It’s the world’s most popular spirit, but just what is baijiu – and what does it taste like?
Distillers of China's national drink are targeting the UK – but most westerners have never even heard of it. Amy Broomfield lifts the lid on baijiu
Chinese consumers get through £65bn worth of baijiu a year, making it the world’s most-consumed drink. Yet in the west, it is practically unknown. With Chinese producers working to introduce the spirit to the UK, that might change soon.
Qiqi Chen is managing director of the company she set up, Cheng International, which distributes premium baijiu brands – including two of China’s most renowned producers of the spirit, Fenjiu and Wuliangye – outside of China. Her key task? To introduce baijiu to UK consumers.
‘One of the biggest challenges is changing the perception that baijiu is just some sort of firewater,’ she says. ‘It’s actually a very nuanced spirit, with so many fragrant and complex layers.’ In China, around 8 billion litres of baijiu are made each year, from 6,000 distilleries (Fenjiu alone makes 160m litres a year), and just 0.5% of this is exported. But is the western consumer ready for – and willing to absorb – such complexity?
Baijiu (meaning ‘white liquor’) is China’s national drink, dating back thousands of years. During the Yuan Dynasty in the 13th century, it was drunk only by royalty and high society during celebratory events. Today it is drunk throughout China. Earlier this year, China’s best-known baijiu brand, Kweichow Moutai, was crowned the country’s biggest public company and the largest drinks business worldwide – worth an approximate £198bn.
In China, baijiu is consumed both in shot form at formal affairs, and over the course of a meal in more informal surroundings.
Yet baijiu remains a craft proposition – made entirely by hand in a process that, says Chen, is inherited and passed down through ancient techniques and understanding. It is produced via a range of methods but typically involves cooking up a variety of grains before blending this with a starter culture known as qu. The mixture is then left to ferment and mature in water for anywhere between five and 50 years. Flavour-wise, different styles ensure a wide spectrum, but Chen describes its essence as marrying the floral, fruity notes of a white wine with the clean purity of vodka. Such a marriage also echoes how baijiu is consumed: like wine, it is enjoyed during a meal, but similarly to vodka it can also be taken as a shot.
Where baijiu becomes infinitely more complex is when you look at its three main types, which are so wildly different from each other in aroma and taste that they barely seem like the same spirit. Fenjiu, with a 6,000-year heritage, is among the oldest – and most premium – brands specialising in the light-aroma variety. Its baijiu is made in the Shanxi province of north China, where it is double-fermented and distilled, before being matured for up to 30 years in ceramic pots. Fragrant, light and delicately floral, it provides a little heat before the flavours spread across the palate into something much sweeter.
On the other side of the spectrum are strong-aroma varieties such as the aforementioned Kweichow Moutai and Wuliangye; the latter has been made in the same fermentation pits for 650 years, and part of the production process involves leaving a quarter of the distilled grains in the pits to infuse the surrounding pit mud, resulting in an incredibly potent aroma with strong hints of overripe pineapple and papaya.
Finally, there’s the sauce aroma, which bears more savoury notes of herbs and mushrooms, achieved by being fermented and distilled eight times over the course of production.
A worker fills a steam vat with fermented grain at a baijiu production facilityBaijiu is the product of fermented grain matured in steam vats. Chinese Distillers want to transform the spirit into the new tequila for US and European consumers
Ivan Dixon, former head of drinks at UK department store Harvey Nichols, has tried them all. ‘I enjoy the subtleties and balance of light-aroma styles, which tend to be less forward, but my favourite is the sauce aroma, which has an amazing, savoury umaminess that you can’t find in any other spirit.’
In an attempt to spread the word in the UK, Cheng International has teamed up with bars and hotels around London. The Stratford Hotel held a competition that challenged bartenders to come up with a cocktail incorporating the spirit. Chef Lee Che Liang at Park Chinois in Mayfair switched the better-known Shaoxing rice wine for baijiu in his menu and found the spirit lifted new layers and aromas from his dishes. Meanwhile, pâtissier William Curley created a special-edition truffle with baijiu – in this case, Fenjiu – which he found ‘complemented the chocolate to create a truffle rich in flavour but also balanced and long-lasting on the palate’.
Despite such exposure, Dixon still isn’t convinced baijiu is going to go mainstream. ‘The bottle prices tend to be rather prohibitive,’ he says. ‘Add to that the fact that baijiu is such an unknown category over here, and it starts to become a tough sell for bartenders. I also think the strong-aroma examples are simply too flavour-packed to make for a balanced mixed drink.’
编辑：Frida Xu
