Wine Times On New Years Resolutions

As January starts we all begin to convince ourselves that giving something up is the best way to start the year so we indulge in the common practice of taking up a New Year’s resolution. I have tried on many occasions to give up smoking at this time of year and so this year, I am not going to make that resolution.  Nor am I going to give up drinking as, if I did, I would be out of a job!

According to Wikipedia, 88 per cent of all New Year’s resolutions are doomed to failure and, according to the Guardian newspaper, as little as 35 per cent of all smaller goaled resolutions actually succeed. So, I get to thinking, what’s the point of making sweeping statements and resolutions when they are, according to the percentages, destined for failure?

Asking around groups of wine lovers in Hong Kong the general consensus is that most of us want to get fitter, lose weight, join a gym and eat less fatty foods. All are worthy of an attempt but New Year’s resolutions are generally made at a time of the year when you are at your most vulnerable, that is, right after Christmas and New Year, a time when we have all indulged heavily and the post-alcoholic guilt is slowly setting in.

Setting realistic goals as resolutions are good though. In a world where another country is just a click of a mouse away or a swipe of an iPhone away, there is no excuse for not keeping in touch with family members abroad. Even with the most advanced technology in our hands, we still find it difficult to make time for family in a world where avarice and making money are viewed as more important than family. I am as bad as anyone – seldom do I call my sister, or my parents for that matter and, when my loving mother e-mails me, it sits in my inbox for a good week or two before I get around to answering it. So, I am going to make sure I keep in better touch with my family this year.

But what about wine? Last year when I was writing for Time Out, I resolved to try to put a more positive spin on Chinese wines. A noble effort was made but, yet to encounter more than a handful of wines made in China that were worthy of swallowing, it was a difficult task. By not being negative about Chinese wine, I figure I completed this resolution quite well.

This year, I want to try more wines from countries around the world that are not on the commercial wine lists you see around town. This also should take into account wines from smaller wine producing regions within established wine producing countries too. I want to try more from Patagonia in Argentina for example. I want to taste more wines from Romania, Bulgaria, Macedonia and Moldova too.

There is such a wealth of wine available in Hong Kong that there’s no excuse for being a little adventurous when it comes to you r choice of wine here. The tide of change is slowly working here with less interest on reading about French wines (sure, they still dominate the consumption market) as people think they know enough and are moving their interest onto other countries – currently Spain and Italy take that mantle.

As far as Italy goes, I have had to eat my words as 2012 came to an end and my sweeping generalization that “I do not like Italian wines made from non-indigenous grapes” changed somewhat as I found some great Cabernets and Merlots from Chianti. Never a huge fan of super Tuscans, I still have a little bit of distain for the wines, but have come to the conclusion that you cannot base your judgment on one or two wines you have tried…..you have to try as many as you can before you can make a committed statement as such. Although, I think this year I would like to try more regional varietals from Italy such as Primitivo, Negro Amaro and the diverse wines of Sicily. With the number of Italian tastings that go on in the city, I don’t think it will be hard to meet this expectation.

I am not one to base a wine on price, although I do know that the cheaper the wine, the cheaper the production costs and, in general, the higher the levels of wine produced by a winery. This has, and still does, somewhat affect how I buy wine for my own consumption at home. A wine snob I certainly am not but do I want to buy the cheap wines off the supermarket shelf? Maybe not, but that does not meant that I can’t as there are hundreds of millions of people around the world that do that on a daily basis. Thus, I invite people to make a decision (and give an opinion) on the wines they are drinking before they ask about the price. Just because it’s expensive…..does not make it good. (Note that at Wine Times we do not talk about the price of the wines we write about).

Sweeping through the Facebook pages both yesterday and today I see many of you are going to either give up something you perceive as bad, or take up something you perceive as good as a New Year’s resolution. I can only wish you the best of luck and hope that you don’t fall into the 88 per cent failure category. With my New Year’s resolution being to drink more wine, I see no reason why I should fail in that – I guess the only obstacle to that is fitness and health so maybe, just maybe, I might join a gym, eat healthier food, get fitter and quit smoking. Then again….probably not!

Good luck all that are doing resolutions and do let us know how it’s going.

(main photo taken from techpsot.com)