Six of the best drinks to pair with a scotch egg

For those unfamiliar with the delicacy a scotch egg is a whole egg wrapped in sausagemeat, then coated in breadcrumbs and deep-fried.

Traditionally the egg would have been hard boiled but more recently the fashion has been to serve them soft and even runny like this version from the Opera Tavern. And in some cases - presumably in a vain attempt to make them more healthy - they’re now baked which is wrong on every level.

The classic pork casing has also been subject to endless variations from black pudding to smoked haddock which seems more like an outsized croqueta. The venerable National Trust even does a pea and mint scotch egg while Sainsbury’s magazine offers a teriyaki chicken one.

But assuming your scotch egg is of the classic British variety the six drinks I would go for are

Cider

Better than beer IMHO, apple being a natural accompaniment to pork. Particularly good with a pork and leek scotch egg.

Apple juice

By the same token apple juice is the best option for non-drinkers

A pale ale or IPA

You want a beer with a touch of sweetness so a contemporary pale ale or IPA is better than a classic bitter, particularly if you like a dollop of piccalilli on the side

Cava

Champagne is a bit posh for a scotch egg and prosecco a touch sweet but Spanish cave just hits the spot, especially if you’re a fan of a runny yolk. (Fizz is one of the wines that can deal with eggs and always a good match for deep-fried food)

Which wines pair best with eggs?

Rosé

With a summery scotch egg with salad (and even salad cream) you can’t beat a glass of rosé

A glass of fruity Bordeaux

Given that a scotch egg is half way to being a cooked breakfast and that Bordeaux goes surprisingly well with bacon and eggs I reckon it’s a good wine to drink with a classic Scotch egg too. I don’t mean some treasured old bottle from the cellar but a young juicy fruity claret of which there are plenty. Much-maligned merlot would be great too.

See also Top wine - and other - matches for sausages

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Top wine pairings with asparagus

Whenever anyone talks about foods that are difficult to match with wine, asparagus always comes up but I reckon the problem is overstated.

Just like any other ingredient it depends how you cook and serve it and how many other ingredients there are on the plate. Few people serve asparagus totally unadorned.

The most popular pairing is with Sauvignon Blanc which can have a marked asparagus flavour itself so you need another ingredient on the plate such as salmon, chicken or goats cheese to revive those flavours in the wine.

Wines that can be tricky are wines with a touch of sweetness as asparagus can accentuate that. Oaked whites are generally not too successful (except with rich buttery sauces - see below) nor are wines with pronounced tannins.

Here are my suggestions with different asparagus preparations:

• With a vinaigrette - Needs a wine that can cope with the vinaigrette and won’t compete with the asparagus. I prefer an earthy, dry, unoaked Italian white such as Verdicchio or dry Orvieto to a Sauvignon Blanc here. Or a light, dry rosé without too much upfront berry fruit

• With melted butter or mayo - Where the asparagus is offset by the richness of butter or mayo but there isn’t anything else on the plate: an unoaked or lightly oaked Chardonnay such as Chablis

• With hollandaise or soft-boiled or poached eggs - Here the sauce or accompaniments begin to take over so go for a mature oaked Chardonnay (one in which the wood is well integrated but which is still fresh-tasting), traditional white Rioja or Champagne

• With goats cheese or prawns and salad - here’s where to drink Sauvignon Blanc, especially minerally Sauvignons from the Loire like Sancerre. The goats’ cheese accentuates rather than knocking out the asparagus flavours in the wine. English whites like Bacchus are also good.

