Tandoori grouse and an Indian ‘SuperTuscan’

If you’d asked me a week ago whether I thought it was a good idea to cook grouse in a tandoor oven and then to serve it with a full-bodied red I’d have said no, and no. Which shows how you can continually be surprised by this food and wine pairing lark.

The dish was one we couldn’t resist trying at Trishna where Itamar Srulovich of Honey & Co and his wine buyer Dee and I had gone to hammer out the final details of our pop-up wine school this autumn. (Gratuitous plug. More details here)

Grouse is such an expensive delicacy it seems on the face of it mad to smother it in spices but the team at Trishna (who also own the much-fêted Gymkhana in Mayfair) know what they’re doing. In fact they have an awesome-looking game menu there that is matched with some really interesting wines.

The red - a 2010 blend of Sangiovese and Cabernet called Sette - is made by Fratelli, a collaboration between an Indian family-owned winery and Tuscan winemaker Piero Masi. I would have predicted that it would have been much too intense and full-bodied to accompany the grouse but how wrong I was. The rare meat and spices soften the tannins of the wine making it taste fabulously velvety.

Impressively Trishna pairs every dish on the menu with an accompanying wine. They recommend the 2013 Kloof Street Swartland Rouge from South African producer, Mullineux with the dish which would also be interesting.

Grouse and Chambolle-Musigny

Today is the official start of the grouse season. (Yes, it is the 13th but since the Glorious 12th falls on a Sunday this year they (though I haven’t the faintest idea who ‘They’ are) decided to postpone it a day). For those of you unfamiliar with this gastronomic treat grouse is a small, wild bird that inhabits open moorland, and is much prized for its gamey flavour.

It’s sufficiently rare to create a bit of a stir when it turns up on a menu, particularly this year when numbers have apparently been adversely affected by disease and the poor weather. If you’re not a member of a gentleman’s club or fortunate enough to have a traditional Scottish butcher on your doorstep you’re most likely to find it in such game-friendly establishments as The Goring, Hambleton Hall in Rutland, the Mayfair butcher Allens or London department stores such as Harrods and Selfridges, though you may well need to order it in advance. (I also discovered a website www.ovenreadygrouse.co.uk that supplies direct from the Barningham Park estate on the edge of the North Yorkshire moors)

In terms of a wine match this is the perfect opportunity to bring out one of your best bottles of red burgundy - and an ethereal style of red burgundy at that: something like a Chambolle-Musigny or a Vosne-Romanée with a few years’ bottle age would be perfect. Assuming you don’t have a Romanée-Conti to hand, of course . . .