Boeuf bourguignon and Saint-Romain

It should really come as no surprise that a beef stew made with red burgundy should pair with red burgundy but when you think about it it’s not a given. A rich stew cooked for hours in red wine accompanied with a light red burgundy doesn’t sound like a match made in heaven even if the cooking wine involved is burgundy.

But it works as I can testify from a meal at the Hotel les Roches in Saint Romain last week when a youthful bottle of Frederic Cossard’s delicious 2011 Domaine de Chassorney Saint-Romain ‘Sous Roche’ proved the ideal counterpoint to one of the darkest most intense bourguignons I’ve had for a long while, just lifting the flavours rather than being obliterated by them. I’m not at all sure that a more full-bodied burgundy let alone a lusher, riper pinot noir would have done any better.

Proof, if proof were needed, that the classic wine matches are hard to beat!