• With grilled salmon - Semillon-Sauvignon blends, especially from Bordeaux or Western Australia generally work well

• With crab - a very dry Riesling, from e.g. Austria won’t overwhelm the crab

• With sautéed or fried chicken - Here asparagus is likely to be the vegetable so go for a wine that will match the chicken such as a light or moderately oaked Chardonnay

• Asparagus risotto - You’re matching the creamy risotto not just the asparagus. A crisp, fresh Italian white such as Pinot Grigio from the Alto Adige is the ideal option in my view or other dry Pinot Grigios

• Asparagus quiche - Alsace Pinot Blanc or Italian Pinot Bianco is a generally reliable choice with quiches. Alternatively go for a light, unoaked Chardonnay

• Chargrilled asparagus with mushrooms/roast asparagus with pancetta - Here’s where you can go for a light Loire red such as Bourgeuil or Saumur-Champigny, inexpensive red burgundy or other light, unoaked Pinot Noir

• In a stir fry - the sauce is likely to be the determining factor here. Assuming it’s something reasonably light to preserve the flavour of the asparagus I’d go for an off-dry Riesling from e.g. Germany

• White asparagus - Popular in central and southern Europe. My favourite pairing is young Grüner Veltliner, though others will go for dry Riesling or even dry Muscat (though the latter is not to everyone’s taste). Dry Spanish rosado is also good.

Image by Elena Veselova at shutterstock.com

Six of the best pairings for roast pork

If you’re wondering which wine to pair with roast pork the good news is it’s a flexible meat that can take a white or a red - or even - given the crackling, a sparkling wine.

Cider too is a great option.

It depends how you cook it, of course - in the traditional British way with crackling and gravy (better with white wines and cider) or Italian style with garlic, fennel and herbs (better with red)

The Portuguese also have a fondness for roast suckling pig with juicy reds like baga and barraida

Here’s what I’d choose

Chenin blanc

Especially old vine chenin blanc and Cape White blends from South Africa which have the richness and weight to cope with roast meat. Sparkling chenin blanc is delicious too.

Cider (aka hard cider)

Just as pork goes with apples, it’s perfect with cider - a medium dry cider for preference. (Apple juice too if you’re not drinking)

Sangiovese

A medium bodied Italian red like a Rosso di Montalcino is perfect with Italian-style roast pork with garlic fennel and herbs

Beaujolais

Classic with charcuterie but also great with roast pork, especially ‘cru’ Beaujolais like a Morgon. It can even handle Chinese-style roast pork. Try Spanish Mencia too.

Côtes-du-Rhône villages

Warm, generous, grenache-based reds are good with wintery pork roasts

Hoppy IPAs

Or even double IPAs are just brilliant with pork, especially pulled pork. Saison beers are good with roast pork too.

For pairings with other pork dishes check out

Which wines pair best with pork

What wine - and other drinks - to pair with Korean food (NEW)

If you’ve developed a taste for Korean food - as so many of us now have - you may still be struggling with what drink to pair with it - and whether that should include wine.

The flavours are certainly not subtle. It’s richly spicy and umami, accompanied by fermented and pickled side dishes most notably kimchi, that present their own challenges.

Except in more modern Korean or Korean fusion restaurants dishes tend to be served at the same time so it’s useful to find a drink that will take them all in its stride.

That needn’t necessarily be wine which is just as well as many restaurants offer a limited selection, by the glass at least. But there are a wide range of Korean drinks including soju, which is apparently the world’s best selling spirit and makgeolli, a fermented rice-based drink.

Here are the beverages that you could drink throughout a Korean meal - or at least switch to half way through plus some pairings for popular Korean dishes you might eat on their own. 

Wines that generally go with Korean food

Crisp, zesty whites tend to work with the small plates that appear at the beginning of a Korean meal. Sauvignon blanc - particularly New Zealand sauvignon blanc - would be the obvious choice but consider Rueda, unoaked white Rioja and Austria’s grüner veltliner.

Gewurztraminer and Gewürztraminer blends
Often too powerful for other Asian cuisines Gewürztraminer comes in handy with Korean - whether you drink it as a varietal or a blend with other aromatic varieties like riesling and pinot gris

Orange wines are particularly good especially those that fall into the ‘natural’ category and which are made from aromatic grape varieties like malvasia or pinot gris. Natural wines work well with fermented and pickled foods - take a look at this match with tongdak (rice stuffed chicken) which made my match of the week slot last year.

