Judgement de Li Hwan (2005 Bordeaux v New World Cabernet)

It so happens that we were meeting up for some poker and BBQ last week and so happens I had just taken delivery of some 2005 bordeaux...it so happens too that Gary and Gao each brought a bottle of new world cabernet! So happens too that I had a few bottles of new world cabernet blends I had been waiting so long to taste. One thing led to another and Walaa!... we unofficially had a new world vs old world cabernet taste-off.
To start off the day, we had a refreshing NV Henkell Trocken Blanc de Blanc (a personal fav appertif), 2007 Coopers Creek Sauvignon Blanc (which was amazingly full of juicy sweet fruits ranging from pineapples to peaces to some bananas..i was pleasantly suprised by this supermarket wine), 2006 Grosset Sauvignon Blanc (razor sharp acidity that was too much, lacked the fruits to balance off).

From L to R: Henkell , Coopers Creek, Balnaves, Voyager, La Fleur de Bouard, Robert Mondavi, Blason d'Issan, Pepper Tree and Grosset .

The first 4 wines had been bottle decanted for about 6 hours for the taste-off but I had tasted the wines and written the notes as per tasted fresh out from the bottle.

In tasting order,

2005 Blason d'Issan, Margaux (WS87)
2nd wine of Chateau d'Issan (3rd Growth)
WADA rated 81pts
Deep purple. This has obvious cat's pee at the start but blows off after a while to reveal cherries, some indian spice backed by some dark coffee powder / dark bitter choc. Good riipe currants and plums framed with velvety thick and chewy texture from the tannins. At first, I thought it too thick for the fruits and acidity to balance off. But it was a little better balanced after the bottle decanting.

2005 Voyager Estate Girt By Sea, Margaret River (JH94)
WADA rated 79pts
Dark purple. Earthy and oaked..it feels like being in a furniture workshop. Also, some dirtiness on the nose and some interesting choking chilli / curry smells. Good blackberries provide the body ending with some powdery tannins. Finishes rather short.

2005 La Fleur de Bouard, Lalande de Pomerol (WS90, RP89)
WADA rated 85pts
Dense purple with a reddish hue. Sharper intense unripe cherries. Hints of green. Very dense on the mouthfeel with black cherry tart lined with liquorice. This is good drinking even now, good balance with no alcohol heat and smooth sweet tannins. It's like a girl with just the right amount of makeup. Elegant. Noted some dark mushrooms notes on the finish. At the start, the nose seems in contradiction to the palate but after bottle decanting, the nose got jammier.

2004 Balnaves Cabernet Merlot, Coonawara (JO95, JH94)
WADA rated 83+pts
Sharp metalic nose, cherry and some pepper. Good cherry currants with plums. Sharp tannins that brings you just on the edge.

2005 Robert Mondavi Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley (WE91)
WADA rated 79pts
Strong on oak & alcohol when first tasted, this is just choking all the other fruit flavours. However, I had re-tasted the leftover the next day and held out beautifully well. Typical new world approach with intense plums & hints of blackberries and mint. Not many layers of flavours but this is like a big-bosomed gal that doesn't need to take much reading into....simple eye candy.

1999 Pepper Tree Grand Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon, Coonawara
WADA rated 84+pts
This is a grand ole dame with new world decadence aura. This is what aussie wines can do when good and aged. Still intense but with some elegance ...full mouthfeel with good dark fruits with a dash of eucalyptus mint and some dark choc. Medium to long finish that is satisfying.

Asia Grand Restaurant (80p)

331, North Bridge Road. #01-02 Odeon Towers Singapore 188720
Tel : 6887-0010 Fax : 6887-0020
Business Hour : 11.30 am to 2.00 pm , 6.30 pm to 10.30 pm

WADA rating: 52+28=80pts
QPI: 8 ($40 per pax for a very comfortable meal)
WFI: A (Free corkage, good stemware , staff are wine-smart enough to distinguish between using a white wine glass v a red wine glass)
Tasted various times.

Another current favourite restaurant of mine, this restaurant and my family go back a long way...It used to be known as Tsui Hang Restaurant at the pre-overhauled Marina Square before evolving into Asia Grand @ the old Asia Hotel and finally ...it has now settled in the ex-location of renowned "Chef Chan's Heavenly Three Ultimates" (shen chu san jue). The decor at its current location reminds me very much of a business-lunch class chinese restaurant in HK...very cina, very empress dowager...v cliche but its sure to impress. My dad's "good fren" - the restaurant manager , Mr Jacky Ma, also adds to the very HK restaurant feel. He's been around with this restaurant since Tsui Hang days (roughly 20 years ago).

