A makgeolli house just won Seoul’s supermarket white with Vinho Verde
Nine Korean retail buyers scored 14 wines blind in the 50,000-won band. Kooksoondang’s Soalheiro Granit 2024, Alvarinho from Vinho Verde, took the whites at 85.7.
Nine buyers sat in the Marriott Yeouido on 27 August and scored 14 wines blind. Three department stores, three supermarket chains, three convenience chains. The band was 50,000 won.
The white winner was not a French château. It was Soalheiro Granit 2024, Alvarinho from Vinho Verde, imported by Kooksoondang — a makgeolli house. Average 85.7.
The red winner was Vino H’s Villa Annone Rosso Verona 2023, 86. Vino H sits in the Hyundai Department Store group.
The Asia Business Daily ran the tasting as a side event of its fifth Global Wine & Food Trip. Seven importers entered. Judges said the field was tighter and more advanced than last year. Margins decided the table.
Granite is the cue on the Soalheiro label. The wine is Portuguese, pale, made for a Korean supermarket shelf that still wants a name it can pronounce after rice wine.
Mini-concept: the buyer who wins a Seoul heat can be a rice-wine company with a granite white from Minho.
A flavoured can is easy to stack. This was a 50,000-won blind, and Alvarinho won the whites.
Remember: Kooksoondang’s Soalheiro Granit 2024 scored 85.7 with nine Korean retail buyers.
Source: The Asia Business Daily