Trobneville

Back in HK wednesday

2010-02-08T21:30:00.000-08:00

Back in Hong Kong wednesday, with some new california wines close behind me...

Lan Kwai Fong consequence

2009-09-05T19:07:00.000-07:00

Classic post LKF

Peking duck with pork rhind

2009-05-31T22:46:00.000-07:00

Has anyone tried to Peking Duck in Shanghai where you eat it with the pink pork flavored deep fried chips also in the crepe?

Has anyone tried pairing with Guang Dong Duck?

2009-05-31T22:41:00.000-07:00

Guang Dong duck is not the same as Peking Duck. It is very savory has almost a Bovrol flavor to it and is eaten with cilantro as well in the mix.

Next Pairing?

2009-05-31T22:28:00.000-07:00

I love duck, and while I'm not in Beijing the duck in Hong Kong is still great! Tell me what your favorite wine pairings are with Peking Duck (including plum sauce, scallions cucumber and crepe) and I will do some experimenting...

Winecast 2. Follow Up 2. Vocab, flavors and other cultural issues with wine

2009-05-31T02:32:00.000-07:00

One of the things that I didn't talk about in the winecast 2, or rather talked about and cut, was why it is important to me to understand local flavors, in this case, South East Asian fruits...
When I try and talk about many common flavors in wine such as blackberry, blueberry, raspberry and strawberry in China, or even in Hong Kong to an extent (black currant), I come up against 3 communication barriers and a few cultural ones.
First of all, some flavors are hard to come by in China (and expensive) and as a result, it is not uncommon that I find myself talking with someone who has never had a blueberry. Secondly, if they have, they may not know the English word for blueberry, and thirdly, I don't know Mandarin for blueberry. This makes it very difficult for me to talk about wine flavors in the way I am used to doing. But who's responsibility is it to learn how to communicate when talking about wine in a culture where French and English wine speak means nothing? For me, the obvious answer is that the western world needs to make the effort and not just on vocabulary, but also on understanding local food and beverage cultural experiences.
The first reason stems from why I love drinking wine, and why I think many others do as well, which is the ability of familiar smells and flavors in wine to transport us to another place or time. I like to think about the food critic from the movie 'Ratatouille', Anton Ego. When he takes his first bite of Ratatouille Anton Ego is immediately brought back to a rich and vivid childhood memory and is completely transformed and rejuvenated by that experience. I can think of a wine I had recently in which I tasted Sea Salt and was teleported 5 years back to a beach in California where I watched Elephant seals. I hate elephant seals! They are noisy and smell terrible, (not to mention that day was cold and windy) but I love that this wine had the ability to bring me from the other side of the world, a tradeshow in China, back to California.
While I get excited when I find someone who has eaten blueberry before in China and can pick it out of a wine, finding that flavor for them seems so matter of fact. If we make an effort to understand the flavors that are important to cultures like China that are becoming excited about wine, maybe they will begin to 'experience' wine in a similar way with recognition of flavors like lychee, asian pear and purple mangosteen. (Hypocritically I do not know the Mandarin names for any of these fruits...yet)
Beyond understanding unique cultural flavors, comes understanding those cultures. I look at China and say, "How are 80% of wine sales in reds when Chinese food is full of rich and heavy spices"?! "Why don't they drink Sauvignon Blanc in SiChuan"? The first thing I try and remember when I these questions is my first experience with a true SiChuan meal where I thought I was going to pass out after my first bite of chicken baked with "mildly" spicy chicken. Instinctively I reached for my glass of cold ice water to put out the fire only to realize that all I had to drink was hot chrysanthemum tea! There was no cold water to drink in this area, it wouldn't be safe for me to drink, and the Chinese believe strongly that drinking hot liquids is healthy for you. Certainly there was no ice for drinking; there never had been. My other memorable experiences with food/drink pairing all involve 165 proof "Bai Jiu" which burns as badly as SiChuan food with hot tea and ensures that you will get to taste your meal a second time that night.
While of course it is my wish that China would drink more wine with food, and try more white wine with food, these wishes are based on my personal palate and preferences (based on my cultural upbringing). Before we try and push western trends onto a several thousand year old culture, or other cultures, it is important for us to try things their way as well and to gain a better understanding of their experiences with drink and food.
So, what does this mean? If you want to understand the Chinese wine palate, you have to experience the Chinese Palate. Eat Sichuan food with hot Tea, drink Bai Jiu, put coke and sprite in your wines, put ice cubes in your wine. Say "gan bei" (dry cup) and Chug a glass of wine. Try everything once before you judge it, and instead of judging it (and rejecting it or trying to change it), try and understand it and accept it. You will find drinking and talking about wine much more enriching in whatever new culture you choose and you will find it easier to share the things you love about your own culture as well. Rob.

Winecast 2. Follow Up 1.

2009-05-30T23:51:00.000-07:00

Thank you for the continued feedback on my winecasts. The best feedback I have recieved so far was from winecast one. "I'm sorry, I just couldn't watch through it. Ten minutes of my life I will never get back". I fully appreciate that level of criticism and I did my best to edit winecast #2 so that it would move faster. As a result, people have told me that I rush through the fruit on number two and do not spend enough time with it.

Let me iterate that the 10 or so minute fruit segment was edited down from a nearly two hour wine and fruit feastival. While a portion of what I cut out was tasting, spitting and chewing, most of the cuts were actually of me thinking! With most of the fruit I ate I really spent a great deal of time processing that flavor, then sipping wine, then searching for that flavor in the wine.

I am new to this, it is bad, but with your continued feedback, it should get better. I will try reduce the amount of content I put into one episode so that I can make episodes shorter, and focus on making the content more meaningful rather than appearing to push through it.

Thanks again for your support and criticism, Rob

Reflections

2009-05-30T23:27:00.000-07:00

Big buildings just end up being reflections in even bigger buildings... Hong Kong in a nutshell.
This and more new photos are posted in my Picasa album at the top right of the page. Great feedback on my photos is what has prompted me to share them, and continued feedback will is always welcome and appreciated. Thanks, Rob

Dark side of Hong Kong

2009-05-30T23:17:00.000-07:00

While there is a balance to Hong Kong, it is in a very Ying Yang type style where that balance comes together by the presence of one extreme within the other. Weekend nights on Lan Kwai Fong provide a humbling reminder that along with the glitz, glam and wealth of this futuristic city there is also a great deal of poverty and homelessness. Here, it goes unnoticed.

China/HK winecast 2

2009-05-30T02:52:00.000-07:00

I promise I listened to your feedback and tried to make this one half as long. I failed. This one isn't as terrible as the first one, and like I said, I'm going to continue to do this, so the more feedback you give me and the more critical you are, the better I will get at doing this. While I will respond to all forms of feedback/comments/questions, it's best if you place them below so that they stick with the video. Thanks, Rob.

China/HK winecast 1

2009-05-28T05:47:00.001-07:00

First video cast on Wine in China/ Hong Kong from SIAL China tradeshow. I know this is laughably bad, (and I do laugh when I watch it), but I WILL continue to post, so please give me feedback, lots. The more feedback you give, what I talk about, how I talk... and the more critical you are... The better I will get at doing this. Thanks for watching. Rob.