Hokkaido Winery

I found out that this winery was exhibiting at this year's Wind Fair, so I made a note to pay them a visit there. My first encounter with their wines was this botrytised Kerner,which I don't seem to have blogged about yet! I bought that bottle some 10 years ago, and still am waiting for an occasion to taste it.

They had a whole range of wines on show. I started off with a dry Kerner, and moved through a Gewurztraminer to a Zweigelt. Then I moved to varieties more popular in Japanese wine-making, such as Niagara ending with a rose wine made from Campbell Early. An interesting winery overall.

Doing a Vin Santo del Chianti tasting at the Chianti Pavilion

It was one of those serendipitous opportunities which one can take when it presents itself. Quite a few of the exhibitors at the Chianti Pavilion at this year's Wine Fair presented their Vin Santo and so I was able to get a tasting together of this interesting sweet wine.

Of the six wines tasted, the oldest was from 1997 and the youngest from 2010, with the rest (the largest "cohort") being from 2007. They varied in sweetness from moderately sweet to nearly cloyingly so, and surprisingly the least as well as the most sweet wines tasted were from the 2007 vintage. Little can be said comparing the 2010 and the 1997 wines. What is however evident is that the different estates produced very different wines and perhaps it is best to explore these separately later on in different entries.

Albarin Blanco

I was passing by this booth displaying different wines made from Prieto Picudo, when I remarked that I had tasted all of the grapes they use to make wines. It turned out not to be true, as Albarin (Blanco) is not the same as Albarino. This rare grape from a small area of Spain (there are apparently only 35 acres of this grape on earth, of which this estate has already 11) is easily confused with Albarino, which may be related but are certainly distinct from each other. Albarin comes from Leon and Asturias, and it is lower in acidity than Albarino and tends towards tropical fruit flavours. As for this wine, it was a pale lemon with an aromatic fruity nose. The palate was off dry and slightly fruity, with a slightly bitter (grape pips astringency) acid backbone.

HKIWSF 2014

Just got back from a short afternoon visit to the Wine Fair today. I had not been preparing much for this year's fair, as I had to leave for Mexico on the last day (Saturday, Public Day), and also had to prepare for the Conference which is the reason I am hurrying off to Mexico. My wife spent some time at the Chinese Spirits booths and tried out some really special (and expensive) spirits. My eyes were opened too, but I must say, I really am not a spirits person. I was surprised to find the muscadine growers from North Carolina back after an absence of a few years. Equally surprising was the fact that muscadine was a family, not one variety of grape. I learnt a little more about those grapes today.

Ch Chasse Spleen 2005

Having blogged about Chateau Chasse Spleen finally, I realized that I  still had not commented on how I found their wines on this blog. Unfortunately, I have not been able to locate the notes for the 2003 CBE tasting for now and so cannot comment on that vintage.

The 2005 Chasse Spleen was a nice deep purple ruby, with a sweet berry nose spiced with a good smattering of wood. The palate was sweet fruity tannic as well as woody. All this was nicely held together with an acid backbone seasoned with a smidgeon of tannins. All very nice and well matched to the Beef Wellington served that evening, except for an odd bottle of two with cork taint (one of which found its way into my wife's glass, unfortunately).

Champagne Zoemie de Souza's Brut Precieuse

This was a generous gift from a friend. A non-vintage Grand Cru champagne, the back label was most illuminating. It was pure Grand Cru Chardonnay (and hence a blanc de blanc). I had previously blogged about the Echelles des Cru de Champagne in the blog entry about a red Coteaux Champenois and so will not repeat what I have already written. There are 17 Grand Cru villages in all; the back label helpfully states that the fruit for this cuvee comes from the villages of Avize, Oger and Cramant, the last of which I had also previously blogged. I also noticed a date of disgorgement: 21st July 2009.

Looking up the Champagne de Souza Website, it states that apart from the villages noted above, le Mesnil sue Oger and Chouilly als provide fruit fro the above wine.

Wine for Hairy Crab

The Shanghai Hairy Crab season is here, and a group of friends got together with us over the weekend to have a tiny feast on the seasonal delicacy. Traditionally various types of  Chinese "yellow wine" (not vin jaune from the Jura, but Chinese rice wine) are drunk with these crabs, but I had got a bottle of Chablis for some seafood we were going to have for the meal, nothing special, just village level Chablis.

Well the restaurant got a little bit muddled over the dishes, with the result that I had needed to open nearly all the bottles whilst we were finishing off the crabs (which we were having first). Although the rice wine was nice and traditional with the crabs, Chablis was a better match with them (well their meat anyway), and better than with the other seafood, which tended to be sweeter in the flesh than the crabs. As for roe, we had a little try of anejo tequila, but I still go for Cognac XO for the really hard crab roe (the roe that is like the yolk of a hard boiled egg).