This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.
Slideshow
Top wines in the Asian press
1982 Leflaive – Chevalier-Montrachet Grand Cru
Jeannie Cho Lee MW, recommended this “mature” Chardonnay produced by Domaine Leflaive in the Côte de Beaune, Burgundy, writing in The Asian Palate.
She said: “One of the most beautifully mature white Burgundies I have come across. Filled with sweet marzipan, toasted nuts and dried roses, this intense, concentrated white is still at its peak. Long, persistent, unforgettable finish.”
2005 Jean-Francois Coche-Dury – Mersault
Another recommendation came in the form of this Chardonnay, also from Burgundy but from the Côte d’Or, region, which Cho Lee said was currently “at its peak.”
She said: “A powerful, ripe Meursault, classic Coche-Dury in style with even more opulence than usual. After an hour, the wine became even more expressive. Impressive concentration and length. Enjoy it now, the wine is at its peak.”
Price: Average £216
1934 Marques de Murrieta Castillo Ygay – Rioja Gran Reserva Especial
From Marques De Murrieta Castillo Ygay comes this Rioja gran Reserva which Cho Lee said was “dry and silky on the palate”.
She said: “Tasted blind, this wine was a mystery at first with its deep amber colour. By pure luck and deduction, concluded it was a white Rioja because the sweet, lingering coconut notes gave it away.
“Shocked to find it is an 80 year old white! Luscious texture, with honeyed and sweet dried leaves and fruits in the aroma but dry and silky on the palate. A wine that is still alive and tingles your palate.”
Price: £332
Caprice de Bastor Lamontagne 2012, Sauternes
Blogger Wai Xin, writing in The Blabber, recommended this 2012 Caprice de Bastor Sauternes. He said: “Fresh white flowers, honey and a light mineral undertone. Rich roundness with vibrant citrus-like acidity to support. A sweet wine that won’t make you sick. Very enjoyable.”
Price: £10
Chateau Haut-Gazeau 2010, Saint Emilion
Another of Xin’s recommendations was this 2010 Bordeaux blend from Saint Emilion.
He said: “Blackberries with plenty of vanilla and toasted aromas, over-illustrated its oak treatment. While overall texture was structured, it gave a linear expression that suggested it had possibly went into sleeping state.”
Price: £10
Blanc Fumé de Pouilly 2010
The Wine Times HK took a look at a series of “sublime whites form the Loire” produced by the Dagueneau family, now helmed by Benjamin and Charlotte Dagueneau, the children of Didier Dagueneau who the HK Times said created a “cult following for his Sauvignon Blanc from the Pouilly Fumé appellation in the Loire”, before he was tragically killed in a light plane accident in Cognac at the age of just 52.
Of this 2010 Sauvignon Blanc the HK Times said: “Crisp and refreshing and would make for a lovely drink-alone wine with mineral characteristics that Charlotte says are endemic of the terroir from which the wines come.”
Price: £35
Buisson Renard 2010
Another recommendation from the Dagueneau estate was this Buisson Renard which the HK Times deemed its favourite of those tasted.
It said: “The Buisson Renard 2010 (RP 90/91) which was rather more a masculine wine with more body and intensity – a wine that is certainly best served with food. This wine was served alongside the iconic Silex 2010 (RP 93/94) with a beautiful dish of crayfish on asparagus with a morel mushroom sauce.
“The wines are meant to age noted Charlotte, some of them for up to 20 years she said. This makes the appeal of the wines even greater as, for your investment (the wines don’t come cheap!) you will need patience to wait for the wines to be drunk at their best.”
Price: £50
Les Jardins de Babylone 2007
The Les Jardins de Babylone is the only wine from the Dagueneau estate not to be made in the Loire, but in the Jurancon region of South Western France.
The HK Times said: “Named after the famed (and “Wonder of the World”) Hanging Gardens of Babylon, this wine could in itself be one of the ‘wonders of the world’. Beautiful fruit sweetness with excellently balanced acidity makes this a delightful sweet wine but far from the cloying, over sweet wines often found on the sweet wine market. The wine is made from the Petit Manseng grape, a grape well suited to making sweet wines in the region and the sweetness comes from the dry winds in the region that dehydrate the grapes and intensify the sugar content – these are then harvested in early November and made into this unctuous sweet wine.”
Price: £70
Misha’s Vineyard High Note
Chee Wee Lee, tasting for Hong Kong’s Local Nose, said this Pinot Noir from Central Otago had “great texture”.
He said: “Lovely complexity on the nose. Iron and copper mineral notes with herbs and spice aromas too.Round sensation on the entry with good fruit intensity at the mid-core with a nice weight, texture and balance. Lovely. Slight warm fruit flavour on the finish.”
Ed Soon, “oenologist and basically a wine scientist”, added: “Really ripe red fruit, plums, currants and cut wood aromas on the nose. Palate adds some touches of cinnamon and Chinese preserved plums. Beautiful, soft tannins with a tasty and tangy finish.”
It looks like you're in Asia, would you like to be redirected to the Drinks Business Asia edition?