Match of the week

Beef stew and oloroso sherry

Posted by Fiona Beckett (Google+) on October 14 2023 at 11:47

Last week I was at the Copa Jerez, an international wine and food competition where teams pair a 3 course menu with sherry.

(I judged the UK competition last year which was won by Gail Ge’er Li and Jaichen Lu of Dinings SW3 whose pairing of braised beef tongue and oloroso sherry I wrote about here.)

The ultimate trophy this year was won by Parsley Salon of Copenhagen in Denmark who also presented an oloroso as their main course pairing.

We enjoyed oloroso a couple of other times during the three days we were in Jerez, in both cases with a beef stew. As a ‘racion’ (more substantial tapa) at Valdespino and as the main course of beef cheek at an utterly splendid dinner at Lustau where they paired it with their Colleción Almacenista Garcia Jacana Oloroso Pata Gallina which you can buy from Waitrose Cellar for £22.99 a 50cl bottle.

Most of us obviously think of drinking red with a dish like that but if there were just the two of you - and you were both sherry fans - a glass of oloroso would be the perfect accompaniment. (Many supermarkets do excellent half bottles for less than this, quite often made by Lustau. Morrisons has one for £6.50 for example)

I attended Copa Jerez as a guest of the organisers

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