Tasting Report: Bordeaux Values – Watson's, Hong Kong
The headlines for Bordeaux wine sales in Hong Kong are full of phenomenal prices for first growths such as Lafite-Rothschild, but this is just one tiny segment of the wine market there. I spend plenty of time in this vibrant, beautiful city, and a whole other – more real – wine market exists.
You don’t have to spend a fortune in Hong Kong to find an excellent bottle of Bordeaux – or anywhere else for that matter!
The biggest player in the retail market in Hong Kong in terms of reaching top wine lovers at every level is wine merchant Watson’s Wine Cellar. It controls 19 retail stores in Hong Kong, not to mention one in Macau and one in Shanghai.
I asked the Watson’s team including James Hepple, Jeremy Stockman, Eddison Leung, and Ben Cheung to put together a small blind tasting of 40 or so value Bordeaux that they currently had on sale in their stores in Hong Kong. They came up with a fascinating tasting.
My results are below. Most of the wines sell for between $HK250 and $HK400 ($32 and $57). The best wines were those from the super 2005 vintage, but I found a number of interesting wines from other years as well as more mature ones. Most of these wines are also readily available in other key wine markets around the world.
Happy Chinese New Year – the Year of the Rabbit – and enjoy some value Bordeaux.
Value Bordeaux tasted but less than 90 points:
2005 Barde-Haut $498HK 2006 Barde-Haut $380HK 2006 Bernadotte $280HK 2006 Chateau Grand Puy Ducasse, Pauillac $450HK 1998 Dalem $225HK 1996 de Chambrun $360HK 2006 Haut-Batailley $480HK 2005 Haut-Bergey $348HK 2005 La Parde de Haut-Bailly $360HK 2000 Larrivet Haut-Brion, Pessac-Leognan $390HK 2006 Le Coteau, Margaux $211HK 2003 Le Sillage de Malartic $299HK 2004 Poujeaux, Moulis $400HK 2004 Richelieu Fronsac $190HK 2006 Sarget de Gruaud Larose $290HK 2006 Vivens, Margaux $288HK