Grape wall: which varieties are the ones to watch in China?
Janet Z Wang, author of The Chinese Wine Renaissance, gives her breakdown of the grape varieties showing great promise in Chinese soil. Eloise Feilden reports.
When Wang published The Chinese Wine Renaissance: A Wine Lover’s Companion in 2019, her aim was to offer a taste of China through its winemaking history.
Earlier this year, Wang announced that the Académie du Vin Library would be distributing the 2nd edition of her book, updated to reflect the changing face of China’s wine industry in the years since the Covid-19 pandemic.
Eloise Feilden caught up with Wang to see which grape varieties the banker-turned-wine expert believes are exhibiting potential in China. So which grapes are coming out on top as the market matures?
“Marselan is definitely the one to watch for China,” Wang said. The variety, a Cabernet Sauvignon x Garnacha cross first obtained by Paul Truel in 1961, this southern French grape has found significant appeal among winegrowers in Mainland China.
Wang dubbed Marselan the “overwhelming rising star” of Chinese viticulture. “It’s true that if you want an example of the best Marselan produced anywhere in the world today, you would look to China,” she said with confidence. “China is setting the standard for good quality Marselan.”
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Wang isn’t the only one to think so; speaking to db in March, 67 Pall Mall’s Richard Hemming MW described Marselan as China’s flagship grape. “I’ve tasted a lot of Marselan recently, and it offers a real point of difference to the better-known varieties,” he said at the time.
In Marselan China can carve out its own distinct niche. “China has the opportunity to define the archetype of Marselan, offering something familiar yet distinctive to wine lovers. It will take a long time to establish Chinese Marselan as one of the world’s signature styles, but from the wines I’ve tasted, that process has already started,” Hemming added.
Other grapes are also beginning to set a standard among Chinese winemakers.
“Petit Manseng is something to watch,” Wang said. The grape has a remarkable ability to concentrate sugars while retaining very high acidity, making it ideal for high-quality aromatic sweet wines made from grapes picked as late as November or December in the Northern Hemisphere. According to Wang, winemakers in China are using the grape to make “beautiful dry and sweet wines” which are gaining popularity.
The potential of Chinese sweet wine continues to grow, particularly in the case of ice wine. “Ice Wine is a category to really watch in China, because in the northern provinces they already have the capacity to produce more ice wine than Canada,” Wang explained. Indeed, China is the second largest global producer of ice wine, and produces approximately 40% of the world’s ice wine. Significant portions of the industry occur in the northern Gansu and Liaoning provinces, with smaller portions in Yunnan in the southwest of the country and Xinjiang in the northeast.
Wang is also seeing promise in crossings and native grapes which producers in China have made strides with in recent years. This includes grapes which previously “weren’t very commercially viable or didn’t make reliable vintages before, but are now coming through”.
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