Mezze and a Palestinian white wine

Finding a Palestinian restaurant in London is unusual enough but discovering a Palestinian wine to go with the food is beyond all expectations

However at Akub in Notting Hill which bills itself as a modern Palestinian restaurant they have both.

The wine I particularly liked was called Nadim and comes from the Tabeh winery. It’s made from the local Zeini grape and is deliciously dry, nutty and slightly herby - the perfect counterpoint to the selection of dishes we ordered.

They included some labneh balls rolled in sumac, zaatar, turmeric and Aleppo pepper, a watermelon, black olive and mint salad, a chopped tomato salad with chillies and Mafghoussa, a dish of courgettes with smashed courgettes, garlic yogurt, pine nuts and mint. Oh, and an amazing collection of breads but they didn’t really need matching.

I imagine unless you go there you won't come across a Palestinian white but there are some quite similar Lebanese whites or try a Greek Malagousia.

I ate at Akub as a guest of the restaurant.

Smoked mackerel salad and 'ancestral' cider

Last week was mainly about cider - I went to the Cider Salon in Bristol at the weekend where I enjoyed a succession of English ciders with a five course feast prepared by Native Vine.

Although the pairings were spot on - especially a superb dish of belly pork with a fennel and peach salsa - none of them came as a surprise (which is what I try to focus on in this slot).

That honour went to a smoked mackerel potato and pickled cucumber salad I had at Café Deco in Store Street in Bloomsbury which was just brilliant with an ‘ancestral’ Spanish cider called Fuente Guijarro from Andalucia. (Interestingly the south of the country rather than the cider-obsessed north but made 2000m above sea level)

It’s basically a pet nat so the cider was cloudy and slightly funky but not to the extent that it overwhelmed the pure apple flavour which was the element that went so well with the smoked fish, sweet-pickled cucumber and pea shoots which were part of the salad too.

There was another salad on the table - made from green bean, basil and parmesan - which also worked really well.

Cider, even artisan cider like this, tends to be a cheaper option than wine so is definitely worth exploring if you find it on a drinks menu.

You can buy the Fuente Guijarro ancestral for £15 from Native Vine in Bristol and from Crouch End Cellars in north London for £16.

For other cider pairings see my Top Food Pairings for Cider.

Pet nat and pizza

I’ve been on a road trip visiting wineries in Kent for the last few days but the highlight from a food and wine pairing point of view was the pizza and pet nat combo we had at Westwell, a ‘low intervention’ (aka natural) wine producer just southwest of Canterbury.

Like many other English wineries now they produce a ‘pet nat’ or pétillant naturel which is an deliciously fruity semi-sparkling wine that is bottled while it’s still undergoing its first fermentation (as opposed to champagne which is aged on its lees). There’s a good explanation here. Westwell’s, which is rather charmingly called Naturally Petulant Pink, is particularly appealing

We got the chance to try it with pizza as they had a truck from Alkham Valley Pizza dishing it out on the Friday evening we were there. I'm not sure the toppings made a huge difference - maybe the Spicy was a tad challenging but the Margherita was a cinch and I loved the garlicky, cheesy ‘Nutty Blue’ (above) which had Stilton and confit garlic on it. Pet nat basically works just like a beer with pizza - thirstquenching and refreshing. (And yes, beer is cheaper but pet nat is more fun!)

You can buy it direct from their website for £24 a bottle.

You can see their other upcoming events here.

For other pizza pairings see the best wine and beer pairings for pizza

I visited Westwell on a press trip.

Fresh crab and a citrussy spritz

Even wine writers have to take a day off occasionally, especially if they’re lunching with a teetotaller, but it’s always a bit of a challenge finding a drink that goes as well with food as wine

A crisp dry white would always be my first choice with crab (see my list of pairings here) but I had ordered a 'temperate' cocktail, the Mellow Yellow Spritz, with my crab on toast at Hawksmoor Guildhall and it went really well

It’s based on an aperitif called Botivo which admittedly sounds a bit like a tropical disease you might want to inoculate yourself against but it made a refreshingly citrussy spritz along with lemon, elderflower and soda water. It’s actually 0.1% so not totally alcohol-free but so long as you're not avoiding alcohol on principle or for health reasons, as near as makes no difference

The crucial thing - for me at least - was that it was refreshingly dry and in no way interfered with the delicate flavour of the crab. You can find a similar spritz on their website.

I ate at Hawksmoor (with my daughter) as a guest of my son!