hey guys

any red wine lovers would liek to ask your opinion on what red wine is good and where to buy em

of course budget comes in to. . . not the typical buy what you want at what price

Don't buy any Chinese red at any price, unless it's produced from or near Qingdao.

Any red wine from Australia that is available for sale in Kunming, is usually quite nice.

From South Africa and commonly available here is the Obikwa brand, which is alright.

I've had no luck with French Cabernets. All swill. French Merlots seem good.

As to where to buy, Metro, Carrefour, and Walmart all carry foreign wines. Try in that order.

There's a wine shop on Baita Lu (near the SW corner of DongFeng DongLu intersection) that has some great Australian shiraz' - "Two Hands"..but a little pricey at RMB400+..I'm still trying different Chinese red wines, but yet to find anything good!

Try the Tibetan Red and put a review okay? If you are a connoisseur it could be okay to hear any thoughts. I have a friend who brought a bottle to a wine seminar in Europe and they gave it three stars out of five. Maybe some romanticism in those points, who knows?

Theres a vineyard in Burmas Shan State (Aythaya) made up by Germans and they make excellent wine. From what I know they have now expanded their market to Ruili, having an eye on Kunming too. Do not walk past this wine if you ever come across. (I hope this didnt sound like marketing, it was a genuine opinion.)

Edit: Sorry, ..you are obviously not a connoisseur, I re-read the first message. But the Tibetan ("Shangrila") wine has a history, and the grapes were brought, and cultivated, there by French missionaries since over a hundred years ago. With this perspective it is truly an interesting wine. Its probably among the oldest vineyards in China anyway.

Don't ever buy a Chinese wine, with exception of Tibetan and Yunnan red.

Dynasty and Great Wall and other big brands, are buying cheap foreign wines by the barrels and fill it in their bottles, then they smack their label on it and sell it for 4 to 5 times the price.

I hear Niya produces their own wines but I never tasted it, because you still dunno if it's the real thing and if it's worth the steep price. Especially if you can get real and good value red's or white's here, since the Chinese market is battled by winemakers worldwide.

Yunnan and Tibetan are ok but they are very light and don't exactly have what it needs to be the star of a dinner gathering, they lack a bit volume and dunno harmony.
But nonetheless they are cheap and 'not bad at all' options if you wanna sip local red wine with friends.

Try this nice little wine shop called "Henri 19..." [not in the listings] the owner Phillipe will show you very good and reasonably priced wines. Mostly, if not all French, though.

I personally like new world wines over heavy Bordeaux especially the lighter South African 'Pinotage' is a nice red wine for warmer weather.
Although, I tried a cheaper blend from Metro i think about 70 RMB and that wasn't so great. So no more blended Pinotage's for me.

There are a few very good wine shops run by Chinese wine connoisseurs with good choices around the Dianchi lake, I will try to get the address if I can find it.

Also forum member silvio da vinci is having, or working for a wine place. I think a good stroll through the listings section would help.

@Dudeson's, may I ask, how do you know that Great Wall and Dynasty are just pouring cheap foreign wines into their bottles and lying about it with their labels? I would like to write an article on this, and any information you have would be greatly appreciated!

I have to be honest it is not first hand information but I was told by a representative from a french vineyard at a chamber of commerce mingle. His vineyard selling or sold to big Chinese brands and he said it was the crap they could sell by "no chance in hell" back in the old country.

He also said just check out the numbers. The wine that all China produces with the sales numbers of Great Wall and Dynasty [biggest wine sellers in China] and you will see that they don't produce enough grapes or wine to reach those numbers.
Especially on bad production years due to weather and whatnot.

I don't think that it is a necessarily bad, since I am sure it's a common practice in Europe [I assume] but what stinks is the price vs quality..

Dudeson's, thank you. I need to research this.

I think I heard somewhere that imported wine is sometimes cut into local wines. There is local wine in the bottles, but not 100%.
The other thing to watch out for is that there is a lot of fake wine, including the GW and Die-nasty labels. This is grape juice cut with industrial alcohol. This kind of stuff turns up in the small supermarkets.

tigertiger
die-nasty....lol
Yeah especially top shelf imported wines are fake.

I think Lafitte de Rothschild [would be a miracle if spelling is correct] announced that up to 90% of their wines are fake in china.
So go with the ones that are less like being fake.
So go to proper wine shops they usually get shipments from vineyards directly.

Well not all safe and sure but at least safer.