What's Good

Steamed Cold Crab
A very simply prepared dish that stands out because of the sheer quality of the seafood used. Jacky Ma intro-ed this dish to us..said it was some special crab from don't know hokkaido or off South China Sea. Whatever it was... this crab is wicked stuff! If you are wondering what I mean by clean / purity of taste...this is it. Its also not expensive..was like $30 per crab which is well worth the money. The crab roe was bright saffron coloured like those of monk robes. The paste consistency provided much fresh sweetness to the crab meat , which in turn was ocean fresh and wild. The cherry on the topping is the well-mixed vinegar & brown sugar sauce accompanying it. Perfect acid balance with a sugary edge that brings out the true fresh sweetness of the crab. This dish SCREAMS OUT for some minerally, citrus-framed white vino!

Roasted Peking Duck
The foremost reason that kept me going to this restaurant is the $30 special offer Peking Duck (no min spending required) and its not some cheap gimmicks to attract the crowds and at the same time get rid of unwanted stock. The duck is GOOD man! Textbook quality that all other peking duck should take lead from. This is the standard...well-roasted dark reddish crispy skin with just enough fats to give it juice and not grease up the palate. Clean flavours. I could have this everyday and actually its really possible given the $30 price tag! This is a good deal that just makes any diner happy...pl pl pl order it even if you are a vegetarian. Its perfect with a good glass of Pinot or a Grenache.

Beef in Mushroom Roll
Lovely smells permeating from the dish..if you close your eyes, you might think you are standing just next to the ventilation fan of a Czi Char stall. Some sesame oil on the nose. The abnoxiously intense flavours of the dark brownish gravy reminds me of Japanese teppanyaki-teriyaki sauce but with chinese "hua diao" wine providing the structure. The beef literally slides down your throat with its velvety texture. The straw mushrooms add a nice chewiness that is much appreciated.

Fried Black Pepper Udon (with the carved up meat from the Peking Duck)
This is fried udon at its best. A 100 pts dish. Its perfect in all aspects. As my foodie brother puts it : " you want to slowly savour this." It is a heavenly balance of "wok hei", saltiness, oiliness, spiciness (from the black pepper sauce), sweetness (from the duck meat) and roastiness! The flavours hits you on the front and peaks all the way to the finish...that lingers on with pepperiness...just like an excellent shiraz...nothing less than an Old Bastard(the wine). Perfect.














Black Pepper Beef Cubes
Another very well balanced dish with just the right amount of spice from the black pepper. A well oiled dish with once again good "wok hei" showing in the after taste. Beef is as tender as chicken with the right level of done-ness.

What's Not

Conqueror Chicken
This is basically the samsui chicken from Soup Restaurant but it fades in comparison. Nothing special, a little bland and the ginger / spring onion dip is not at all comparable to Soup Restaurant. Eat only if you are recovering from a long bout of illness.
So far, the quality has been consistent and most dishes are good or at least of above average standards. Their dim sum is a little just bordering above average and I would recommend to avoid or eat as an accompaniment to the ala carte.

Other Dishes Tasted

We tried their basic stable of dim sum favourites like har gao, siew mai, chicken feet etc....all okay with none outstanding. A few claypot dishes like the pork ribs with bitter melon, brinjal with minced meat, chicken...all of which were very tasty and shouts for fragrant white royal umbrella thai rice. Also, had various vege dishes, sweet sour pork , coffee pork ribs etc. (all of which are good too).
About two years back when Asia Grand was at Asia hotel, we also had a steamed fish with mandarin peels and olives which I fondly remember as extremely exciting and appetizing with its play of flavours...will try to re-taste this some day.

Comments

Service is prompt, straightforward and generally warm. True to keeping with HK styled traditional restaurants, there are always a few captains / managers in their well-pressed suits going about chatting with customers. Not only does Jacky impress with his knowledge on wines, his staff does impress me with their understanding of the various types of stemware for various varieties of wine. Bring your family here, bring your colleagues here, bring your clients here and even bring your mistress(es) here! cos this place will impress with its comfortable vibe and grand setting. It appropriately deserves its name - Asia Grand.

Wine Pairings Done

Pl see http://wadadvocate.blogspot.com/2008/04/almost-all-shiraz-night-asia-grand.html

Also tasted recently here with my family:

2003 Jean-Marc Pillot & fils, Chassagne Montrachet Blanc, Bourgogne
WADA rated 82+pts
Pale yellow. A buttery nose ...reminiscent of butterscotch and some baygon! Lemon peel and slightly toasty , it finishes off with some bitterness and some alcohol heat. Needs another year or two.

1998 Chandon De Brialilles, Pernand Vergelesses 1er Cru, Bourgogne
WADA rated 77+pts
Light brick red with brown tinge. Red cherries and some bell peppers peeping through. Sharp manuka honey mixed with deflated cola framed by a fresh acidity (despite 10yrs of aging). However, loses out on the short finish.

