{"id":601393,"date":"2026-04-13T15:06:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-13T15:06:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/601393\/"},"modified":"2026-04-13T15:06:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T15:06:09","slug":"at-26-she-became-canadas-first-south-asian-female-head-winemaker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/601393\/","title":{"rendered":"At 26, she became Canada\u2019s first South Asian female head winemaker"},"content":{"rendered":"

Before becoming Canada\u2019s first (and potentially only!) South Asian female head winemaker at age 26, Manpreet Dhaliwal was studying nursing at Okanagan College. She was managing the tasting room at her family\u2019s business, Kismet Estate Winery<\/a>, during her summers, but was more focused on her medical career and her side hustle making custom cakes.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But in 2022<\/a>, an unusually heavy harvest meant Dhaliwal\u2019s uncle, then Kismet\u2019s winemaker, needed all hands on deck, landing her in the cellar learning everything from the ground up. She fell in love with winemaking and went on to complete her WSET Level 3 award in wines. When her uncle stepped back in 2023<\/a>, Dhaliwal was ready to take over.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Now at 28, she\u2019s bringing more than representation to the male-dominated industry<\/a>. In her first few years as head winemaker, she\u2019s seen major success. Beyond producing award-winning wines, Kismet has grown its wine club by 35 percent under Dhaliwal\u2019s leadership. \u201cThe recognition I received very early on helped knock off some of the imposter syndrome,\u201d she says. \u201cIt helped validate that this isn\u2019t a space for just men.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Kismet Estate Winery, a family-owned and operated winery in Oliver, blends Punjabi heritage with Okanagan terroir. The winery plans to expand the wine club and direct-to-consumer channels by 50 percent in the coming years, while continuing to push new vintages\u2014like their first sparkling wine, Sitara, among others. Dhaliwal hopes to see Kismet become a household name with a reputation for commitment to excellence and diversity.<\/p>\n

On breaking barriers<\/p>\n

\u201cYou will be challenged at first. You will be questioned. But you do deserve it and can do it. No one\u2019s going to invite you to the table. It\u2019s there for you to go and take that seat.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

See the full list of our 2026 30 Under 30 winners here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\"Hanna<\/p>\n

Hanna McLean is a Vancouver-based journalist and editor with over a decade of experience in food and lifestyle journalism, digital publishing and editorial strategy. Formerly Editor-in-Chief of Dished, she’s as comfortable behind a byline as she is at a bar, and probably already has a reservation somewhere worth writing about.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Before becoming Canada\u2019s first (and potentially only!) South Asian female head winemaker at age 26, Manpreet Dhaliwal was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":601394,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[49,48,44],"class_list":{"0":"post-601393","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-canada","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=601393"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601393\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/601394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=601393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=601393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=601393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}