And the Tastings Roll On

After Tuesday's Port evening, the tastings continued....

First in the office with a 1er Cru from Vosne Romanee from Sylvain Cathard.  I didn't get a chance to try to the Gevrey  before it was gone, but the Vosne was just wonderful.  My bosses are super into Burgundy.  I never drank much (good) before as it's a bit price inhibitive.  I don't generally (ever) shell out $1,000 for a wine, so when my bosses pop one, I jump.  We all jump!

And we had this; Bernard Van Berg's de-classified Burgundy.  This was super strange and I would have in no way ever guessed it to be from Burgundy (Meursault, which is a white wine appellation and this was a Pinot, hence the de-classification.)  My note for it said 'plastic-y, meaty, fruity' but in all of the very best pf ways.  Jay told me that this producer is very avant garde; super tiny production and very original winemaking techniques.  Well, done Bruno, I'm a fan.

And then I left for Restaurant and Bar.  I've not been to an expo (outside of China) as a visitor, well, ever.  I've always worked them, and wow is it so much more fun to go NOT work one.  I met with Simone and Julia and we walked around catching up with wine friends, F&B friends, and of course, trying wine. 

This was super heavy on the acid- would have been great with shellfish or sushi

I had met this winemaker, Paul from Australia, a few months back when he introduced his new wine 1,000 candles.  He brought it back this go round, with some of his other more 'commercial' wines, and let us all have a try.  Again, just a really interesting wine.  He said it really polarized people, but I'm of the 'love it give me more' camp.

Some Champagne?  Why, yes please.

Jon and Julia enjoy some chips and beers

This guy had some wonderful Chard and Cabs from Oz

 

My new favourite Japanese brew master.  Wonderful Kagua beer!

I had perhaps just enough to drink between wine tastings and beer, but deemed it necessary to go meet Allison and Courtney for some "Drinks for Good."  I don't know who organized, or where the money was going, but 40 bars around HK participated, and I suppose for every drink bought a portion of the $$ goes to charity.  Nice little bonus because we had been planning on catching up anyway.  Allison is off to the US for 3 weeks and the only way to prepare is with two bottles of wine....

And Thursday I had a bit of a headache.  The girls made me stay out til midnight.  On a school night! So I had sushi for lunch.  Pretty, no?

 

A little hair of the dog later, Jay and Mandy popped open our newest line of wines.  We only have a few brands that we distribute exclusively (Van Berg and Matchbox being two), and the rest of our wines are bought on the secondary market.  These Matchbox wines are from an artisanal producer in the Clare Valley, Australia.  There's a Riesling, Malbec, and Syrah.  They're all really fruit forward and quite simple, great for summer on the porch!  The Riesling went particularly well with my salmon salad on Saturday afternoon. 

Cool label

After work I popped into an HKU Space WSET alumni party.  It was great to catch up with some people from my class and try some wines from ASC and Golden Vintage.  I had a nice sparkling from Australia, a Chardonnay, and a rose from Italy, but I was tired and called it a night at 8. 

Tersina in the middle and Christophe from ASC on the right

Friday and there was no wine opened in the office.  Say what?  I suppose we had our fill earlier in the week.  After work I walked from Happy Valley to Tai Hang.  It's a lovely little back street walk with trees, birds chirping, and most importantly, very very few people.  I LOVE working in Happy Valley.  It's just so pleasant. 

I met Will and then Paul and then Sarah and then KC and then Patrick and then Courtney and then Jon, and then we'd had enough and went home.  This place Stone's is great though.  Run by an American, Joel, with real American food and really fantastic beers and wines by the glass.  Tai Hang in general is just a really cool, kind of out of the way neighborhood.  Lots of restaurants (Japanes,e Chinese, Vietnamese, American, French...), gourmet shops, an awesome wine shop, and then best of all, Lab Made.  Lab Made uses nitrous to freeze their ice cream, and it really has no rival in terms of awesome deliciousness. 

Saturday I got BAGELs from Schragels.  Ohhh the things we used to take for granted.  Then worked on my wine paper, for like a minute, and then went on a lovely afternoon run/hike.  It was absolutely gorgeous out yesterday!  I made Paul some delicious little bagel sandwiches, myself a salmon salad, and then we were off for the initial Craft Brewer of HK meeting at the Globe.  Many of the top craft importers got together and decided to start an association that abides by certain quality standards.  Then they asked all of us beer loves to join in.  Each importer brought a nice selection of their craft beers for us to try.  Yum.  The Iron Fist, Kagua, and one of the German ones really stood out as amazing. 

Iron Fist, Chipotle Beer, monk beer x 2, Stout, and German beer.

Apparently HK likes beer!  So many people and there was a good buzz about some local brewers.  Lets hope HK catches up with Korea in terms of our own local brewing scene. 

It being such a beautiful day and all, we decided to stroll along the harbour in the always surprisingly vacant Wan Chai park. 

 

Then had the brilliant idea to go to our favourite tapas place.  We love Taverna del Mar and every time we go in owners Kim and Domenec make us feel so welcome.  They always have something new to show us too.

Sherry. Estrella on draft, baby eels, and homemade bread.  Yum.

 

Anchovies!

And the new fun selection of the night was paella....made with noodles.  My go-to is generally the squid ink rice, but followed Kim's suggestion of the noodles.  Oohh so delicious and seafoody

 

And then being the old people we are, went home at 9pm to watch Into the West.  Does anyone remember this mini-series from like 10 years ago? It's fantastic and I definitely recommend you go download it. 

 

Sunday Funday and I'm up at 7:30.  Debating a run or eating leftover seafood noodles.  Debate may not be the right word there...trying to convince myself to run before eating the noodles.  Run you don't stand a chance...