Match of the week
Hot ham, kumquat relish and saperavi
Given the intense contagioiusness of Omicron it seemed a good idea to have a low key New Year’s Eve celebration this year which took the form of a really lovely kitchen supper with my friend Jenny Chandler and her family.
(Jenny wrote the great book Green Kids Cook: you can find her recipe for Smacked Cucumber and Crispy Green Salad with Zingy Ginger Dressing - which is EXACTLY what I feel like eating after 10 days of stuffing myself - here.)
On the night though she cooked a simple, delicious dish of ham poached in ginger ale with lentils (for luck in the new year), cavolo nero and a fresh zingy kumquat relish. I’d taken along two bottles to compare, a 2014 Cousino Macul Finis Terrae a mature blend of cabernet sauvignon, merlot and syrah from Chile and, on impulse, a rich Georgian red, a 2018 Orgo Saperavi which went brilliantly well with the dish, especially the kumquat relish. Orangey flavours, it appears, need that kind of vibrant brambly fruit. Dolcetto, I suspect, would also work as would Bonarda.
Incidentally I’d tried the wine a year or so ago and found it slightly disappointing but it absolutely sang on the night.
Other good matches for Saperavi are slow cooked Wagyu beef and, you may be surprised to hear, roast grouse.
Sausage and gammon pie and Wiper & True Family Tree IPA
OK, pie and beer is not rocket science but sometimes it’s good to be reminded what a very good match they can be. Especially when both the pie and the beer come from the same place.
The pie was the super-crumbly warm sausage and gammon pie they serve at No 12 Easton in Bristol with a generous dollop of piccalilli and a fennel salad and the beer a bottle of local Bristol brewery Wiper & True's Family Tree IPA which contains Nugget, Simcoe and Mosaic hops. I was quite startled to find it was 7.2% ABV - the alcohol didn't seem at all overpowering
Being in the West Country, cider would of course have been an equally good option but I didn't miss wine at all.
How often do you put a bottle of beer on the table when you bake a pie for friends?
Ham and Barossa Semillon
Thos of you of a certain age may remember that great ‘70s favourite ham and pineapple which conisisted of a large limp gammon steak, curling at the edges and a couple of fried pineapple rings. From a tin. There was one thing that was good about the dish though and that is that ham and pineapple are great together, something we’ve rather forgotten in these more sophisticated times.
It works too with Barossa Semillon which has a powerful pineapple flavour of its own. I discovered a 10 year old bottle, an inexpensive Peter Lehmann, at the weekend when I was clearing out the wine store and was amazed to find just how lush and rich it still was. I knew Semillon aged but it’s Hunter Valley Semillon that has the reputation for longevity not the Barossa and that matures in quite a different way - more like a Riesling.
If you want to repeat the experience you obviously don’t have to drink such a venerable bottle - a rich young Barossa Semillon will do nicely. Keep the ham - hot or cold - relatively plain like a good old fashioned glazed joint of gammon and serve in thick chunky slices. Resist the temptation to put tinned pineapple slices with it or they’ll knock out the pineapple flavours in the wine. Not that you would anyway . . .
Image © viperagp - Fotolia.com
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