Grape Wall of China

A China Wine Blog: The Scene in the World’s Largest Market

Holiday cheer! Palette offers 100 wines for 100 kuai

- By Jim Boyce
Good holiday fun last weekend in Beijing as Palette Vino organized a five-hour tasting of more than 100 of its wines… for a mere RMB100 (USD13). Add last month’s Taste of the Nations with 150 wines from Torres China (RMB188 / USD25) and the recent Hilton Food & Wine Experience with over 1,000 wines [...]

Beijing wine notes: coal, exhaust… and is that a hint of asbestos?

- By Jim Boyce 
Like a mysterious fog slowly drifting in from the Grand Banks… like a heavy morning haze that like an unwanted guest forgets to leave for three days… like baby mice playing in cotton balls… I’m trying to find a way to describe Beijing’s record-breaking air pollution for this year, which hit 421 parts [...]

All I want for Christmas is… a sommelier

- By Jim Boyce 
According to the The Yomiuri Shimbun, Japan has created the first “robot sommelier.” This might make for a stocking stuffer… if you like wine… and you’re rich… and your feet are big.
“The 40-centimeter-tall robot can determine the type of wine, and varieties of ingredient grapes, by holding a sensor built into its hand [...]

Chinese wine, vintage 393 BC

- By Jim Boyce
The China Daily reports that 2400-year-old wine has been discovered in Shaanxi province.
“Local archaeologists said they unearthed a sealed bronze pot containing 2 kg of red liquid during an excavation of an ancient tomb built in the Warring States Period (475 BC – 221 BC),” states the paper. “Wafts of the ancient vintage greeted [...]

Holiday warm-up: 100 wines for 100 kuai, and more

Here are a few wine tastings over the next few days to get you warmed up for Christmas:
December 22
Let the holiday spirit pour forth as Palette Wines holds a tasting of more than 100 wines for 100 kuai. The Christmas Wine Bazaar is Saturday, 2 PM to 7 PM, on the second floor of the [...]

Pruning in Beijing: The battle against cold

- By Alain Leroux 
One of the big challenges of making wine in Beijing is pruning the vines. Due to the warmer weather this year, we began pruning at Taillan one month later than usual, starting on November 7 and finishing on November 29.
We plant our vines in depressions. This allows for irrigation and it makes [...]

Launched: Greater China Sherry Association

- By Jim Boyce and Campbell Thompson
The Greater China Sherry Wine Association held its inaugural Beijing event one month ago. A dozen Beijing-based wine writers, distributors and academics attended a wine dinner at Aria hosted by Cesar Saldana, president of Jerez-Xeres-Sherry DO, and John Isacs of Enjoy Gourmet, who is a certified Sherry educator and a [...]

Small haul in Beijing: Hot, moist weather affects production

- By Alain Leroux
We didn’t have a lot of grapes this year at Taillan. The main problem is that I left for a three-week holiday in 2005, the staff didn’t properly care for the vines, and some of them became diseased, lost too many leaves, and died during the winter. We had to replant some of the vineyard [...]

Beijing Wine Club: Second anniversary party this Saturday

The Beijing Wine Club will hold its second anniversary and wine awards on December 15 at Sequoia Café (Guanghua Road). The party gets started at 8 PM and includes a tasting of five wines. The cost is RMB150 per person. RSVP in order to ensure enough wine is available for everyone. To book a spot [...]

How can I sell my wines in China? Part 5

- By Dan Siebers
This is part 5 of 5. See also part 1, part 2, part 3 and part 4.In part 4, I talked about brands in China. In this, the last part of the series, I look at distribution and at some of the “land mines” for producers to consider in the China market.
Here is some [...]

Good Fallows: In China, writer finds message in the bottle

I spotted a post by James Fallows (The Atlantic Monthly) about buying an 11.8 RMB bottle of “China Red Wine.” His comment, “How bad can it be?” set off my “please, not another person making fun of Chinese wine” alert.
So, I dashed off an abrupt email and asked if it would be possible for him to write about some [...]

Joining the bunch: Yvonne Chiong

Yet another wine lover is joining our group of contributors at Grape Wall of China, a nonprofit site that provides info and opinions about the country’s growing wine scene.
Yvonne Chiong, wine director, WHM Group
Key focus: Sommelier insights

“Yvonne Chiong was chief sommelier at Jean Georges restaurant (Three on the Bund) in Shanghai, 2003 to 2007, and now [...]

Now legit to spit: Wine tasting approved as profession in China

“A shortage of professional tasters in the wine brewing industry will soon be eased as China has listed wine taster as a new profession in the country’s tenth batch of new professions,” reports state media.
The article states that more than 80 percent of China’s reported 15,600 wine companies have complained about the wine taster shortage. [...]

Bubbly Beijing: Which of these six wines sparkles?

- By Jim Boyce 
“Green is go, red is stop,” explains Frank Siegel as he hands each participant two poker chips at his most recent blind wine tasting – this one focused on bubbly – on Friday night at Sequoia Cafe in Beijing. The idea: taste all six wines, then use the green chip to vote for [...]

Bordeaux in Beijing: A Grand Cru afternoon

- By Jim Boyce
The best wine event of the year – AL
This is the best wine tasting event in Beijing. I put this event on my calendar a year ago. – EW
Definitely the best wine tasting I’ve been to in Beijing – AU
Praise abounded for this year’s Beijing visit by the Union des Grands Crus [...]

How can I sell my wines in China? Part 4

- By Dan Siebers
This is part 4 of 5. See also part 1, part 2 and part 3.
In part 3, I discussed some facts about importers as well as kinds of importers, including independent foreign-owned, independent locally owned, independent Hong Kong-owned, Chinese wine companies, and “cowboys.”  In part 4, I look at brands.
Here are some facts about [...]

Oliver’s twist: A new way of looking at Aussie wine

- By Jim Boyce
Thanks to the persistence of Adam Steinberg at ASC Fine Wines, I attended the media tasting with Australian wine guru Jeremy Oliver at Hilton’s recent two-day Food & Wine Experience in Beijing. Sponsored by the Australian Wine and Brandy Corporation, with wines supplied by ASC, the seminar outlined a new approach to [...]

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  • About Grape Wall of China


    beijing-boyce-grape-wall-of-china-logo

    A nonprofit blog by wine professionals and consumers.


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    Email: beijingboyce at yahoo.com

  • Grape Wall Contributors


    In alphabetical order (see full list)


    Nicolas Carre
    Sommelier


    Chantal Chi
    Writer


    Yvonne Chiong
    Sommelier, consultant


    Judy Leissner
    Grace Vineyard CEO


    Alain Leroux
    Wine maker, consultant


    Li Demei
    Wine maker


    Huiqin Ma
    Professor


    Campbell Thompson
    The Wine Republic co-owner


    Brian Yao
    Consumer


    Frankie Zhao
    Pro-Wine Training & Consultancy owner


    Jim Boyce
    Consumer, blog administrator