Sage and spirit meet in wine

This heady brew is a white spirit that is milder than the usual baijiu. It is a sweet wine made with sorghum, wheat, barley and pea, according to the ingredients list on the labels. This is the Confucius Family wine from Qufu in Shandong province.

Perhaps the manufacturers have kept in mind the sage's advice that food and drink should be enjoyed in moderation, hence the white spirit's relative mildness ranging from just below 40 percent alcohol content to about the mid-30s.

Whatever they lack in alcoholic kick, the wines make up for in flavor. Chinese connoisseurs value the "three fragrances" - fragrance on the nose, fragrance on the lips and fragrance in the after taste. They also value the "three perfections" - perfection in aroma, perfection in taste and perfection in body (alcohol content).