In Thailand, Tropical Wine Is Ready for Its Close-Up
GranMonte
It’s a steamy May morning in Thailand’s lush Khao Yai National Park, just a two-hour drive northeast of Bangkok, and the tok-tok call of a gecko sounds as I stand on a balcony overlooking the GranMonte wine estate. Among its holdings are 7 guest rooms and 40 acres of vineyards at the edge of a tropical jungle, all baking in the 80-degree heat. The winery’s workers protect themselves from the sun, wearing wide brimmed hats and long-sleeved layers as they prune the vines that tangle and twist around dozens of constructed frames. Later in the year, the grapes that they bear will become bottles of Grenache, Verdelho, and Cabernet Sauvignon—all of them with roots, literally, in Thai soil.
“We do the first pruning of the year now, and then a second pruning in October. In November, you start to see baby grapes,” says Bangkok-born Nikki Lohitnavy, the general manager at GranMonte, as we walk down a graveled thoroughfare that cuts through the vineyard. The estate sits just two hours northeast of the Thai capital, in the green yet dusty Asoke Valley, on the fringe of a jungle that’s home to wild elephants, lar gibbons, and wreathed hornbills. Though the area has a relatively cooler climate compared to Bangkok, an oppressive heat beats down in the summer months, and tropical downpours during monsoon season turn the nearby hiking trails into muddy slopes.
Despite the heat, however, Lohitnavy is dressed in jeans as she lucidly explains to me the estate’s harvest schedule. She points out the grape varieties that flank either side of the path with ringing passion: “The grapes change color in December, then there’s ripening and harvest that begins in February. Elsewhere in the world, it would be done at a different time.” The top of the year is the coolest time of year in Thailand: It’s when the climate more closely resembles the weather of harvest season in prolific wine regions like Europe, that of August and September.
Viticulture—that is, the practice of growing grapes whether for wine or your fruit bowl—typically thrives best in landscapes where temperatures are unlikely to drop lower than 55°F or climb higher than 70°F. On our planet, they’re most likely to be found in locations between 30 and 50 degrees latitude, on either side of the equator: Think the Willamette Valley, Oregon state’s wine country; Otago on New Zealand’s South Island; and of course, France.
So to find a winery like GranMonte in Thailand can be surprising, a fact Lohitnavy is keenly aware of. As an oenologist and Thailand’s only woman winemaker, Lohitnavy oversees her family’s production of 28 varieties of tropical wine at GranMonte, while her sister Mimi manages the marketing. Driven by the passion for wine, their parents purchased the land—originally a cornfield and cashew plantation—in 1999, and immediately began studying soil and vines to experiment with growing wine grapes. As a result, Lohitnavy grew up venturing from Bangkok to the countryside on the weekends to help her parents with their passion project. She wanted to take her own wine education further, and went to Australia to study oenology and viticulture. After graduating, she returned to Thailand and, under her leadership, the winery officially opened in 2009.
Since then, Lohitnavy has experimented with cultivating a range of varietals on GranMonte’s land, building a collection of 28 distinct labels. On top of that, she travels around the world to learn from colleagues in places like South Africa, and bring back what she’s learned to apply on her home soil. Now, with 15 years of experience, Lohitnavy is well-respected in her own right, often invited overseas to share her expertise about what it takes to cultivate high-quality wines in places like warm Thailand.
“When people hear of Thai wine, they imagine it must be too warm to grow grapes here, so the wine must be jammy or high in alcohol,” she says, she says shaking her head. “But they're not.”
Tropical wine is more fruity in nature but still retains structure, Lohitnavy says, as she pours a glass of straw-colored Verdelho, while we sit in GranMonte’s cozy on-site restaurant for dinner. I sip the white wine, and soft flavors of guava and banana wash over my palate, where a floral element lingers long after the liquid gold has disappeared. Extremely dry yet fruity, the wine is surprisingly versatile and calls to be served with the soft, spicy dishes typical of Thailand, but also home-cooked chicken dishes of the West.
“The wines are not like what people imagine,” Lohitnavy says. “When they think of Thailand, they think of the beach, but wine made in Khao Yai has more cool-climate characteristics, which means it’s not high in alcohol. It has nice acidity because of the greater ripening in cooler weather.” Most GranMonte wines have an ABV somewhere between 12% and 14%. This makes for relatively easy drinking as Lohitnavy and I dine on khao chae: a meal of multiple small plates including shallots, shrimps, balls of shredded meat, and fragrant rice soaked in cold water—all of it refreshing.
Vanessa Conlin, a Napa Valley-based master of wine (a more academic qualification distinct from “master sommelier”) interested in emerging wine scenes, tells me that “tropical climates lack the diurnal shift that aids a long ripening season.” Put simply, a diurnal shift is the difference between the average daytime high temperature and the average nighttime low temperature. “The warm to very hot temperatures can be challenging for maintaining the acidity found in balanced and high-quality wines,” says Conlin. Yet for 25 years, the Lohitnavy family has navigated and defied this expectation, proving that beautiful vintages can come out of the most unlikely of wine countries.
During another tasting in the adjacent winery, where air conditioning makes for a welcome reprieve from the heat outside, Lohitnavy turns the spout of one of the silver vats. A short burst of Crémant, the winery’s crowning jewel, funnels into a waiting glass. The cloudy color signifies that the fermentation process is ongoing, Lohitnavy explains, and points to a riddling machine that gives the wide its signature fizz. A loud alarm goes off every 15 minutes and the machine rotates the bottles, ever-so-slowly tilting the bubble-producing yeast toward the neck, to be disgorged at a later time. (Crémant is a term used to describe any sparkling wine that is made in the same method as Champagne, yet outside the Champagne region of France.) As I take a sip, a soft fizz quickly delivers a hit of citrus before giving way to a subtle nuttiness.
