Prawn laksa and dry German riesling

It was a bumper week for wine pairings with some classic favourites such as pork and Beaujolais (an excellent Fleurie at Cora Pearl) and oysters and muscadel (at the new Hawksmoor in Edinburgh) but I’m going for this riesling pairing as it solves the thorny problem of what to drink with laksa.

Actually I discovered I’d flagged this up once before but 8 years ago so it felt it was worth reminding you. The laksa was at the newly opened - and wildly popular* - Sambal Shiok in Islington. We chose a moderately hot version which was maybe a mistake as it lacked a bit of punch but that was probably a plus so far as the wine - a very delicious off-dry Mosel riesling - was concerned. (The list is put together by writer and wine consultant Zeren Wilson who also chooses the wine at the Thai restaurant Smoking Goat)

The riesling also went brilliantly with the sides we ordered including a gado gado salad and Malaysian fried chicken with peanut sauce. Often I advocate slightly sweeter rieslings with spicy food but this was wonderfully refreshing. And - unusually for the Mosel - 12%, so strong enough to carry the punchy flavours.

*Go if you’re in that part of town but I wouldn’t cross London for it.

Passionfruit and tarragon with Jurancon

There were so many outstanding pairings in the meal I had at the Michelin-starred Casamia in Bristol last week I don’t know quite where to start.

Not with Frerejean Frères premier cru champagne with a dish of turbot with truffle and a champagne sabayon although that was perfect (I wrote about a champagne pairing a couple of weeks ago and I wouldn't want you to think I'm a one-trick pony!)

Nor a lovely little warm vegetable and sheeps' curd salad with a delicate Portuguese field blend* from the Alentejo called Equinocio, impressive though that was.

It’s got to be a wonderfully summery dessert of passionfruit and tarragon - a combination that was recommended by chef Peter Sanchez’ herb supplier Jekka McVicar with a 2015 Uroulat Jurançon dessert wine from south-west France.

I’m not sure how to begin to describe the dessert which was like little explosions of passionfruit and tarragon popping in your mouth - the slightly aniseedy tarragon perfectly counterbalancing the exotic sweetness of the fruit. Apparently it was passion fruit gel, seeds and sorbet made using a syringe and liquid nitrogen I later learnt from Peter. With tarragon meringue and tarragon infused custard. (Honestly, mindblowing.)

The wine, which was young enough to have retained all its freshness, had a lovely peachy flavour that echoed but could have been cancelled out by the passionfruit but was thrown into relief by the tarragon.

Not obviously a dish you can replicate at home (which is why we go to restaurants) but I'm wondering if you could make a tarragon ice cream and serve it will grilled peaches to similar effect ....

* a field blend is a wine made from vines that are all mixed up in the same vineyard rather than from varieties that are grown separately. It gives them a particular vivacity.

I ate at Casamia as a guest of the restaurant.

Cider and tapas

Cider isn’t, I admit, the first drink I’d pair with tapas but when I spotted on the menu of newly opened Bar 44 in Bristol that they had Spanish ‘sidra’ on tap - the first, they claimed, in the country - I had to try it.

it was a Spanish cider called Avalon at 5.5% - rather higher in alcohol than you’d have thought and comes from Gijon in the cider drinking Asturias region. On a hot day it was really quaffable - dry with a good strong, appley flavour - and went happily with all the dishes we threw at it from jamon iberico (iberico ham) to hake with cockles.

The dishes I think it paired with best were some delicious roast chicken croquetas with crisp smoked morcilla and a pea purée and a seasonal fish and shellfish fritura with a punchy alioli (garlic mayonnaise) - both fried, note. Cider, like beer, tends to work well with fried foods.

Do I prefer it to my normal go to of fino sherry or cava? I wouldn’t go that far but then I’m not a regular cider drinker. If you are you may be pleased to know, if you don’t already, that it will take tapas in its stride.

See also 6 of the best Spanish wines to pair with tapas

Champagne and pigs tails

Champagne, we all know, goes with practically everything but PIG TAILS? Surely not.

Well yes, if they’re in the capable hands of chef Rob Roy Cameron of Gazelle in Mayfair who hammers them out into fine crispy shards and partners them with Jerusalem artichokes (another champagne-loving ingredient) and a Manhattan jus. Fried things, as I’ve said before, go exceptionally well with bubbles - in fact I’m hard pushed to think of a still wine that would have partnered this clever dish better.

Two other matches among the small plates we sampled stood out with the champagne - (a rich, Benoit Lahaye Brut Nature): a dish of mushrooms with pine nuts and wild garlic (well, mushrooms flatter everything) and another umami-rich dish of squid with sandalwood cured jowl and girolles (yes, more mushrooms but the dish was more about the pork)

The pairing was the more surprising given that the restaurant heavily features cocktails devised by leading mixologist and co-owner Tony Conigliaro so I was expecting to drink them through the meal too but the negroni I ordered, while delicious, was just a bit too strong and sweet for the delicate flavours of the food.

We did however try one of the cocktail pairings in the bar upstairs: a Serafin (tequila, pear shrub, pear liqueur and ginger beer) which was perfect with a delicate crisp corn tostada and a champagne cocktail - the Twinkle, I think - with Grapefruit Goldy (whatever that is), citrus and champagne with what looked like an ice-cream wafer, but turned out to be frozen yeast and taste like frozen parmesan. (Cameron used to work for El Bulli.) Quite gorgeous.

I guess the champagne would have gone pretty well with that too.

I ate at Gazelle as a guest of the restaurant.