At the beginning of each year, I like to go back through my tasting notes from the past 12 months. Here are some of my drinking highlights from 2013 …

Music and wine with Nathan Waks, maker of some award-winning artisanal shirazes and rieslings at Kilikanoon, in Australia's Clare Valley.

It was an unexpected treat to be serenaded by Waks, a former principal cellist of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, while tasting his wines. When I asked him if he plays his cello in his vineyards, he replied: "Of course! Practising outside is very therapeutic for myself and the vines." He added that he saw a lot in common between his two passions: "Practise makes perfect, sooner or later, and whether one is making wine or music, it is 99 per cent hard work."

Going to a Glenlivet whisky dinner at Madam Sixty Ate, in Wan Chai, where the same whisky (the 18-year-old) was served in a range of glassware - and tasted different in each glass. Our drams were paired with food, too - each dish brought out different characteristics in the spirit, which was served with a wee splash of H2O from the spring Glenlivet sources its water for brewing from. My favourite moment of the evening was drinking the whisky from a champagne flute with a splash of sparkling Glenlivet water - it had a lovely liveliness and a heady aroma, slightly reminiscent of champagne.

"A Passion for Pinots" was a masterclass on pinot noirs from Burgundy, France, and various parts of the new world. The winemakers in attendance described pinot as a "heart-break grape" but said that when the weather gods are working and conditions are right, it can yield a wine that is seductive, enlivening and uplifting. Almost all of them said they practiced sustainable viticultural methods and many had gone biodynamic, using wild yeasts. Most said they de-stemmed their grapes before vinification, preferred cold maceration (that's keeping the grapes chilled to stall fermentation when "soaking" them in their own juice) and "punching down" the pulp by hand during that process. They also agreed that the best wines come from vines that have been 25 or more years in the ground, meaning the taste of the finished drop reflects the terroir.

"A Pink Pearl of the Orient" champagne dinner with Antoine Billecart of French house Billecart-Salmon, where we met for aperitifs at Watermark, at the Star Ferry pier in Central, before taking a private ferry to Lamma and dining at the Lamma Hilton Shum Kee Seafood Restaurant. It was a great treat to enjoy champagne in an informal setting and accompanied by fresh seafood (the wok-fried razor clams in garlic paired with the brut rosé was my highlight). The only pratfall of the evening was drinking a glass of champagne too fast during the toasts - a great way to get the hiccups, I found.