Wine

I

ikileo

Arch-Supremacy Member
Joined
Sep 21, 2003
Messages
23,718
Reaction score
0
nice...great way to try the Musar.

i'm also keen to try the subsequent tasting of Catena Zapata
 
I

ikileo

Arch-Supremacy Member
Joined
Sep 21, 2003
Messages
23,718
Reaction score
0
looks like i only got 2 out of my 5 choices, at least these it's not a total loss. i managed to get the only 1994 sem and the 2008 viognier.

sending in a second round of orders, hopefully still got. their bloody servers still crashing.
 
L

looiwte

Member
Joined
Oct 2, 2003
Messages
379
Reaction score
0
Just had a Vallformosa/Primium Vitae/Joven/Rioja/Tempranillo 2008 from Wine Connection and found it quite awful. Alcoholic heat, spice, tannins all over the place. Is this what they call not well-integrated flavours?

Btw anyone have a reasonably priced Merlot (<$50) to recommend?
Am spying on this from the WEA sale: Haan Merlot Prestige 2003 Magnum. Interesting, an Australian producer (Barossa) specialising in Merlots...
 
I

ikileo

Arch-Supremacy Member
Joined
Sep 21, 2003
Messages
23,718
Reaction score
0
haha...i guess that's not really intergrated. although i did enjoy the white wine from vallformosa (Vallformosa Claudia) the last time i visited (prob 1+ years ago). It's a nice weekday wine.

to be honest, i don't drink enough merlots, which i should. but u should try the Haan and let us know. one of the more famous merlots in Aussis is Irvine with their Grand Merlot. People seem to like it but it wasn't to my liking, at least during the point of tasting.
 
hkm520240

hkm520240

Member
Joined
Mar 2, 2006
Messages
322
Reaction score
0
That is the most ridiculous deal of the year! For a wines retail less than US$20 in US the reasonable price I think in Singapore is the most $30. I especially get irritated for their nice phrase wording trying to mislead less inform consumer. Sigh...

Vintry is a wines bar/cafe with very good range of wines by the glass with reasonable price and they do organize wines tasting too. Wanted to pay a visit but never have time to do so.
 
Last edited:
I

ikileo

Arch-Supremacy Member
Joined
Sep 21, 2003
Messages
23,718
Reaction score
0
Calling the HWZ Wine Forumites, now it's time to plan for the Nov Wine Outing again.

Let me know how many of you are keen. I can suggest a casual dining place like Bistro One Zero Three along Pasir Panjang road. Corkage is $5. I've eaten there twice before and it's quite nice.

If you have other themes you'd like to suggest let me know. Here are some possible options:

- Country specific
- Varietal/blend specific
- Colour specific
- Wines you think will impress
- Regions you've never tried before

let me know so i can get started in the organization.
 
L

looiwte

Member
Joined
Oct 2, 2003
Messages
379
Reaction score
0
hkm520240 said:
That is the most ridiculous deal of the year! For a wines retail less than US$20 in US the reasonable price I think in Singapore is the most $30. I especially get irritated for their nice phrase wording trying to mislead less inform consumer. Sigh...
Click to expand...

Sorry a bit OOT

That is one of the trademarks of the original Groupon - creative, somewhat out of context, copywriting.
But the local version tends to be a bit contrived and formulaic.
This Mocca (Mediacorp) Perks is an exact clone, down to the deal countdown timer, deal-on indicator on the LHS, and the style of writing.

That seems to be the 'deal' most of the time for such coupon offers locally, it's either sub-standard products to be cast off, or jacked up prices, to entice our love-a-good-bargain audience who tend to be price-conscious rather than value-conscious.

Back to thread topic, one question I've always wanted to ask, or maybe I've asked this one way or another: About our local wine scene, I've always been puzzled by the high ratio of distributors and shops to actual wine drinkers. Is there a re-export market? I'm sure there's economic sense here - otherwise they won't be around - but I'm not seeing that many serious drinkers. Of course there's the restaurants and pubs, driven by our high expat population and middle-class, but for the rest, I can't quite explain the large amount of wine displays in the supermarket, where if anything doesn't sell and stock doesn't move, won't be able to justify its presence. Or is everyone stocking up and consuming at home? Still don't see that many, apart from ang mohs, drinking beyond a glass each at most restaurants. Pardon the ignorance, just clue me in if it's all out there, just that I haven't seen enough.
 
