Dear Fellow Members

It has been a while since I last wrote to you, so, as we had our latest Committee meeting earlier this week, it seems the right time to do so and give you the latest news about the Society.

1. Events of the Society

Since our last newsletter in May, we have had 6 Events – the Domaine Huet @ KHA where we had the wonderful pairings of beautiful Loire Valley wines with exquisite Thai cuisines, the Almaviva Nite @ Capella where the members were treated to a rare vertical of the Almaviva Wines, the President’s Table III at Cherry Garden where our members had a chance to break the shipment of some of our wines that were brought in earlier in the year, our National Day Dinner at St. Regis, the Marcello Zacagnini @ Ristorante Bologna and the recent 1998 St Emilion Dinner at The Universal in Duxton Hill, which was a great success. This is the first time in the history of our Society that an event had to be held over two nights - the 16 & 17th Oct - in view of the seat limitation at the venue and 46 people were present for the two evenings.

Meanwhile, our next event, which is the Gaja Dinner at The Lighthouse @ Fullerton on the 7th November 2009, has been sold out and again, the limited number of seats in the restaurant was the controlling factor. However, due to the exquisiteness of this event, priority was given to members and none of our members who had wanted to attend this dinner was disappointed. Ultimately, only 3 seats were given to guests for this event. The wines were purchased by the Society and are not subsidized by Gaja in any way. This accounts for the somewhat higher price than usual for this event.

Mark your calendars for the following forthcoming events:-

12th December 2009 - The President's Dinner, our traditional year-end Black Tie event will be held at the Marina Mandarin this year. Get ready to taste the beautiful wines of the Ch. Troplong Mondot and Ch. Cheval Blanc from the 80’s.

29th January 2010 - Bin Ends Night at the Tanglin Club.

13th March 2010 – our Annual General Meeting (AGM) followed by Dinner @ The Pines where arrangements are being made for a night of Japanese Cuisine with matching wines.

2. The IWFSS Official Web-site & Photographs

It has often been said that the state of our website leaves much to be desired. This committee has finally looked into this matter and a lot of work has gone into creating our new-look at our website, thanks to Committee member Andy Sim. Our new website will be up and running very soon and keep a lookout for our announcement in due course on the re-launching date of our official website.

In these days of political correctness, we should point out that our new website will feature photos of members taken at past events as well as in the future, photos taken at our events will be added to the site. For all photos that were previously taken at past event, if anyone of you has any reservations about their image being published on website, please let our President know and unless we do receive your express objections to the same, we will have to take it that you will have no objections to us publishing your image on our website. As for future photos to be taken at our events, please also let the photographer know if you have any objections to your image being published on our website for otherwise, we will similarly take it that you will have no objections to us publishing your image on our website.

3. The Society's Wine Purchases

Our Cellarmaster, Joyce Chang, has been very busy in the last 2-3 months to take advantage of the low value of the British Pound. The following are details of her purchases which were very reasonably priced and they make an excellent addition to our cellar, particularly the older vintages. Members can look forward to trying out these wines at several hallmark events in the near future.

Château Pavie, 1er Grand Cru Classé, St Emilion, 1978
Château Pontet Canet, 5ème Cru Classé, Pauillac, 1982
Château Lagrange, 3ème Cru Classé, St Julien, 1982
Château Grand Puy Lacoste, 5ème Cru Classé,Pauillac, 1983
Château La Dominique, Grand Cru Classé, St Emilion, 1983
Château L'Arrosée, Grand Cru Classé, St Emilion, 1986
Château Pavie Decesse, St Emilion Grand Cru, 1988
Château Troplong Mondot, Grand Cru Classé, St Emilion, 1988
Château Certan de May, Pomerol, 1995
Château de Beaucastel, CDP 1994,
Bâtard Montrachet, Grand Cru, Jean Noel Gagnard, 1992
Meursault, Les Genevrières, 1er Cru, François Jobard 1999
Hugel Gewurztraminer Vendange Tardive 2000

5. Wine Trip to Tuscany

Following the success of the Society's trip to South Africa earlier this year, it was decided that the Society will try to organise a trip to Tuscany next year. Past President David Jen and Andy Sim have agreed to act as the organisers of same. More news in due course once the itinery of the proposed trip takes shape.


6. Introduction of new members

Since the introduction of the new members in our May 2009 Edition of the Newsletter, we have had some new Members to have since joined our ranks. Some of you may have already known them and have interacted with them during past events that they have attended and it is with absolute pleasure that I now introduce these new Members to all of you:-
· Daniel & Julie Ho
· Pok Soy Yoong
· Shirish & Rochelle Shenolikar

A very warm welcome to all of them to this fine family of wine and food lovers.

"That's All, Folks". Hope to see you at an event soon …

Regards,
Graham Hayward,
Vice-President.