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Port and Christmas
Food+Drink (Guangzhou) / Wine Culture
Written by : text by Elliot Brenchley
Dec 4, 2008
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Port and Christmas
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Portugal: a hot, predominantly dry country with a coastline
on the south Atlantic. So why do we associate port with inviting
fires, cold nights, good cheer and generally all things
Christmas-y? There are interesting answers to these questions and very
good reasons English-speaking countries often celebrate Christmas
with a nice glass of Port.
Port, cultivated and produced in the Douro Valley in northern
Portugal, retains its strong roots to the Anglican Christmas through
the drink's connection with the United Kingdom. The history of
port is quite straightforward. England fought a war with the
French in 1678 and subsequently all Bordeaux, Rhone,
Burgundy and Loire wines found themselves unavailable
to the thirsty British nobility, who had over the years, grown
quite accustomed to having vintage French wines at their beck
and call. They were stuck but certainly not about to go down
without a fight, and looked to their Portuguese "cousins" to ... ... |
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I've Come From a Plane That Crashed in the Mountains.
Art+Culture / Cinema
Written by : Han Mingjie
Nov 1, 2008
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Mountains
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Nov 2nd ★★★★★
The scourge of both the big and small silver
screens at present is that dreaded, toe-curling
combination: the docu-drama. These are
documentaries about historical events told
through period-dress reenactments which
are neither believable nor dramatic. Stranded:
I've Come From a Plane That Crashed in the
Mountains is one such docu-drama, but it is
so deftly wrought, so chillingly accurate and
so emotionally pulverizing that it flees the constraints
of the docu-drama format to emerge
as a cinematic tour de force.
The historical event in question is, of course,
known to all. Three days before Christmas in
1972, Chilean shepherds found two frost-bitten
young men who had crawled out the Andes
after surviving a horrifying plane crash. They
were part of Montevideo's Old Christian rugby
team, and their plane had been downed
by a vicious snowstorm two months earlier.
Miraculously, there were more survivors awaiting
rescue b ... ... |
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New Wines Break the Mould
Food+Drink (Guangzhou) / Wine Culture
Written by : Elliot Brenchley
Oct 29, 2008
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New Wines Break the Mould
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| I'm often sucked into conversations about the direction of
China's wine palate. There's nothing more frustrating
for me than when someone knowingly exclaims that "the
Chinese market solely cares about classic French wines
like Bordeaux and not much else." I don't disagree with this statement,
but just the attitude that it projects. Out of 10 recent tastings
I've been to in Guangzhou, at least 70% have extolled the virtues
of new-world or under-marketed wines. This is extremely encour
aging. It shows the wheels of progress are in motion and there's
a sense of invigoration and excitement in the air concerning the
changing taste in wine here in China.
I asked a handful of distributors to showcase some of their new
labels for the fall. There was no direction given on my part as I
wanted to use the opportunity as a survey to get an idea of the
general direction in which the PRD's wine culture may be headed.
The results were exciting.
A ... ... |
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Bordeaux, Napa Valleyand... Shanxi?
Food+Drink (Guangzhou) / Wine Culture
Written by : Elliot Brenchley
Jun 5, 2008
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wine
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| n our last issue, we talked about new versus old world wines, and perhaps the newest of all the new world wines (for such an ancient place) seems to be tricking slowly out of the dry, northern
regions of China.
You've all seen the Great Wall and Dynasty wines on the shelves at 7-11 and, frankly, you have cause to be prejudiced against them. Over-manipulated, sweet and unvaried, domestically grown wines have gone a long way towards creating a negative stereotype for China's wines. All is not lost however, and there are presentable wines on the market representing some of the best of what the
nation has to offer.
That's PRD recently sat down with Judy Leissner, CEO of Grace Vineyards to discuss the challenges that go into making a high-standard wine in China:
Firstly, where exactly do you grow your wines?
Our vineyard is located in Taigu, Shanxi Province. Before we built the vineyard, we spent two years looking for vineyard sites across China and believed that Taigu would b ... ... |
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Climb every mountain...
Lifestyle / Local Customs
Written by : Lena Gidwani
May 9, 2008
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| Those who aspire to ascend the 29,028-foot peak of Qomolangma (Mt Everest) this month will have to scupper their plans - at least till 10 May. Its temporary "closure" (for obvious reasons) means that adventurers will have to set their sights on something a little less, um, steep, yet closer to home.
For some two thousand years, the grassy peaks of Guangdong have always inspired scholars, scribes, poets and painters. Yet for the rest of us, who want to see havens of beauty undisturbed by pollution and noise, these glorious natural wonders are only a short drive away. Guangzhou leans against the Jiulian Mountains in the north, Luofu Mountain in the west, Qingyun Mountain in the east, and the Jiulian-Nankun Mountain range in the middle, giving the city extraordinary aesthetic mountainous features. Here's our guide to a walk on the high side…
Lotus Mountain
Escape the daily grind with a visit to Lotus Mountain (Lianhua S ... ... |
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Fear ye not the forbidden kingdom
Travel / Regional Travel
Written by : Matthew Niederhauser
Feb 4, 2008
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travel
valley
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| The remote beauty of a hidden Himalayan valley.
Spending a few weeks amid the vaulted peaks of the Himalayas is a requisitepilgrimage for any serious travel trekker or nature enthusiast. Isolated valleys girdled by snowcapped mountains engender a sublime trepidation, as if one were trespassing upon an inhuman landscape fit only for the gods and demons adorning the walls of local temples. Each time one returns one feels humbled by the sheer immensity of these natural marvels. Here, heaven touches the earth and gives the Himalayas its undisputed title as the roof of the world.
The heart of the Himalayas straddles the border between Tibet and Nepal. An extended string of massifs – including Dhaulagiri, Annapurna, Manaslu, Cho Oyo, Qomolangma (Mount Everest), Makalu, and Kochenjunga – form an
imposing wall of 8,000-meters-plus peaks that draw some of the most intrepid (and some say slightly insane) climbing teams in the world.
The best views of a mountain ... ... |
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