2001 Coriole Mary Kathleen Reserve Cabernet Merlot, Mclarenvale
WADA rated 82pts We had this decanted because the first whiff and taste was very closed up. The decanted dark reddish wine displayed strong oak with sweet vanilla and dark red fruits. Very bordeaux styled with some strawberries and plums backed by some inkishess. Hints of roasted coffee as well. Could do better if it found greater balance.

Pairing Suggestions

A myriad of cuisines that can be paired with a wide variety of wines. If in doubt, just ask Mr Jacky Ma for some recommendations from their wine list , which is pretty decent. Bordeaux blends would do well here.

End of Reservist 6th HK ICT Celebrations!

Just had this to celebrate the end of my In-Camp Training and the fact that I got SILVER!! for IPPT (that's $200 free dollars from our beloved Gahmen!)

Tapanappa is a joint venture between Brian Croser, Bollinger and the Cazes Family of Lynch Bages.

2005 Tapanappa Tiers Chardonnay, Piccadilly (WS93, GV86)
WADA rated 83+ to 93+
Light golden. Extremely tight on the nose and palate. It does eventually open up but I suspect that this wine is way too early to drink even with decanting. Extremely dense and intense. A very serious wine. Hits you upfront with an asteroid of co-mingled vapours and flavours...very hard to break it down...it slowly melts like butter on a hot pan into your palate with waves of butter, green fruits, bitter lemons, honey oats and earthy/mineral-like complexity. Throughout the 30mins of tasting, this wine seems unresolved...undecided in its direction...like an adolescent...it just keeps going back and forth with its flavours. I also caught more nuttiness after 15mins...somewhere between cashews, almonds and macadamia. To wrap it up...there are some petrol-like nuances (which Uncle L calls Benzene) lurking at the back palate which is a little too hot for me...almost unbalanced ...but it seems to pull back and gets engulfed in its own evolving atmosphere of vapours. This is dificult to rate being so tight and unsettled. Therefore, at the moment, a range of 83 to 93 is probably the best range we can give. I suspect another year or so in the bottle will stabilise this monster and maybe give it more creaminess.

Min Jiang @ One Rochester (64+~74+p)

5 Rochester Park ,Tel: 67740122, 11.00am to2.30pm & 6.00pm to 10.30pm Daily

WADA rating: (42 to 52) +22.5= 64+ to 74+ pts

QPI: 6 ($60 per pax

WFI: C ($35 corkage per bot, Schwott Zwissel stemware but glasses are not well polished, wine list is deplorable for such an atas-class restaurant

Tasted twice in 1H 2008. Most recently with my family and bro in May.

Min Jiang (@ Goodwood Park Hotel) used to be a favourite food haunt for my family back when I was still attending pri school. Back then, it had already established itself as a premier sichuan restaurant famous for its smoked duck and kung po prawns. Its only appropriate that we have my bro's farewell dinner here before he leaves for Perth. My rating has been given as a range due to the fact that during the most recent visit, I had been down with a sore throat which would definitely have impaired my judgement. To add salt to wound, half of the restaurant had been booked for a wedding and the other half was explodingly full. Signs of stress were evident in their less than adequate service standards with spillover effects on food quality as well. Fortunately for them, our first visit had nullified any negativity caused by the second.

What's Good

Smoked Peking Duck
If there is only one dish to order here, you CANNOT NOT order the duck! Pre-ordering is required, this is worth all the trouble just because of its uniqueness and pains taken to slowly cook this goose (by goose ..i mean the duck). The smokiness of various fragrant woods are infused wholly into the crunchy skin and half-juicy meat. This dish is eaten in three flights. Firstly, the light crunchy skin is taken with a coating of sugar and this pairing is absolutely fabulous! The thin layer of fat with each slice of the skin perfectly gels the woody smokiness with the granules of sugar. Second flight consists of freshly steamed crepe wrapped around a nice sizeable delectable piece of duck meat with skins on and throw in a sprig of spring onion and sweet sauce. The difference this dish brings with the normal peking duck is the smoky spice flavours infused into duck meat instead of just crispy duck skin. The third flight is my favourite eaten also in a crepe but with exciting spicy sourness contributed by sichuan "archar"...v interesting.

