Lunar New Year (aka Spring Festival, or Guo Nian in Mandarin) is arguably the most important holiday for people of Chinese heritage — especially in Taiwan, where I grew up. It’s been my favorite since I was a kid. Now, living in Brooklyn, I recall that a few days before the New Year every household starts to “sweep the dust” to banish bad luck, erase unhelpful habits, and create positive new ones. On the day before New Year’s Eve (a holiday we call Little New Year’s Eve), we will take down the old Spring Festival couplets and replace them with fresh verses. On New…
Born and raised in Taiwan, now based in NYC, Joyce Lin is a sommelier, writer, educator, and wine consultant, holding both CMS and WSET 3 certifications. Joyce’s interests in food and wine led her to create 酒意思Sip with Joyce, an omnichannel platform providing wine pairing ideas with daily meals, specializing in Asian cuisines. Joyce believes that through food and wine, people of diverse backgrounds can be unified and share the joy of life with each other.
At 2,010 meters above sea level, the first thing that changes is your breathing. The second is your appetite. By the time you are standing outside a mountain hut with a glass of Blauburgunder in hand, something else has shifted too. The wine tastes different up here. In December, I went to Alta Badia, a small, jagged pocket of Südtirol-Alto Adige, with skis, a notebook, and a question. Nestled among the villages of San Cassiano, La Villa, Corvara, and the Campolongo Pass, the region is defined by its verticality, snow, and fine cuisine. Every year, as the ski season starts,…...
For centuries, the grape variety Vernatsch has been both flagship and albatross around the neck of Italy’s northern region of Alto Adige-Südtirol. In this final installment of his three-part series, Simon Staffler looks closely at DOC Alto Adige and posits the question: Why Vernatsch? “Vernatsch is unique in the world,” says Martin Pollinger, winemaker at Weingut Eichenstein. The estate is located 400 meters above the city of Meran, and Pollinger is part of a new generation of winegrowers and winemakers who are finding their way back to South Tyrol’s flagship variety. Surrounded by vines, Meran makes up the westward start of the…...
TRINK Magazine | It was a wine, not a memory, that motivated Joyce Lin to make Jing Jian Rou Si: the Kellerei Kaltern 2018 Lagrein Riserva ‘Largeith.’ Recipe and pairing included.
Südtirol-Alto Adige winegrowing has already exerted tremendous energy in re-inventing itself. But as has become ever clearer, that was only step one. The second is yet to come.
