Pairing wine with Chinese food is more than a Cottage industry

Gourmet and wine merchant Ada Leung was born in Hong Kong, but grew up in Canada. She attended the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, and then returned to Hong Kong, where she worked in sales and marketing before founding wine importing company, Cottage Vineyards International in 1996.

After a false start, she mothballed the business and went into financial information services. She used the proceeds of her information services company to re-established Cottage Vineyards in 2006. Leung's passion is pairing Asian cuisines with wines from regions that are not well- known in Hong Kong.

I was 11 years old. My grandfather discovered that there is nothing that can elevate the dining experience more than wine, so the family interest in it started three generations ago. My parents were very open to us having exposure to wine at an early age, and when I graduated from the children's table in the kitchen to the adults' table in the dining room I found that the food tasted so much better. Food and wine pairings were always part of the dinner table conversation, so it just seemed natural.