Singaporeans, turtle skirt and South African wines as investments(1)
we have worthy investment wines in South Africa.
Asia's fine wine market seems to have attracted a lot of attention
on this website recently. It brought to mind a Chinese wine dinner I
was treated to in September 2008, generously hosted by long-time
wine and food friends in Singapore. A mischievous, male-dominated
group of lawyers, investment and financial consultants, a
neurosurgeon, a crystal stemware supplier and a small-time wine
importer, they call themselves the Monday Reprobate Table (MRT). If
you've ever spent time in this humid city-state, the MRT
abbreviation will also bring to mind their super-efficient,
air-conditioned, ever-spotless mass rapid transit underground train
system.
The MRTs have been getting together for years, finding flimsy
reasons to tour overseas cellars, host visiting wine producers or
get together at chosen restaurant lunch or dinner tables where
managers allow them to bring out their own wines (BYO is not common
practice in Singapore). Although they dip into the New World, France
is their preferred drinking destination. But then French wines have
been available longer than most wine-producing nations in first
world Asian countries. Scouting the swish wine bar of the recently
opened St Regis Singapore hotel for instance, I was unnerved to find
wines on tap in a glass display case. No ordinary wines available by
the glass here, but Ch鈚our Latour 94 and Pichon Lalande 97 no less!
With impressive selections but none of that level of show-off
silliness defining Singaporean MRT members' cellars, this group's
criterion is simple. They take turns supplying the wines and hosting
the group, plus partners, at a Singapore restaurant table on their
respective birthdays. By chance I witnessed the tail end of one
birthday dinner, arriving after the main course to see a table
bulging with Riedels for 20 tasters - around 15 glasses per head -
alongside individual dishes at a French restaurant. The mystery
theme was Burgundy whites followed by reds, and discussion and
merriment was plentiful.
My own Chinese MRT dinner a few days previously was a more intimate
event with eight or so of the core members (partner-free) in the
private room of the Imperial Treasure restaurant. Lawyer Tan Kah Hin
delights in selecting a menu more exotic than his last, so that
evening's line-up kicked off with his Dom P 2000, with a Lazy Susan
of snacks including bean curd, warm red and yellow peppers, and pig
intestine saut閑d in sweet dipping sauce. To follow was suckling pig
with crispy skin and the most delicious battered miniature fish
fillets. As we warmed up, gelatinous shark's fin (something my
marine sensibilities prefers to avoid) with an egg foo yong sauce
arrived on a lettuce leaf. Members contributed foil-covered wines
and the "guess it" game began. "Is it white, is it red, is it
Chambolle or Gevrey?" they'd chant.
Personal wine highlights of many interesting bottles included
Domaine Leflaive Puligny Montrachet 'Clavoillon' Premier Cru 2000
(outstanding despite its sharksfin partnership), and
Corton-Charlemagne Grand Cru 99 from Domaine Bonneau du Martray. The
Vosne-Roman閑 Premier Cru 'Les Beaux Monts' 2000 from producer
Domaine Bruno Clavelier offered a classic expression of Pinot Noir.
A solitary Bordeaux, Third Growth Ch鈚eau Cantenac Brown 2002 from
Margaux, made its entrance as an alternative to Burgundy, with
succulent goose in its crispy skin. Its blackcurrant, violet
intensity had an almost Syrah-like black pepper quality. Also
delicious was stonefish with mustard greens, an ugly-looking
specimen in the fish tank before its poisonous spikes removed. The
intended high point of the meal was braised turtle skirt on Chinese
spinach, prized for being rich in collagen - did I mention I was en
route to Bali, where a friend has saved 3,500 turtles from ending up
in the cooking pot over the years?
Sweets included a thousand-layer salted egg yolk cake. I'm familiar
enough with Chinese etiquette to know better than to refuse generous
hospitality, but I did scold Kah Hin gently about the turtle. "Next
time we'll eat crocodile from head to tail, the feet near the ribs
are the next part!" he declared.
I joined another group of Singaporeans for lunch at Terroir in
Stellenbosch a few weeks ago. Enthusiastic members of the
International Wine and Food Society (Singapore branch) they were out
for a whistlestop tour of the Cape Winelands. With compliments
flowing over the lovely South African scenery, food and wines
tasted, it turned out that they'd been hosted at Kanonkop, Meerlust
and Boekenhoutskloof. So the follow-up question from a wine
collector took me by surprise. "Does South Africa have any
investment wines, something along the lines of Australia's Grange?"
he asked.