The next morning, a bus trundles down the dirt tracks that separate the estate’s grape varieties. It typically carries day trippers from Bangkok and overnight visitors to Khao Yai National Park where hiking trails and nighttime safaris are the main attractions. But today, I am the only one being shepherded through the grounds by Lisa, an enthusiastic GranMonte tour guide who grew up in a nearby town. As we drive, she points out the occasional bundle of pale green grapes still clinging to the vine long past harvest season. Inside the winery, she pulls back a heavy wooden sliding door to reveal a side room where oak barrels contain the latest productions. A sweet scent hints at the forthcoming tasting session.
The tasting room is lined with GranMonte wines and the trophies they’ve won—awards from the AWC Vienna and Cathay Pacific Hong Kong International Wine & Spirit Competition, to name a few. Lisa serves me a quarter glass of the 2021 Heritage Syrah, a strong-tasting red with hints of plum, coffee, and a powerful punch of tannins. At only 11 a.m., it’s quite an assault of flavors, but the softer 2021 Midnight Harvest Chenin Blanc hits the palate with a fruitier taste of peach and, paired with a palate of local cheeses, goes down more easily. Busaba is the next wine, and at only 8.5% ABV, it is different again. Lisa highlights the notes of fresh cut grass and gooseberry, but to me, the acute candy-like sweetness and dusty pink coloring sets it apart from the others.
In today’s market, Thailand is not the sole originator of tropical wine; Cabernet Sauvignon from Colombia and Chardonnay from Brazil have been on the scene for longer, with roots in the regions of Urabá Chocoano and Serra Gaúcha, respectively. But connoisseurs the world over are steadily seeing Thailand as a wine country to watch, says Nutawan Jumpanak, the chief sommelier of the Anantara hotels in Bangkok. She notes how even growers from Champagne have visited Lohitnavy in GranMonte to learn how they might adapt and evolve their techniques as European summers grow ever hotter in the global climate crisis.
Where to try Thai wine:
Rent a car in Bangkok and drive the two hours northeast to GranMonte for a four-wine tasting and 90-minute tour of the family-owned winery; then spend the night in a plush wine cottage on the estate.
By the beaches of Hua Hin, three hours south of the capital, Monsoon Valley Vineyard does tastings and tours featuring mountain biking, wine bottle painting, and elephant meet-and-greets.
At both the Anantara Siam Bangkok Hotel and the Anantara Riverside Bangkok Resort, in-house experts, led by chief sommelier Nutawan Jumpanak, pair Thai and international wines with local cuisine.
Vivin Grocer, a deli-slash-restaurant in the city center of Bangkok, stocks the best of GranMonte and Monsoon Valley wines alongside locally-produced cheeses, meats, and chocolates.
Set to open later this year in the heart of the capital, Electric Sheep will be a French-fusion restaurant housing one of the biggest collections of Thai wines in the country.
“We have Thai wine [in our hotels] to showcase what we can do,” Jumpanak a Thai native from the northeastern province of Chaiyaphum tells me, as we make our way from the bustling hotel lobby of the Anantara Siam Bangkok to a central courtyard where sunlight bathes the multiple restaurants that encircle a central bar. “We use the wine from GranMonte and the customers are very excited to try them.”
We perch at a high table just within earshot of the bar staff who Jumpanak occasionally beckons over to serve up snacks or another glass of wine. With a nose she describes as “better than a dog’s,” she sniffs the first glass of rosé before her. It’s from Monsoon Valley, another Thai winery that grows their own grapes in Thailand and is working to raise the profile of tropical wine. Jumpanak sips, holds the wine in her mouth for a few seconds, and nods in approval. The flavor profile is “a fresh strawberry,” she says, and explains that rosé wines go well with the spicy elements of Thai food.
So does GranMonte’s Chenin Blanc, she notes, with its pear flavors and toasty notes. Fittingly, one of the earliest wines produced by GranMonte—a 2001 vintage first sold in 2003—was a Chenin Blanc. However, GranMonte’s Crémant with its delicate flavors of apple, pear, lime, and cashew, is Jumpanak’s firm favorite. A glass of good bubbly “can change your world,” she says, laughing.
Maybe the sheer surprise of Thai wine could do the same for traveler. Jumpanak says that tourists to Thailand—whether they are wine connoisseurs or simply consumers—should try the country’s tropical wine; the long drive from Bangkok, she adds, is worth it for the “wine education.” Conlin, the master of wine in the Napa Valley, says she doesn’t expect expert collectors of wine from more traditional regions like Burgundy or Piedmont to be swapping out their bottles for tropical wines any time soon— “but those with a thirst for continuing to learn about the world of wine should approach tropical wines with an open mind, as wine production constantly evolves,” she says.
In the meantime, the early morning wake-ups will continue for Lohitnavy and everyone else at GranMonte. They’re experimenting with different varietals and growing locations in the Asoke Valley, continuing to explore opportunities to create ever more types of tropical wine. Lohitnavy is hopeful that, with time, the region will further grow its wine-making capabilities—and that GranMonte will be its renowned ambassador. “I still think there are other grape varieties that are more suitable for Khao Yai,” she says, determined. “We just have not found them yet.” From what I’ve seen—and tasted—it’s only a matter of time.
Originally Appeared on Condé Nast Traveler
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