Mushroom risotto with Barbera

I went to a Piemontese wine dinner last week at a local Italian restaurant in Bristol, Prosecco about which I’ve written before. There were some very good matches - along with a couple of off-key ones, one of which involved a faulty bottle which the wine merchant introducing the event seemed determined to disregard despite grumblings from the floor.

One of the best was a fabulous mushroom risotto which had been paired with a very attractive 2003 Barbera d’Asti Superiore ‘Tere Caude’, Ca’ del Matt. Fruity Italian reds tend to work well with mushroom risotto (Dolcetto is another example) but this was a particularly good match - a wine with great intensity and character but also enough bottle age to mellow the youthful exuberance that the winemaker - a New Zealander called Matt Thompson - had introduced to this traditional style.

It’s a useful wine that would comfortably take you right through an Italian meal - slow roast pork with fennel would be another good pairing. You can buy it from www.everywine.co.uk.

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