Strong, dark fruity rosés such as those from Rioja and Navarra in Spain
Better able to stand up to ingredients such as gochujang (the widely used Korean chilli paste) than Provence rosé. Again natural or low intervention rosés work well

Big full-bodied reds, especially cabernet blends. The standout pairing - somewhat to my surprise - but although Korean food is spicy it isn’t often searingly hot. See Korean barbecue below

Other drinks

Beer
The most obvious go-to. Generally a light lager though I’ve found darker beers go well with umami-rich Korean stews. Well known Korean brands are Cass and Hite.

Soju
Either as shots or lighter drinks like Jinro’s widely available Chamisul.

Soju is a high strength spirit as opposed to sake which is fermented and more delicate so you might not want to drink it throughout a meal but it does go well with the punchier dishes of Korean barbecue.

It’s also used in cocktails which is another popular way of kicking off a Korean meal.

Sake
Despite the above sake is a pretty good match for Korean food as is fino sherry.

Makgeolli 
A refreshing cloudy mid-strength sparkling rice wine that makes a refreshing counterpoint to kimchi. Often flavoured though I prefer the plain version particularly if it comes from an artisanal producer like the one above.

Alcohol-free options

Tea, grain and herbal infusions such as barley tea and Solomons seal root tea are popular in Korea. The latter is slightly bitter, tastes of grilled nuts and toasted sesame. Japanese genmaicha would also work

Kombucha and other sparkling tea drinks.
Kombucha works in a similar way to natural wine while Saicho’s nutty Hojicha echoes the toasted sesame in many Korean dishes.

What to pair with popular Korean dishes you might eat on their own

Banchan
The Korean word that refers to small plates that are often served as sides to the main dish but may well arrive first. They often include kimchi and other pickles, gyoza-like dumplings (mandoo) and noodle dishes such as japchae but could also include fried chicken

If you’re going to drink white wine with a Korean meal this is the best stage to do so - zesty whites like unoaked white Rioja and New Zealand sauvignon blanc work well or skin contact whites aka orange wines.

If there’s a fried element like Korean fried chicken you could drink sparkling wine - champagne if you really feel like splashing out but cava or crémant would do perfectly well.

Kimchi
An obligatory side but also features as a light meal in its own right as in kimchi pancakes (above) and Kimchi fried rice for which you can find a recipe here. Makgeolli is a good choice to cool the heat of hotter kimchis but orange wine, natural wines, craft cider and kombucha are also good options.

Bibimbap
Korea’s iconic rice bowl dish can be mild (which it quite often is in a chain restaurant) or punchy. At the restaurant of the same name in London I recently had what was described as a Korean root tea (see above) which tasted of grilled nuts and roasted sesame and had a slightly earthy, woody flavour. A low strength soju drink like Jinro’s Chamisul fresh (17%) or a lager would be good too.

Korean barbecue/Bulgogi
Bulgogi is a dish of marinated steak either seared or cooked on a barbecue and typically served with with doenjang (soy bean paste or a dipping sauce and several sides.

This is where your full-bodied reds come into play in just the same way as they would in any steakhouse. I had a Journey’s End The Pastor’s Blend Bordeaux blend from South Africa with bulgogi at Chung’dam, a Korean BBQ restaurant in Soho and a Veronica Ortega Quite Mencia from Bierzo in my local Korean, Dongnae in Bristol so you can see it covers quite a range of styles. And if a Bordeaux blend why not more modern styles of Bordeaux come to that? Grenache I think would work well too.

In more contemporary Korean-influenced rather than traditional Korean restaurants such as Miga in Hackney the dishes may not be hot and spicy at all. I drank a 2013 Rioja from Lopez de Heredia with a dish of soy braised short ribs with mushrooms which was spot on.

Soju shots also go well with bulgogi and other beef dishes.

Hearty stews and hotpots

A slightly trickier to match main course option, often more like a soup than a stew and flavoured with a miso-ish soy bean paste called doenjang

I struggled to find a good wine match with it - it seems to have the effect of turning reds overly sweet but reckon it would be great with a dark lager or a dark, maybe Belgian Trappist beer.

Since this is my first dive into Korean food and I haven’t yet got to Korea I’d love to hear from those of you who are more familiar with it.

Top image © Kuba Puchajda at shutterstock.com