I

ikileo

Arch-Supremacy Member
Joined
Sep 21, 2003
Messages
23,718
Reaction score
0
looiwte said:
Back to thread topic, one question I've always wanted to ask, or maybe I've asked this one way or another: About our local wine scene, I've always been puzzled by the high ratio of distributors and shops to actual wine drinkers. Is there a re-export market? I'm sure there's economic sense here - otherwise they won't be around - but I'm not seeing that many serious drinkers. Of course there's the restaurants and pubs, driven by our high expat population and middle-class, but for the rest, I can't quite explain the large amount of wine displays in the supermarket, where if anything doesn't sell and stock doesn't move, won't be able to justify its presence. Or is everyone stocking up and consuming at home? Still don't see that many, apart from ang mohs, drinking beyond a glass each at most restaurants. Pardon the ignorance, just clue me in if it's all out there, just that I haven't seen enough.
Click to expand...

[MY TURN TO RANT]

well i did speak with some of the larger distributors here in SG before and our wine market is very saturated upstream. There are many importers, distributors, retailers and some are all 3 as well.

Considering the still growing wine market of Singapore, there is opportunity but we are not a Japan and HK or China which have a far greater wine consumption vs SG for an Asian country.

a large proportion goes to restaurant and hotel sales. and i guess the plus point for wine is that it's shelf life is much longer compared to the average consumer product. so they can hold their stocks for a bit while their main revenue (i think) comes from selling their more expensive wine to the usual group of collectors who have the cash to blow on cases of Burgs or Bords with every new vintage.

I see 2 main revenue streams: sale to restaurants/hotels & rich man sales.

we do not have a developed wine culture as yet where every other person can pop into a wine store to pick up a $20+ - $30+ wine (some people here think $30 for a wine is ex) and the retailer gets to enjoy the volume sales. Hence they are dependent on the volume sales to food services and high margin profits from rich case buyers.

As for supermarkets, they go by volume and from retail audits, their wine sales do grow year on year. They have a constant supply from many of the bulk producers. There is a big market for the under $25 wines in SG as many people who are just starting out with wine are usually not confident enough to pay more than $25 to their wines.

Some restaurants charge ridiculous markups as well. Usually 2-2.5X the retail price is understandable to me but if i'm going to pay that price at least give me something interesting that i can't find outside. I can easily go to the retailer on hand, buy the exact same wine and pay the corkage and still pay less than the menu fee. But then again, the wine culture is still not big enough for mainstream consumers to do it.

Imagine if it was more mainstream and consumers were more educated on the wine and their pricepoints, this would make the market more competitive and restaurants to reconsider their wine program. There are only a few restaurants with a decent to good wine program (usually limited to the higher end restaurants); again mainly because consumers are still not fully educated on it. IMO, a good indication of a restaurants wine program is their 'by-the-glass' list.

A good 'by-the-glass' list shows how much effort an establishment puts into their wine program insteading of choosing the usual suspects and typical flavour profiles. if anything, glass pours are potentially the most profitable part of the wine menu and so many things can be done to make it more robust and interesting

Thank goodness there are still some BYOB joints with reasonable corkage.
 
fireduke86

fireduke86

Arch-Supremacy Member
Joined
Sep 26, 2002
Messages
18,256
Reaction score
49
ikileo said:
will the white wine only go into the vongole?

either way, u can use any table white wine. after it has gone through the heating process you won't be able to taste the subtleties of each wine so it's no point splurging on an expensive bottle of wine when you are cooking.

as for vongole, being a traditional dish from Naples in the Campania region, you can use wines from Campania such as Greco di Tufo or Falanghina. But i know these aren't as common in local SG supermarkets so for italian dishes i usually grab an affordable white wine like a Soave. This is found in pretty much any cold storage.

