4 top China wine producers pushing quality and reputation

China’s top wine producers are leading a surging effort to increase the quality and reputation of the whole Chinese wine industry. That was the message from a video seminar “Unconventional Chinese Terroir” I recently attended (July 7), co-organized by Ethica Wines, Alberto Recupero of StudioKom and the Hong Kong wine news site Vino-Joy.com, where four premium Chinese wineries were invited to speak about their wines and their distinctive terroirs. Winemakers and owners of Grace Vineyard from Shanxi, Silver Heights from Ningxia, Ao Yun (LVMH) from Yunnan, and Puchang from Xinjiang led the talk.

Natalie Wang, founder and chief editor of Vino-Joy News, recollects that 10 years ago, the idea of inviting someone to drink Chinese wine was probably “the equivalent to serving leftover chicken wings on a Christmas eve.” But now things have changed.

Grace Vineyard, a Shanxi-based winery founded by Hong Kong businessman C.K. Chan in 1997 was among the first quality wineries to be recognized globally. Before long, a few boutique producers from Ningxia such as Helan Qingxue and Silver Heights also earned a reputation through positive reviews from international critics, gold medals they won from major international wine competitions, as well as the efforts of their retailers. These names now top many lists of fine Chinese wine.

The major wine regions in China are Shandong, Ningxia, Hebei (and Beijing), Xinjiang, Yunnan and Shanxi. Bordeaux red varieties and chardonnay are still the most popular cultivars, though the popularity of marselan and syrah is picking up. In the freezing cold northeastern corner of China, Liaoning and Jilin provinces have seen success with ice wine using hardy hybrids like vidal.

Many people wonder which region they should look for in such a vast country. China has a total area of 855,000 hectares planted under vines, according to OIV, second only to Spain (though the data included vineyards for table grapes and raisins). Many believe Ningxia is where the future of Chinese wine lies.

Grace Vineyard planted 67 hectares of vineyards in Qingtongxia of Ningxia in 2011, adding to their 80 hectares of vines planted in 1998 in Shanxi’s Taigu Plateau. “The grapes in Ningxia tend to develop a darker color with its intense sunshine and dry climate,” said Yean Yean Lee, chief winemaker at Grace. They have planted Bordeaux varieties and shiraz, and now make a blend of cabernet sauvignon sourced across from two regions — Shanxi and Ningxia, as the color of cabernet sauvignon in Shanxi can be quite pale despite a more elegant style. I have had a few of these cabernet-driven blends that almost had a pinot noir-esque sensibility and syrah pepperiness. If not diluted, the wine can be very interesting. Chateau Rongzi of Shanxi makes some stylish wines like these, but few know that Jean-Claude Berrouet, the former winemaker of Petrus, has been consulting for them and fly at least twice a year to the winery. 

“Consistency is the key, and the climates in Shanxi can be very variable,” said Yean. “I remember my first vintage in Grace Vineyard—2006, there was a severe frost, and in 2007, my second harvest, it was very rainy, and before the harvest, the vineyard looked like a swimming pool. Another good thing about Ningxia is the intense government support, which you don’t get in other regions.

“But in Shanxi, now we are practicing dry farming here as the rainfall is enough, and we don’t need to worry about the acidity. And of course, in Ningxia, acidification is common, and you need to irrigate the vineyards and bury the vines in the soil before the winter comes.”

The burying process represents a considerable task and brings high labor costs. “This is one of the major issues that keep us away from Ningxia,” said Maxence Dulou, chief winemaker of LVMH’s ambitious Chinese winery Ao Yun. “We traveled many regions before settling down in Yunnan, where we were lucky enough to find vineyards at this altitude tended carefully by the local farmers.”

The Ao Yun winery lies in the distant Xanadu of Mekong Valley in the north of Yunnan province near the border with Tibet (read our report about the recent release of Ao Yun 2016). “By the time we came there, the local people were still selling the grapes by kilos, so we had to work hard to control the yield before we can make excellent wines,” Dulou added.

 

Emma Gao, winemaker of Silver Heights in Ningxia, walked us through her biodynamic farming methods. She converted her vineyards recently with a nod towards ancient Chinese philosophy. The Bordeaux-trained winemaker admitted it was something that she couldn’t understand initially, but Chinese wisdom and culture helped.

“It’s like our Chinese philosophy and medicine, the balance of Ying and Yang, and the regimen that people always talk about in China. Ancient Chinese people also excelled in astrology, and today we have our lunar calendar marking the year with 24 solar terms to help with agriculture,” said Gao, as she showed us a picture of her practicing tai-chi in the vineyards. “In our culture, we try to find harmony with nature.” She added that she believes this is a natural part of life for Chinese people, and applies it in biodynamic farming, which is about finding peace and harmony in the vineyards.

Puchang Winery from Turpan Valley of Xinjiang region is another stellar producer we found in our small tasting last year, featuring 150 Chinese wines. In the marketing and PR side of the wines from Xinjiang, the region is known to share the same latitude with Bordeaux, despite its distinctively arid, desert climate. “We are on the Silk Road, from which the wine grapes were brought to China more than a thousand years ago. So we also decided to plant the ancient, Georgian varieties of saperavi and rkatsiteli, which turned out to be a success,” said Clara Wang, whose father KK Cheung purchased the winery in 2008. The first vine was planted in 1975 and their vineyards were certified organic in 2013.

The success of Puchang is a testimony to the booming diversity of Chinese wines, which offer more than just Bordeaux varieties and chardonnay. Now, they also have beichun planted, a hybrid between wild grapes from Jilin, northern China, and muscat from Xinjiang.

At JamesSuckling.com, we are also up to speed on the latest in the Chinese wine and wine industry. A few top bottles are already leaving us in awe. Last week, James attended a blind tasting in HK featuring six premium Chinese wines standing shoulder to shoulder with some of the finest Bordeaux; the result was inspiring (read here).

While impressive the top bottlings are, Chinese wines still have a long way to go as people work through the problems in the establishment of regulations, pricing, the distribution side of the business to spur more selling. There is also a need to enhance the average quality to improve the image of Chinese wines. With the unremitting efforts of top producers and the support from the local government, Ningxia has already taken the first step. Wait for my upcoming report on Ningxia and stories from some of its high fliers. 

– Zekun Shuai, associate editor in Beijing

Below, we list the wines from the four producers featured in this online seminar.