Wine in China June 2010

I was recently in Shenzhen in China for 10 days. Whilst there I checked out the wine scene from a foreigners point of view. I stayed in the Nanshan district (the tourist part).

In the hotel, Seaview O'City Hotel, they served Concha Y Toro Frontera Cabernet Sauvignon and Sauvignon Blanc which were gluggable but nothing special but the price was ok.

There is such a thing as "Chinese Wine" but it is just licqour. I tried to locate the local Grace Vineyards store but even with the address the taxi driver could not find it. There was a local licqour store next to the hotel which sold a few Chinese wines and a few French wines.

There was a wine store in the nearby shopping mall, Holiday Plaza, called Ole which had a good selection of wines including a back catalogue of first growths but the prices were double what they would be in Europe.

Shenzhen is in mainland China but next to Hong Kong. Hong Kong duty free shop on the border had a selection of Bordeaux wines which were slightly more expensive than in Sweden but they had wines which were unobtainable in Sweden (but that is difficult since Sweden is a closed monopolist wine market dictated by the government).

I bought three bottles of Chinese wine, one of which was quite good. I will report on these later but I didn't find an undrinkable bottle.