Awards help discover perfect wines for domestic market

The Global Gourmet 2017 International Wine Review in China gave its diamond awards on Aug 18 in Beijing — 59 wines got one diamond award each, 44 gained two, and 19 won three.

Explaining the rationale behind the event, Ricky Xu, the publisher of Global Gourmet, a hospitality, food and beverages publication in China, says: “Since wines from all over the world are flooding into China, it’s getting a bit messy. So, we want Chinese customers to know good wines.”

“It’s not a real competition. It’s just a review, a tasting.”

Fifteen professional judges including masters of wine and sommeliers from China and abroad were divided into three tables, did blind tasting and graded the wines.

A sommelier, or wine stew“Foreigners ard, is a professional who specializes in all aspects of wine service such as buying, storage, selling as well as food pairing.

Nicolas Carre, a French sommelier and one of the judges, says the target when tasting was to try to find the best wines for the Chinese market.

concentrate more on technical aspects, which for the Chinese is not the most important.”

Alun Griffiths, a master of wine and a contest judge, spoke highly of the competition: “The wines we tasted were all at a perfect temperature, and we had good judges on every table.”

Chinese wines were also among the winners. Senpatina Icewine 2014 made in the Hengren Manchu autonomous county, in Liaoning province, won three diamond awards.

Meanwhile, last year, around 100 Chinese wines participated in the Berlin Wine Trophy event. And 34 of them won medals with one grand gold, 20 gold and 13 silver prizes.

Xu, who is happy to see Chinese wines doing well, says: “Chinese wine-making is the future.”

Since wines from all over the world are flooding into China, it’s getting a bit messy.” Ricky Xu, publisher, Global Gourmet