'Beijing girl' embraces romance of Bordeaux, wine culture

Beijing native Feng Wei coauthors the recently published book Bordeaux, a guide to pair Chinese food with French wines.

Soon she was organizing dinners with wine for companies and at hotels in China's big cities, most recently in the capital. At hotels, she gets a sense of the menu and the available wines, and sometimes makes suggestions for additional vintages.

Her recently published book, coauthored with Laurent Moujon and written in French and Chinese, is a guide to pairing fine wines with Chinese food.

"There are eight formal families of Chinese food, but actually 15 distinct cuisines. I wrote the book to help every wine find its Mr Right in food."

Hong Kong and Shandong cuisines, she notes as examples, are very flexible.

"They are not so spicy, they use a big variety of ingredients and natural preparation."

Strongly flavored foods like those of Sichuan province require more thinking, she says.

"People must decide first if they want a wine that will effectively reduce the spiciness, something fresh and light, or if they want something strong enough to stand up to the food as an equal."

Her own preference is the former. She would opt for an inexpensive sparkling wine with most spicy foods, "something nicely balanced, fruity but not too sweet".

It's like designing a marriage, she says with a grin.