Di Vino – wine bar in Thonglor, Bangkok

February 7, 2011

The entry of di Vino wine bar in Thonglor

If you walk through the Thonglor-Ekkamai neighbourhood in Bangkok you might come to the conclusions that wine bars are like mushrooms, sprouting everywhere.

A good place to hang out, enjoy a glass of wine and have some Italian cuisine, is di Vino, a small and cosy wine bar in Thonglor, Bangkok. The play on words is funny too, is it “divine” or “of wine”? Both I suggest.

Roberto, the manager-owner, is a very sociable guy and a pleasure to talk to. He loves quality in wine and food and he is also a good cook. For my wife he made a fegato dish (liver), very difficult to make indeed, which was just superb. And he offers some great wine choices.

For instance the ‘2003 Il Lemos Negroamaro’ by Leone di Castris. The wine is not displayed on the website of Leone de Castris any more. You will fnid there only younger vintages. But the company has a wide selection of different wines on offer.

Leone de Castris was established in 1925 and the winery was the first in Italy which bottled rose wines. Many of its products are made from indigeneous grape varieties such as Negroamara, Primitivo and Aleatico.

2003 Il Lemos by Leone de Castris

This Negroamaro from Puglia produced in the Salento region, the heel of Italy, is just wonderful. It is a very earthy wine, rustic in character. Often it is blended with the highly scented Malvasia Negra as in the case of Salice Salentino. The grape produces some of the best wines of southern Italy.

Roberto has still some bottles left of the 2003 vintage, but you have to hurry to taste it before it is gone.

Address:
Di Vino
Penny’s Balcony, Thong Lo Soi 55,
Sukhumvit Road, Watthana, Bangkok, 10110

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Chinese New Year – Bring the rabbit on

February 6, 2011

I took a time out from blogging. While just watching from the sidelines I had a record number of visitors to my entry on the Johanna Budwig diet which I wrote as tribute to my friend, the late Peter Ryan. But since then, I had declining numbers of visitors to my blog. Well, let’s resume.

Every Chinese New Year we have a family at a Chinese restaurant in our neighbourhood Thonglor called Royal Kitchen.

The restaurant is just a side street away from where we live.

Happy New Year and good wishes from the Adam family

So what did we eat? Well, it was bit of a mix. We started with some dumplings, had lots of prawns, some tofu, a steamed fish and some sweet and sour soup.

Fried dumplings

Prawns in orange

Prawns Shanghai style

Sichuan style tofu

Hmm, was delicious on rice

Sea bass steamed sorry, I came to late for the photo

Sweet and sour soup

Needless to say that the meal was delicious and we had a great time on the first day of the year of the rabbit.

PS: We drank beer and we did not eat rabbit, honestly.

Address:
Royal Kitchen Restaurant
912/6 Sukhumvit 55, Bangkok, Thailand 10110
Tel.: +66-2391 9634, and 2714 8548
e-mail: info@royalkitchengroup.com
www.Royalkitchengroup.com

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Merry Christmas from Bangkok

December 23, 2010

I wish all of you Merry Christmas. Hope you have a peaceful and relaxing time with family and friends.

Cheers everyone

I have a poem for you. It’s from my favourite poet, Jelaluddin Rumi or Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Balkhī (Persian: جلال‌الدین محمد بلخى) and popularly known as Mowlānā (Persian: مولانا). The poem goes like this:

Say I am You

I am dust particles in sunlight.
I am the round sun.
To the bits of dust I say, Stay.
To the sun, Keep moving.

I am the morning mist,
and the breathing of evening.
I am the wind in the top of a grove,
and surf on the cliff.

Mast, rudder, helmsman, and keel,
I am also the coral reef they founder on.
I am a tree with a trained parrot in its branches.
Silence, though, and voice.

The musical air coming through a flute,
a spark of a stone, a flickering
in metal. Both, candle
and the moth crazy around it.
Rose and the nightingale,
lost in the fragrance.

I am all orders of being, the circling galaxy,
the evolutionary intelligence, the lift,
and the falling away. What is,
and what isn’t.

