It’s not usual to witness people wandering around a hotel at Sentosa with tasting glass. Wine Treasure Hunt on 24th November, gave most people a run for their money. Organised by ewineasia.com as part of The Vintners’ Tour 2012, participant saw through six stops, 50 appellations and around 200 wines. A time out was needed before my liver decided to plunge into the sea.
So, the rules are simple. The handout provided a list of questions catered to each station. Participants were required (expected) to ask questions to acquire the answer, obviously the vintners were not going to give it away easily. With the questions for each stations correctly answered, the station master will reveal a ‘treasure’, which was a letter for the missing word. However by the time we reached the third station, the final answer was already too obvious to be ignored.
Nine letters quiz corresponded to the nine-letter name of the organiser, basically a no-brainer.
By having the answer clearly written on the lucky draw slip, participants can qualify for a lucky draw. Spanish trip for two, all expenses paid.
The overall atmosphere was generally friendly, easy, slow-moving and casual. Although a small minority paired their restaurant meals with free wines from the stations, and a snobbish connoisseur-wannabe who went around holding a wine guide-book were some of the annoying bits during the event. But overall, I’m cool.
Okay the wines that got my attention are…
French station, right bank Bordeaux wines represented by Louis Mitjavile were great. Bringing with him vintages from 2002, 2007 and 2009, he gave a good demonstration of the vintage differences among these wines. The Tertre Rotebouef 2009 was at its best, intense ripeness and juicy expression.
Italian station had a few interesting regions such as Sicily, Soave and Trentino. In particular Soave Classico by Dario Pieropan, the differences between two plots of land with schist and limestone were as distinct as the soils. The former rich and densely textured, while the latter acidic and fresh.
The other Italian wine brand was Lis Neris. This Friuli based winery made their Confini wine using blends of Traminer with Pinot Grigio and Riesling. Extremely rich on aroma and light to medium on palate, it gave an impression of durian, in a good way. The other, Lis, was made from Pinot Grigio, Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc. Slightly restrained on aroma, but no less characteristic with the rich palate.
Not forgetting the master class
And yes, there were the master classes with four topics including the one on Schott Zwiesel glasses which we attended. Since the topic is rather technical I shall save it for the next post, till then!