Chef Goh's Tasting Platter
Spectacular fireworks-like presentation...in a high class way...a great start. A constellation of four of the Chef's star specialties - Salted Egg Yolk Lobster, Sichuan Fried Chicken, Fried Eel, Scallops with Sweet Chilli Sauce. The scallops were so-so with sweet thai chilli drizzled over. The chicken reminded me of KFC's popcorn chicken...add in a dash of chilli powder. The lobster is quite nice with powdery salted egg yolk coating that is pleasantly just salty enough not to totally cover the taste of the lobster. I really do like the fried eel...its like eel fries with fragrant sesame oil and sweet honey aromas. Good crunchiness that makes this a perfect accompaniment to a mug of beer...but in our context.. maybe a dryer white wine. This has the longest lasting aftertaste with the fishiness of the eel showing on the end notes.

Soups

We ordered a few selections of their soups to taste but two left a deeper impression. The Sze Chuan Spicy Sour Thick Soup can be summed up as "elegant". Perfect balance between the sichuan peppercorns spiciness , the red vinegar sourness and the sichuan preserved vegetables saltiness. I thought there was a dash of sugar on the near finish as well. The other was a clear chicken soup broth which my failing memory remembers as very refreshing, delicately savory sweet and appetizing.

Durian Mochi and Durian Pudding

This is the other NOT-TO-BE-MISSED! dessert dish besides the smoked duck. As all foodies would already know, Min Jiang is closely associated with Goodwood Park Hotel, which in turn is famous for its durian puffs. However, the chefs at Min Jiang (Rochester) have taken it up another level by using the same high quality durian fillings and presenting them using different mediums. I especially like to give two thumbs up to the mochi... its like a chewy durian fruit bomb that explodes with sweet durian goodness in a bite.

What's Not

The high expectations I had of this establishment probably meant that I had unfairly expected ALL their dishes to be special or at least above average good. So here are some of the expectation mismatches I have....
The Fried Sichuan Style four season beans were a little too salty and tame to warrant anything more than one thumbs up.
The Kung Pow Prawns were also not as exciting as how we remembered it to be years ago at their Goodwood Park location. A lil on the sweet side and not spicy enough...maybe they brought the dish down a notch to attune to the many foreigner palates that patronise this outlet. Once again, good but not great.

Other Dishes Tasted

Black pepper beef and Pork Ribs....both as can be seen from the photo, looks and tastes pretty good with good "wok hei" showing for the beef and perfect sweet-savory balance for the pork ribs. Also, do try their steamed xiao long bao and other dim sum dishes.

Comments

After two visits, I am getting mixed feelings due to the vastly different vibes felt on the two occasions. No doubt, this is an above average restaurant but at the same time...maybe I had expected much more given the prices.
The service on the second visit had been bad but probably they were too packed and had to employ newbies to fill up the waitering void. We had a nasty tussle over Durian Mochi when we were told that they had run out of it even though we had suggested to pre-order desserts at the start. After some haggling , they finally relented and told us to wait 15 mins for it...but guess what..after 20mins later with no mochi in sight...we had decided to live with the disappointment.
The serving staff can be best described as a Camry...feels and looks like a luxury car but its really still not a mercs or beemer. However, all said they did waiver our corkage fee! Definitely a redeeming factor.
I want to reserve final judgement until my next visit (hopefully when its not so packed) but until then...my recommendation is go try the Smoked Peking Duck...its definitely worth its price in quality and uniqueness.

Wine Pairings Done

2005 Devil's Lair Chardonnay, Margaret River (JO92, JH95, WS91)
Disastrous! This wine went bad! Most probably tainted during the bottling. Will re-taste this some other time.

2005 Fish Rock Chardonnay, South Aust
WADA rated 78pts
We had to order this wine of the month (@ $80!!!) to replace the Devil's Lair. Have never heard of this label and the bottling looks cheap...most prob its supposed to be a entry level table white. But...suprisingly enough...this was actually quite good! Very intense white fruit aromas...some lychees and pineapples even...sweetness borders between real fruit sweetness and fakey sugar sweet. Good effort but prob not worth $80.

2001 Woodlands Kevin Cabernet Sauvignon (JO87)
WADA rated 87pts
Dark fruits ..plums...chocolate and nicely integrated oak. This seriously tasted like a good bordeaux...it shared some similar characteristics of the Pape Clement 01. Really serious and elegant wine. A pity the cuisine here doesn't seem to bring out its full complexity.

2005 Kooyong Haven Pinot Noir, Mornington Peninsula (JH96)
WADA rated 83pts
Red cherries with hints of strawberries. Good fresh acidity that goes especially well with the smoked duck. Silky texture with mid length finish. Could improve with age as complexity develops.

Pairing Suggestions

Except for the Smoked Duck, all the other dishes would definitely do better if paired with a white...I would say a less complex chard or a clean crisp new world riesling / gurwurtztraminer. I suggest you bring your own wine or recommend that they get a wine sommelier to redo their wine list...its SUX! big time...not many recognisable names and its bloody expensive. It makes paying $35 corkage a much better alternative...so pl...BYOB!