Roast chicken and Rioja (but not all riojas!)

Another great chicken pairing following last week’s ‘cos you can never have too many of them.

You might question whether Rioja was the ideal match for roast chicken but there’s rioja and rioja.

This one was admittedly a top notch one, the ‘San Vicente de la Sonsierra,’ from José Gil, from a recent vintage (2022) and made in a much lighter, brighter style than is typical of rioja. (The alcohol was only 13.5%). More like a Burgundy than an old school rioja or Bordeaux. Interestingly Gil trained in Burgundy.

It’s actually one of the most delicious reds I’ve tasted all year - as indeed it should be at a slightly painful £41 from North Norfolk Cellars and £45 from Chesters in Abergavenny. Still, why should one automatically expect Rioja to be cheap?

The chicken was roasted simply with roasties, runner beans, courgettes and bread sauce so it needed a lighter style of red. (Gil also eschews new oak.) And the Rioja very lightly chilled.

Also a reminder that when you have a good red to hand to keep the food simple!

For other roast chicken recipes see here

And for other rioja pairings here 

Tongdak (rice-stuffed chicken) and orange wine

Continuing in the spicy food vein of last week, this time I was eating at a Korean restaurant called Bokman in Bristol.

I started with a Korean lager called Cass and could happily have carried on drinking that but was tempted by the orange wine which was available by the glass.

It was a Vincent Stoeffler, Feu Follet from Alsace, a blend of muscat, gewürztraminer and pinot gris ‘aromatics dialled up to the max’ as the wine list nicely put it.

Aromatic varieties like this that work particularly well in orange wine (which is white wine made by leaving the juice in contact with the skins as you do with a red) and it really was delicious, full of tropical fruit flavours and a touch of sweetness that took the the hot/sweet dipping sauces with our Tongdak (rice stuffed roast chicken) in their stride.

It was, if anything, even better with the sensationally good Bokman salad which consists of Chinese leaves, toasted seaweed, pine nuts and a ‘house dressing’ which I’m guessing was based on kimchi or kimchi brine. Which suggests that orange wine would be good with kimchi provided it wasn’t too hot.

You can find the wine between £22 and £28 in the UK (e.g. £25 at Victor Indigo November which is a great name) though if you’re lucky enough to live in France you can buy it off the producer’s website for €13.60.

For other orange wine pairings see here

Roast chicken and champagne

There are so many good things to drink with chicken you might wonder why champagne needs to be among them, particularly if you regard it as a wine you drink with canapés rather than with a meal

But I was reminded this week at Bob Bob Ricard’s new offshoot Bébé Bob just how good it can be.

For those of you who haven’t heard of it BBR is a fabulously bling Soho restaurant which serves caviar, beef Wellington and other old school dishes with extravagant wines such as champagne*

Bébé majors on rotisserie chicken and chips though you can still precede it with caviar if you want.

We drank Bollinger which was obviously wildly indulgent but actually if you were fine tuning the experience you might want to go for an all-chardonnay blanc de blancs which would suit the wonderfully buttery chicken gravy better. But almost certainly be more expensive.

Why does it work? Because chicken skin is one of those foods that are rich in umami and so is champagne, particularly vintage champagne which would also be a good call if you can run to it. Waitrose does a good one under its own label on which you can currently get 25% off if you buy any 6 bottles which makes it £26.99 rather than £35.99. (Used to be cheaper but they seem to have upgraded it to the no 1 range and bumped up the price.)

Or you could drink cava which would have much the same effect.

*although, to be fair, their margins are reasonable.

See also 8 great wine (and other) matches for roast chicken

I ate at Bébé Bob as a guest of the restaurant

Photograph © Miredi at fotolia.com

23 year old Chablis and crispy chicken wings

There were a couple of contenders for match of the week this week. I particularly enjoyed a gin and tonic with my king prawn coconut curry for a start but I’m going for this pairing as it’s always tricky to know what to drink with an very old wine.

The bottle in question was a 1999 La Forêt premier cru Chablis from Domaine Dauvissat-Camus which had developed a rich, almost caramelly flavour though still with a fresh acidity that cut through our starter of salt baked celeriac and confit of chicken wings (basically boned out, crisped up wings). There was some black garlic and pickled wild garlic stems in the dish but it was the umami taste of the shards of crispy chicken skin that did the trick.

The dish was at Rhubarb at Drapers Hall in Shrewsbury and the wine was generously shared by James Tanner of Tanners wine merchants round the corner where I had been doing a food and wine tasting. (The prawns with sweet chilli sauce and Barry & Sons Clare Valley riesling and belly pork with apple purée with Domaine Bruno Sorg pinot gris from Alsace were particularly good matches there!)

For other good pairings with Chablis click here

I ate at Rhubarb as a guest of Tanners Wines