You who know Jelaluddin, You the one in all, say who I am.
Say I am you.

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Christmas season lunch in Bangkok

December 18, 2010

While Europe is going under in snow, Bangkok is enjoying coolish winter days, some of them nice and sunny with temperatures in the mid twenties. Then a light lunch is what we need.

Grilled vegetables and some cold cuts are just the right food. And what do you drink with it?

Well, a ‘2007 Sauvignon Blanc’ by Mount Nelson from New Zealand is just the right wine. Apart from Riesling and Silvaner (only from Franconia), Sauvignon Blanc is my favourite white. Moreover, it goes well with light summer lunches, I think.

Grilled ‘veggies’

Cold cuts

Golden Sauvignon Blanc

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Back from the Mosel River

August 12, 2010

Photo taken in Paris at the City Museum

The Man from Mosel River is back in action. After a long, long flight yesterday, we got home to Bangkok safely but exhausted. The summer holidays are over. Needless to say that we had a great time in Europe.

I gained extremely valuable experience with old and new wines and in the process of wining and dining three to four kilos of additional weight. I am also “loaded” with stories of wine, food and play “incidents”.

Europe and its people were kind to us. The summer was just wonderful; blue sky and warm, even hot (we had 45-48 Celsius in Rome) at times, with long and glorious evenings which we spent in beer gardens, restaurants and at barbecues with family and friends.

It is nice to be home again. The weather in Bangkok is humid and cooler than when we left Thailand five weeks ago. Moreover, today is a public holiday and I have time to recover from the excruciating flight.

Sparkle sparkle little wine

I was not able to produce any blog entry after the one on Villa Bucci, Italy. Ever since we have visited Paris, the “Muensterland”, Bavaria, and enjoyed wines from the Mosel, Saar, Nahe and Main (Franconia) among others. In the days to come, I will try to work on my material and extract some interesting information which I will post on the Man from Mosel River.

Bear with me and cheers to the good times.

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Australian barbecue

May 24, 2010

What do you do if there is a curfew at night? You celebrate in the daytime and this is what we did. We invited two families with their children and the 13 of us had a great time last Saturday. Starting at 1 pm gives you plenty of time, and we love it if our table can be put to good use.

We can easily sit 12 persons, and I just sneaked in on the corner. As it is Australian custom, the man has to operate the barbecue, and that’s what I did. My Weber is doing a great job. The recipes came from Italy though. I had a large piece of pork which we prepared the Italian way as “majale al rosto”. Moreover, we had, Italian “spiedini”, skewers consisting of spicy sausages, beef, bacon and sage leaves between them. All delicious stuff.

Seven teenagers and six adults around one table

And what comes at the end of an Australian barbecue? Right a pavlova, the wonderful and delicious, classical Australian dessert, especially if it has 40 Celsius outside.

Pavlova

We drank mostly beer but had also a couple of bottles of ‘2008 Yering Chardonnay’ from the oldest vineyard in the Yarra Valley, which they “flog” in our local supermarket at the moment (but which still costs about 12 EURO/bottle).

What a jolly good time we had.

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Bangkok riots – in no mood for blogging

May 22, 2010

What a week that was! The centre of Bangkok fell victim to senseless rioting, violence and destruction where many people lost their lives. Finally order was restored and curfews imposed in the night. Today is the first day we feel some relieve. It’s over for the time being. It doesn’t feel as heavy as the last few days. Time to relax, time for a drink, no?

Phuket Lager

Phuket Lager is one of my favourite beers here in Thailand. It’s not just the label which is cool. The beer has a lovely hops taste, is no heavy and makes a very refreshing drink on a hot Saturday (or any other day I guess). When next time in Thailand, try it our.

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Away with the fairies – The Iron Fairies in Bangkok

May 4, 2010

A magical place

The Iron Fairies is the coolest hangout in Thonglor, our neighbourhood in Bangkok. On any night of the week, it is busy and buzzing with people. This Wine Bar cum Restaurant might even be the most hip place in town.

I pass by every day when walking to and from my office but it took me a while to check it out myself. It’s been there for about six months. In front of the narrow building, strange equipment is “parked”, sometimes an old motorbike, sometimes and old pump or other ancient equipment.

