Monday, September 15, 2008

Melbournians and Mooncakes

Spring is here and what a magnificent weekend it was, in every way. Our favourite Melbournian friend, Terence (www.terencepang.com) came for another visit. We had not seen him since April so it was a long time between visits. Terence brought two friends with him, Moses (from Singapore) and Dennis (an ex-pat American who resides in Australia and works with Terence in Melbourne).

Terence, Moses and Dennis had flown into Adelaide the night before to meet up and travel from Adelaide to the Barossa for the annual Artisans of the Barossa tasting held at the Angaston Institute. Terence makes his trips from Melbourne to the Barossa as crammed full of all things vinous as possible but always makes time to visit us. He is definitely one of our favourite visitors and we always enjoy the time spent with him immensely.

We opened up a bottle of our 2005 Eden Valley Riesling, a 2005 Bullfrog Flat Shiraz, a 2008 Eden Valley Riesling (not released yet) and a non-vintage Sparkling Shiraz - a collaboration between us, our neighbours, Colin & Fiona Sheppard of Flaxman Wines and one of their friends, Nathan. Sitting in the old red-gum stable, sharing mooncakes - a lovely gift to us from Terence - (see below for information on these treats), cheese, crackers and wines, life could not have been any better!

We ended up sitting around our kitchen table sharing fabulous Roaring Fordie's pizza til quite late in the evening. It was a terrific night and we hope to have the company of Terence, Moses and Dennis again sooner rather than later.


MOONCAKES - During the Yuan dynasty (A.D.1280-1368) China was ruled by the Mongolian people. Leaders from the preceding Sung dynasty (A.D.960-1280) were unhappy at submitting to foreign rule and set how to coordinate the rebellion without it being discovered. The leaders of the rebellion knowing that the Moon Festival was drawing near ordered the making of special cakes. Backed into each mooncake was a message with the outline of the attack. On the night of the Moon Festival the rebels attacked and overthrew the government. What followed was the establishment of the Ming dynasty (A.D. 1368-1644). Today, moon cakes are eaten to commemorate this event.

You can read more about mooncakes here: http://www.chinatown.com.au/eng/article.asp?masterid=155&articleid=743

No comments: