What might look a bit like a haunted mansion within the high rise buildings of Shanghai, actually is a very charming old Tudor house and represents a beautiful setting for wine and food.

For our last dinner in Shanghai I went online and made some research about what the Shanghai fine dining scene has to offer. There are a few branches of international 3 star chefs (The Pourcel twins and Boulud) which I suspected might only be less good copies of the originals. Then there are those much talked about hip restaurants such as “Mr. and Mrs Bund”, which might actually be worth a shot, but also bear a big risk for disappointment. But we wanted none of these, and rather picked a restaurant with a wine theme that seemed to offer a reasonable package: Napa Wine Bar and Kitchen. Read the rest of this entry »

Admittedly, Din Tai Fun is a chain restaurant with branches all over Asia and even in Los Angeles and Seattle, and so in general it represents nothing that would put the epicure mind in a spontaneous state of excitement. But on the other hand it rather is an upscale kind of chain and the food just tastes so delicious that I have to post about our dinner there. Din Tai Fun is specialized in the preparation of Dim Sum, these steemed dumplings and buns that are part of Cantonese cuisine and that have this intrinsic yumminess which doesn’t need much description. So from here on we’ll nearly keep it to food-porn level. Oh, and thanks a lot, Laurence, for having taken us there (Not her first influence on this blog -she once took us to Lei Garden Restaurant in Singapore)! Read the rest of this entry »

Many laugh about Chinese wine culture, often bringing up the example of fine wine being mixed with Coke, but during my 7 days in Shanghai I did see no such thing. On the contrary, Shanghai even has a nice little wine scene, with a panoply of shops (many with the so loved Lafite wines as crown of their selection) and also a few very cosy wine bars. Two times we visited Le Bistro du Dr. Wine, a hip wine bar with bistro flair on Fumin road, it charmed us with its stylish yet unpretentious ambiance and an appealing wine list.
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Now back to our Shanghai-trip that actually just ended a week ago and still is pretty fresh in my memory. Many of the activities there were been taking care of by our hosts, but I still had a small list of recommendations compiled by my friend Toby (Thanks again!). One of those was Di Shui Dong Restaurant within the French concession, a popular place both among locals and expats, famous for its spicy and aromatic Hunan cuisine. We entered the locality for lunchtime on day one. Read the rest of this entry »

After the white wines, now on to the reds of our Paris blind tasting: Read the rest of this entry »

Finally I’m back home after 2 weeks of agitated travelling, and I have lots of stories to tell from my trip to Shanghai, and some more from my subsequent getaway to Paris. But let’s start time-incoherent with a blind-tasting that kicked off my weekend in Paris. I was a guest at my friend Didier’s home and, as usual, we couldn’t meet without popping a few corks. We each added a couple of bottles to this tasting and they were served to us mixed and blind by Didier’s wonderful wife Mizuki, who has developed a hand for pouring the right bottles. Of course, I mostly brought German wines, as I also know Didier has a weakness for these (one among a few) and they’re rather hard to get in France. Here’s the first half of the tasting, dedicated to the white wines.

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