Victorious find

The Hunt:
As I have previously posted, we have been looking for Sauternes, a fine yet rare dessert wine from a small area in France that has a rare molding condition in their wine grapes. This wine is the only wine Cullen and I seek out when we shop for wine. It makes the exercise more of a treasure hunt than shopping. (If you want to know more about Sauternes, check out this site: http://www.wineintro.com/types/sauternes.html )

Yesterday, Cullen needed some more tools and supplies for work. We hopped into a cab and headed to Haidan, the super Tech area Cullen has been working on the blog for (I am beginning to be skeptical about his actually working on it).

Cullen picked up part of what he needed, but was unable to finish getting everything since they close at 5pm, he likes to bargain, and we arrived at 3:30pm. (This means he gets to go back... no really he loves this place so much he would spend every waking moment there if he could.)

With all the "up" escalators turned off, we suspected that something was up. There was no loud announcement of the closure of the place, but as we started to wander around at about 5:15pm, we noticed people packing up, and the escalator status... so we decided to start the other part of our quest... the finding of our wine.

The China World Trade Center:
This structure is 2 towers consisting of offices in the upper floors, and exposition hall, and ... yes... a mall. A big fat designer mall. Cullen and I aren't really into designers, nor are we into malls, but I had searched the internet for fine wine stores, and one of the stores that carries Sauternes was listed to have a store in The China World Trade Center. (Store link and listing is here: http://www.montrosechina.com/include_html/common.asp?type=c&name=winestore ) Our search was on.

Though this mall was down in the basement of the building, we found all the same decor as any mall. Nicely paved shiny floors, tons of small shops on the sides of the central lane. Only about 2 or 3 of the small booth-like structures in the main walk way. It didn't feel as cluttered as some malls, but it was definitely a mall.

We walked for a bit and found that there was a grocery store, with an alcohol department in a store next to it. The store looked promising, and appeared to match the image on the website, though the name was not the same. We went inside and asked about the wine. The sales woman searched the shelves for the wine to no avail.

It is worth mentioning that they had beautifully hand-blown bottles of alcohol. Some in the shape of Goldfish, some in the shape of dragons. One of the most beautifully sculpted bottles was a cylindrical bottle with a blown glass dragon inside, suspended in the alcohol. These bottles of alcohol were not too much more expensive than a regular bottle of wine.

I am not one to knock something before I try it, but I am certain I will be very reluctant to try one of their very special selections on display. From a distance, the drink appeared to be nothing more than a clear liquor with branches or roots from some plant floating in it. We went to get a closer look, and it was roots with snake wrapped in them suspended in a lightly clouded alcohol. The snake was twisted and knotted up, as if it had not been put into the alcohol in a proper state of euphoria. I mentioned to Cullen that the alcohol was really cheap and his response was, "Of course, they have to discount it. It has a dead snake in it."

The rest of the mall was a disappointment, save the Pizza Hut. We had been longing for a greasy American style pizza. Lo and Behold... Pizza Hut emerges!

Upon entering the Pizza Hut, Cullen had to say,"This is the Fanciest Pizza Hut I have ever seen." In all fairness to Pizza Hut, it has been a while since I actually went into a restaurant. Not only is it something we usually have delivered, but it's practically impossible to find an actual Pizza Hut Restaraunt in Houston. If my memories of Pizza Hut interiors serve me correctly, they are under-lit, slightly dingy, a bit worn buildings with sub-par service. This place was well lit, clean, and fresh looking. I was impressed with the service, and the selection. Usually all you have to choose from on a list of beverages is some soda, ice tea, or water. They have a fancy selection of smoothies which included a kiwi-mango beverage that I decided to give a try. Cullen had an ice-tea.

They tend to bring your bill while you are waiting for the food. You pay whenever you like. Very convenient.

We had and "American Style" pizza. This was a deep dish pepperoni with mozzarella cheese. Very American compared to their seafood stuffed crust pizza.

After food, we went off to hunt some more, but found nothing more than a tiny little wine shop with little to offer. We were once again stumped. So far we had spent quite a bit of money on taxi fares to find this wine, and were yet to find the true gold treasure. Cullen with his master problem solving skills decided that we should consult another problem solving master- The hotel Concierge.

China World Hotel is beautiful. With it's grand open lobby, and all the lavish furnishing, it is definitely and up-class hotel. We rode the escalator up into the lobby and around the corner to the Concierge desk. A friendly Concierge greeted us, and despite the fact that we told her we weren't staying at the hotel, she still assisted us in finding our treasure. She directed us to 2 international grocery stores. One, the Carrefour Supermarket, is a French import supermarket. The other was called Pacific Century. We chose to go to the French supermarket.

Arrrggghh Traaeeessure:
Upon finding the second floor of the Carrefour Supermarket, and their wine selection, we had uncovered our beautiful brassy prize. They had not one, but five different bottles to choose from. They have three vintages to choose from, 1996 (with a very deep copper to it), 2003, and 2005. The 2003 full bottle was 4 times the price of the 2005 half bottle. Cullen bought out all 7 of their 1/2 bottles and we proclaimed victory.