Chips with caviar dip and champagne

Caviar and champagne is a classic pairing but it doesn’t actually work with every champagne, especially fruitier rosé champagnes and cuvées with a relatively high ‘dosage’ (added sugar solution)*

At Bébé Bob (the newer offshoot of the better known Bob Bob Ricard) the other day we had caviar with both a Moët rosé and Taittinger (yes, I know, I know. Ridiculously indulgent) and it was much better with the drier, lighter Taittinger.

Adding chips to the equation which go brilliantly with champagne made the match even more successful and I loved their idea of serving them with a crème fraîche dip topped with caviar. Something you could easily do at home with a caviar substitute - or caviar if you were feeling particularly flush. 

*I’d also avoid vintage champagne which can be too rich and toasty for a delicate ingredient like caviar.

For other suggestions see 10 excuses to drink champagne this Christmas and New Year holiday

I ate at bébé bob as a guest of the restaurant.

Lobster roll and Franciacorta

When it comes to pairing wine with a lobster roll I reckon it’s as important to think about the roll as the lobster. I.e. that despite including a luxury ingredient it’s basically a sandwich, a snack, a fun meal.

One you might even have a beer with if you were somewhere where lobsters are cheap which is certainly not the case in London or at Jeremy King’s new restaurant The Park on Queensway but as you can see it is a perfect specimen.

As I was having my leaving party* the same day I decided to stick to just the one glass of wine but rather than the white burgundy you might have expected I chose a glass of light, elegant Franciacorta Corteaura. Sparkling wine often hits the same spot as a beer - or at least lager - with food, oddly. 

You can buy it from a merchant called Outpour for £20.95 or £22.50 or £20.50 for 6 from Lea & Sandeman which indicates The Park, which is charging £15.95 a glass, is making a more than generous margin. Still someone has to pay for all that expensive blonde wood and the flatteringly lit loos. (Spend time down there. It's better than therapy.)

Don't get me wrong. I adored the restaurant which is wonderfully luxurious in a low key way. No-one does understated glamour quite like Jeremy King. It has one of those menus where there’s something for everyone. And the ice creams are divine. Just choose what you order carefully if you don't want to break the bank. Lobster roll compulsory.

For other lobster pairings see here

*In case you missed it I’ve left the Guardian after 14 years to leave more time for travelling and other projects including my website and Substack!

I paid for my meal in case you were wondering ...

White peach and blanc de noirs mousse with rosé champagne

There were a lot of great pairings at the G.H. Mumm dinner I went to in Paris the other night but the most intriguing was the dessert which was served with their RSRV Rosé Foujita

The meal which was devised by 3-starred Michelin chef Sato Hideaki of Ta Vie in Hong Kong was primarily focussed around how the texture of a dish can play with champagne but this last pairing was more about sweetness - or rather the lack of it.

The Rosé Foujita has only 6g of residual sugar but because it's fruitier than most rosé champagnes it was not made uncomfortably tart by being paired with a dessert. Not that the dessert was overly sweet, reflecting more the delicate flavour of white peach. But the accompanying champagne mousse and spun sugar casing were ethereally light which made it the perfect partner for a sparkling wine.

If you haven't the skills to make a similar dessert - and let’s face it which of us has - I think the Foujita could also work with pannacotta and a perfectly ripe white peach or nectarine. It’s also recommended as an accompaniment to beef (rare or raw I’d say) or salmon which really makes it very versatile.

You can buy it from The Whisky Exchange for £69.75 - not cheap but good value. Laurent Perrier rosé is £81.25 and Ruinart’s £89.95

I attended the dinner as a guest of G.H. Mumm.

Indian-spiced soft-shell crab and English sparkling rosé

You might have thought English sparkling wine and in fact English wine in general was a bit delicate for Indian food but this pairing at Trishna last week was spot on.

Crab of course goes well with rosé anyway and sparkling wine is great with deep-fried food so it wasn’t a massive leap to pair the two when spices were involved especially when they were as subtle as at Trishna which has a Michelin star

The wine was one of the most elegant English rosés, Busi-Jocobsohn’s 2019 Rosé Brut which has a lowish dosage of 6.3g which counters the idea that you need wine with a touch of sweetness with spicy food.

However it is a single vineyard wine and slightly fuller and riper than the extra brut rosé of theirs I’ve tasted before which helped it stand up to the dish (and makes for more pleasurable drinking too)

You can buy it from their website busijacobsohn.com for £39 - which is good value for a sparkling rosé of that quality.

For other wine and crab pairings see The Best Wines to Pair with Crab

I ate at Trishna as a guest of Busi-Jacobsohn.