Match of the week
Mackerel and red gooseberry juice
Pairing food with no and lo-alcohol drinks is still in its infancy, alcohol-free drinks being pretty new on the scene themselves so it was lovely to have the opportunity to run through a series of alcohol-free pairings that were offered as an accompanying flight to the tasting menu at restaurant Hjem near Hexham in Northumberland.
The most successful combination was a dish of charred mackerel with raw cream and tomato jelly which was brilliant with the gooseberry juice I had in front of me. Stands to reason when you think about it - mackerel and gooseberries go well together on the plate - so why not take away that fruity element and serve it in a glass?
(I’d say the only problem is that it’s unlikely to go as well with the subsequent course, in our case an extraordinarily luxuriant dish of peas under a brown butter foam. The same wine (a 2016 Domaine des Ardoisières Argile Blanc from Savoie) could and did handle both though wasn't as spot on with the mackerel as the juice.)
The other really good pairing was a woodruff ice-cream (woodruff is a herb with a hay-like scent as explained here) which was served with a light strawberry juice garnished with violas. Very delicious and pretty.
I hope to get round to writing about Hjem which, since it was glowingly reviewed by the Sunday Times restaurant critic Marina O'Loughlin, is not the easiest place to get into. But worth the detour as Michelin would have it.
Gin and tonic with peppered smoked mackerel
Gin isn’t just an aperitif, it’s also a surprisingly good match for food as I’ve already suggested in this post. Last week I discovered yet another way to enjoy it - with peppered smoked mackerel.
It was an impromptu picnic on the hottest day of the year with temperatures (uncharacteristically for Bristol) well up into the 30s. Having slogged away clearing the kitchen for a major refit this week we took two large G & Ts down into the garden below, then realising what a brilliant idea that was, had another, this time with an impromptu fridge picnic of smoked peppered mackerel with a few tomatoes, a squirt of mayo and some crunchy Spanish olive oil crackers called regañas. (No it wasn’t particularly elegant but like most things eaten outdoors tasted sooo good)
Gins are sometimes flavoured with peppercorns these days so I think that was why it worked so well. I’m now on a mission to find other interesting gin pairings.
Six pairings for gin that might surprise you
Photo © Richard Griffin @fotolia.com
Mackerel and artichokes with Mademoiselle rosé
As I’ve been down in the Languedoc for the past week most of my food and wine combinations have been classic. Picpoul and oysters (always great), a rich grenache/syrah/mourvedre blend called Cascaillou* with a beef daube (spot on) and my wine of the week, Mas des Chimères Oeillade (a cinsault) with grilled lamb and herbs.
But the most intriguing pairing was, on the face of it, the trickiest. What do you pair with mackerel, artichokes, brandade and aioli? Answer, it turns out, a dry rosé.
The dish was a somewhat fancy one from Le Bistrot d’Alex, the restaurant attached to the enterprising co-op at Florensac but tasted better than it perhaps sounds. A roughly crushed brandade (salt cod purée), served with grilled lisettes (baby mackerel) accompanied by grilled artichokes topped with aioli. The artichokes were the most dominant flavour which is always fine by me.
The wine, which is made by the co-op and sells for around 6€ is a remarkably good one despite the girly label and being called Mademoiselle. Well worth picking up a case if you’re in the area. My friends, who are taking a car back loaded up with 10!
* from Domaine La Croix Belle. Unfortunately they only make it in limited quantities - it doesn't even feature on their website.
Sweet herring and mackerel rillettes with an aromatic Greek white
Paris isn’t the obvious place you’d think of drinking Greek wine - in fact it’s a rare sighting in a city whose wine lists are almost 100% French. So when I came across one in a hip little bar called Clamato I was intrigued
I had trouble tracking it down but it’s called Efranor and appears to come from a winery called Sklavos in an appellation called Coteaux d’Alnos on the island of Cephalonia and is a blend of Moscatel, Vostyildi and Zakynthino.
I wouldn’t have actually guessed as the Moscatel character is not that obvious and it tastes really dry but with an exotic, slightly perfumed character (the French tasting note I found says bergamot) and an almost oily texture that was just perfect with the rillettes, an unusual combination of sweet herring and mackerel with a scattering of freshly grated lemon zest. There were some watercress leaves on the side which added a nice touch of bitterness.
Admittedly it slightly overwhelmed the other two dishes we ate - a tartare of mackerel and a dish of white and green asparagus with trout roe which went better with the crisper, more mineral Le Pont Bourceau Anjou blanc 2011 from Les Roches Sèches my husband was drinking (a Chenin Blanc). But eating small plates like this you obviously wouldn’t want to keep switching wines.
I reckon a Portuguese white like a young Douro white or a Vinho Verde would have gone with the rillettes too - or a Spanish Albarino or Godello.
Mackerel pasty and Gusbourne Blanc de Blancs 2006
This actually wasn't the dish with which I drank this brilliant new sparkling wine at Rocksalt in Folkestone last week - I'd unfortunately finished my glass by then - but it would certainly have been a knockout wine pairing.
You can see my full account of the meal on my Food & Wine Finds blog here. The mackerel pasty - a combination of mackerel and pork sausage meat - might sound weird but was surprisingly light, savoury and absolutely delicious.
By then we'd moved on to a carafe of Birgit Eichinger Hasel Grüner Veltliner but to tell the truth the Gusbourne, a new sparkling wine which comes from a vineyard just five miles away from the restaurant in Kent, would have been a better match. (Fizz is generally a good call with pastry and fish.)
It was an interesting wine - softer and richer than a comparable Champagne. It won a silver medal in this year's IWSC competition - a considerable coup from a new wine producer. You can buy it direct off their website for £24.99 a bottle.
Other good matches would have been a best bitter or a medium dry cider. Or even a perry.
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