Caviar from Bimiliya Boutique
I received it as a gift, roughly in a set like this.
A set like this
I can’t really tell the difference between the colors.. but once I took it out, it did look fancy. At restaurants you only ever get a single bite of it, which always left me wanting more, but scooping it up with a spoon I could finally tell what it actually tastes like.. So it’s a delicate flavor, sort of an extension of ikura. The thing is, the flavor isn’t strong, so if you eat it with anything bold it gets completely drowned out. It’s best savored slowly on its own.
Sunflower seeds
I picked up a bag in China again this time, but there’s nothing special about them, and since they sell them in Korea too there was really no need to bring them back..
Budget Wuliangye
The bottle is seriously fancy. When you open the cap, a piece of plastic even breaks off. It’s basically an anti-counterfeit mechanism.. but I mean, this thing costs only a few thousand won, so I did wonder whether they really needed to go that far. Tasting it, there’s a very faint hint of Wuliangye, but it’s so rough that there’s no real need to buy it.
Xiao Langjiu
A very popular sauce-aroma baijiu. The sauce aroma isn’t overpowering and the ABV is moderate, so it seems a lot of people seek this one out over pricier bottles. When I tried it there were no off-flavors and it’s cheap, so as far as value-for-money baijiu goes I’d say it’s just about top of the pile. It has advantages even over more expensive stuff. That said, if you want a strong aroma or deep flavor it might fall short. And for Koreans, sauce aroma is always going to be a bit of a hurdle.. strong aroma is the mainstream in Korea, after all..
Jiang Xiaobai
This baijiu seems popular for its pretty design, but the taste is clean like vodka or soju, with a fairly strong acetate note. Personally I’d rather just drink soju; I don’t see much point in going out of my way for this.
Bainian Hutu
Bainian Hutu is a budget baijiu famous for its marketing gimmick of coming wrapped in a paper bag. I’m not sure it’s really necessary, but seeing as hardly anyone else copies it, I guess the differentiation works.. It’s made in Guizhou, but it’s strong-aroma rather than sauce-aroma; light, with a decent nose and good balance, so it deserves its popularity.. Budget baijiu runs about 4,000 to 5,000 won, and for that price, tasting this good, it’s great value.. The 33% version is too weak though; I think you’d have to try the 52% to see what it’s really about.
Niulanshan Erguotou
Niulanshan Erguotou is a very clean, traditional kaoliang liquor, cheap and high-proof, the kind of taste heavy drinkers love.. For cheap liquor, no off-flavors is already a pass, and at this quality it deserves its popularity; on top of that it costs about half of what most value baijiu does, so on value alone it’s number one.. (Being 56% firewater, I can’t recommend it to everyone though..) It goes well with greasy Chinese food, so if you spot it at a Chinese restaurant it’s worth ordering.
Chinese Jingjiu
Chinese Jingjiu is considered a health tonic liquor rather than a baijiu. It’s made with sweet herbal ingredients like schisandra and angelica root, but without the herbal edge of something like Zhuyeqing, so it’s smooth and more approachable. Partly because of the low ABV, it hardly feels like alcohol.. Put a garnish on it and you could pass it off as a cocktail.. I guess that’s why it’s so overwhelmingly popular in China.
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