Sauerkraut and orange wine

I could of course have written about wine pairings with schnitzel this week having spent four days at Austria’s major wine fair VieVinum in Vienna but it merely confirmed my view that grüner veltliner is a pretty unbeatable match. (Along with beer!)

However what was a revelation is just how well orange grüner - even a fairly wild example - pairs with sauerkraut and dumplings, the sauerkraut in particular.

Stands to reason when you think about it. The sourness of sauerkraut offsets the slight sourness of an orange wine. But they also (my friend Ruth Spivey and I had a different one each) went with the grammelknödel (roughly translated as pork scratching dumplings) that were served with it at an excellent little restaurant we found called Glacis Beisl.

You’re going to ask exactly which orange wine aren’t you and I’m going to have to confess I’m not sure given they they didn’t bring the bottles, just the glasses. (My excuse is that we were preoccupied with Ruth’s gorgeous baby, Bob)

However I did at least take a picture of that page of the wine list and am pretty sure it was the first two.

Anyway do remember this next time you’re in a restaurant that serves sauerkraut or choucroute and look to see if there's an orange wine on the list - although riesling does work too as you can see from this post.