but if you don't really care about whether the wine is 'italian' or not, you can use a semillon/sauvignon blanc blend from aussie.



but for a young child, if your concern is alcohol, you'd have to see the cooking time. Assuming you use a bottle of wine for cooking, with an average o 13% alcohol; 750ml of wine contains 97.5ml of alcohol. Under heat the alcohol will break down but it's not as quickly as you'd think.

but within 15-30 minutes of cooking, the residual amount of alcohol will drop to about 35% which leaves 29.25ml of alcohol. Assuming you are of a family of 3-4 persons, that will be about 7.4ml - 9.7ml of residual alcohol in your dish upon serving. The amount will continue to slowly drop as it sits in the hot dish.

if u wish to reduce the amount of alcohol further, a total cooking time of 2.5 hours (braising/simmering etc) will knock it down to 5% residual alcohol.

while alcohol is never recommended for a child, in this case an average 8ml of alcohol won't do much.

if u want to remove alcohol entirely you can use a mixture of white wine vinegar and dilute white grape juice.
Click to expand...

Hi ikileo, I've been using the aforementioned recommendation and they were well enough. Thank you :)

Just out of curiosity, if I'm minded to use a mixture of white wine vinegar and dilute grape juice, where can I get them and I should be combining them in what proportions?

Thank you :)
 
I

ikileo

Arch-Supremacy Member
Joined
Sep 21, 2003
Messages
23,718
Reaction score
0
grape juice you can buy 'em from supermarkets in the fruit juices section.

as for white wine vinegar, you can pop by a cold storage and look at the vinegars sections. they're usually near the sauces and seasonings section. there will specifically be white wine vinegar.

as for proportions i cannot give a definite answer as I rarely use it 'cos I just stick with regular wine.
 
fireduke86

fireduke86

Arch-Supremacy Member
Joined
Sep 26, 2002
Messages
18,256
Reaction score
49
ikileo said:
grape juice you can buy 'em from supermarkets in the fruit juices section.

as for white wine vinegar, you can pop by a cold storage and look at the vinegars sections. they're usually near the sauces and seasonings section. there will specifically be white wine vinegar.

as for proportions i cannot give a definite answer as I rarely use it 'cos I just stick with regular wine.
Click to expand...

Obliged :)
 
hkm520240

hkm520240

Member
Joined
Mar 2, 2006
Messages
322
Reaction score
0
Today follow a friend to visit a wines merchant located at Upper Changi road. This wines merchant share with us 1950 Chambertin Grand Cru, 1961 Beaune 'Clos des Feves' 1cru and 1959 Corton Grand Cru that he opened earlier . All are beautiful except 1961 Beaune.


1950 Chambertin GC by hkm520240, on Flickr

Afterthat we proceed to restaurant "Big Eater" next door for dinner. Food is no bad, no corkage and we brought our own glasses. We brought our wines from the wines shop too. One champagne and 4 Bordeaux for 4 of us. 1982 and 1979 was beautiful and 1994 is good to drink too but still young at the moment.


2001 Segur Cabanac by hkm520240, on Flickr


1982 & 1979 by hkm520240, on Flickr


1994 Pavie Macquin by hkm520240, on Flickr

The wines shop owner is a very generous guy and does not look like a businessman. He footed the bill for food and also wants to treat us the wines. But my friend insisted the cost should be share among us. He has a very good experience in all the top wines and just look at the labels he has tasted!

He has a wide range of aged Bordeaux, Burgundy and Rhone. If you need a special bottle for special occasion can look for him. I would say his price is very good too.


Label by hkm520240, on Flickr

Pardon me if I posted too many pics. Anyway good to know this kind of people :s22:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Important Forum Advisory Note
This forum is moderated by volunteer moderators who will react only to members' feedback on posts. Moderators are not employees or representatives of HWZ Forums. Forum members and moderators are responsible for their own posts. Please refer to our Community Guidelines and Standards and Terms and Conditions for more information.
Top