top chefs for these events. I am still working through the bumps, but have never been happier waking up everyday working for myself and doing what I love - smoking cannabis, drinking fine wine, eating great food and sharing my experiences. I’ve created the job of my dreams. All it took was a vision and patience.