Ashley Sutton, the owner, originally from Perth, Western Australia, is a great host. He is not only a successful children’s book author but also a blacksmith, bar man, restaurant manager and who knows what. He is always there and makes sure his clients get what they want. He has a lot of experience because the Iron Fairies in Bangkok is not his first wine and jazz bar. There are Iron Fairies in Perth and new York.

We asked him for his best red wine, and he recommended a Xanadu Cabernet Sauvignon from Western Australia. It was a good choice. We got a decent wine for a decent price. Also the food was not bad, although the burgers are a bit on the sweet side.

There is also great entertainment at the Iron Fairies. We were lucky to have four young Thai jazz musicians who made our time most enjoyable. On Saturday nights a magician is the attraction.

The Iron Fairies is a very small place and fills up quickly so that latest at about 10 pm, the doors are closed. We were early and it was during the week so that we had a choice where to sit.

In the daytime, the Iron Fairies is also a workshop, a place where fairies are made. Unfortunately, my old digital camera does not produce good pictures if the light is not right. Therefore, only the above photo is available to me.

I found some good pics on the internet. But of course, the best is you check it our yourself. If you come to Bangkok, come to Thonglor and visit the Iron Fairies.

The Iron Fairies

Address:
Iron Fairies
394 Thonglor Road (Sukhumvit Soi 55), Bangkok
(opposite Ton Krueng Thai Restaurant)
Tel.: +66 (0) 84 425 8080
Open Monday-Saturday, 8pm to 2am

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Food and wine pairing

March 31, 2010

Beautiful scrimps in garlic and olive oil

In the hot weather of March and April big meals are not very attractive. Alas, Thailand has a lot of choice in seafood and lighter dishes are the go. Some rice with tofu and green vegetables and plenty of scrimps are the right stuff for a light meal. The question is which wine to drink with it?

A simple “Chinese set” meal

There is a lot of choice actually. As far as white wines are concerned one could choose a Chenin Blanc from Gran Monte, Thailand, for instance. Or one could have a Pinot Grigio from Italy or Germany. Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc are other possible choices.

If the dish is spicy, and the above one was, the ‘Grande Signature de Rapatel’ by Gérard Eyraud, France, a blend of Roussanne and Bourboulenc, is a great choice. The wine is oily and thick and full of apricot flavour. It balances the spicyness of the food in a wonderful way. I never thought that a Roussanne could be such a good complement to Asian food. My tip of the day: try it.

PS: You can get bottles of this wine in Bangkok from Lake House and Comte de Sibour.

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What wine to drink in Bangkok’s hot season?

March 24, 2010

This is the time of the year when the thermometer shows already 32 degrees Celsius at 6:30 in the morning. In mid April it may reach 40-44 Celsius at noon. Alcoholic drinks are not ideal under such conditions. However, a glass of wine with lunch is still something desirable. So what to drink?

Well, my first choice is obviously white wine, maybe a rose, but the wine needs to be chilled. Gran Monte Estate, one of the nine Thai wineries, is located in the Khao Yai region, a two hours drive north of Bangkok, and offers both, white and rose.

Today I talk about their ‘2009 Spring Chenin Blanc’, a fresh and vibrant young wine, very well made with tropical fruit aromas. The grape variety is not my preferred choice when it comes to white wine but for the Gran Monte I make an exception. This Chenin Blanc is perfect for hot days and goes well with Italian and Asian dishes. The alcohol is 12.5% only which makes it also easy to drink in hot weather.

If you live in Thailand or visit Bangkok, try it out. It is worth the odd 500 Thai Bath you pay for the bottle if you purchase directly from the Gran Monte Bangkok shop.

PS: Gran Monte offers also a Syrah rose (the Sakuna rose) in a half bottle which I have tried as well. More about this wine another time.

Address in Bangkok:
Granmonte Co,Ltd.
17 / 8 Soi Sukhumvit 6, Sukhumvit Road,
Klongtoey, Bangkok 10110
Tel : 02-653-1522
Marketing@granmonte.com

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