Match of the week
Carpaccio of venison with Mollydooker The Boxer shiraz
My match of the week is not in fact my match of the week which was some sublime sashimi and koshu at the Japanese embassy but as that pairing has featured before I’m going for my second best this week*.
Grilled tuna tart and Camus Ile de Ré Double Matured Cognac
The idea of matching Cognac with any food other than chocolate is still regarded as unconventional - even more so in the case of fish - but I promise you this pairing, the first course at a lunch at Camus, would have blown you away.
Toulouse sausage and prawn dumplings with sweet chilli sauce and Thierry Puzelat gamay
A pretty wild combination this week at a lovely wine bar, Magnum, we went to in Toulouse on Saturday night. The owner Jérôme’s wife, who originally came from Réunion, had made Chinese-style dumplings with the local Toulouse sausage and prawns served with a sweet chili sauce. Not the kind of thing I would normally go for but he sold it so persuasively we had to give it a go and it was fantastic.
Peter Gordon's beef pesto and Pencarrow pinot noir
I found myself back in an old haunt last week - Peter Gordon’s The Providores in London’s Marylebone High Street. As the bar was crowded we went up to the restaurant and treated ourselves to the à la carte*
Welsh rarebit and a glass of organic milk
This week's pairing is for all those of you who are having a dry January this month (although here’s why I’m not).
Clams with rice and Verd Albera
What do you drink with tapas? My immediate go-to is sherry but having indulged that whim the other day in the form of a glass of tangy manzanilla amontillada from Lustau’s almacenista collection I unusually followed it up with a glass of white.
Soft cheese and onion spread and a natural sparkling Vouvray
This week’s pairing is a short (and I imagine welcome) respite from Christmas fare - a wine we enjoyed with a number of small dishes yesterday lunchtime at a natural wine bar, Toast in East Dulwich.
Wine and cheese: Zamorano and Sandeman 30 y.o. tawny port
Given that it’s the run-up to Christmas I’ve been tasting (yes, tasting, not drinking!) a lot of port recently so have had some indulgent bottles to hand when the cheese comes out.
Eggs Royale and St Austell Clouded Yellow wheat beer
I haven’t had a beer as match of the week for a while but with the British Guild of Beer Writers dinner and Dea Latis Beer and Breakfast tasting last week I could hardly have chosen anything else.
Fonduta with white truffles and Barbera d’Alba
There’s only one pairing I could focus on this week given that I was in Piemonte and that is white truffles. What was the best match? Incredibly hard to say!
Chargrilled endive, hazelnut crumble and Bayonne ham with white Bairrada
I’m having a bit of thing about Portuguese wine at the moment - it’s so great with food and such brilliantly good value. Especially on restaurant wine lists where it’s invariably underpriced in comparison to better known wine producing countries and regions
Foxlow's 10 hour beef shortrib and Pierre Gonon's Saint-Joseph
I can’t pretend to be wholly impartial about this wine match which comes from Foxlow, the latest restaurant from my son Will and his business partner Huw Gott (who also own Hawksmoor).
10 year old Bonnes-Mares grand cru burgundy and confit duck
Rooting round the cellar (well, cupboard under the stairs) in France last week I stumbled across a bottle of 2003 Bonnes-Mares, a Grand Cru burgundy from Jean-Luc Aegerter I’d been sent as a sample about eight years ago and furtively stashed away until it was ready to drink.
Parsley soup, snails and Muscadet!
Not the most appealing food and wine pairing you may think but I have to assure you it was delicious! It was at the newly opened Berners Tavern which is run by chef-of-the-moment Jason Atherton.
Dark chocolate and Guatemalan rum
Another good chocolate pairing this week - plain dark chocolate and delciously fudgy Cana Negra gran reserva Guatemalan rum from Marks & Spencer
Grilled lamb chops and ‘orange’ wine
One of the most striking things I’ve noticed during my few days in Rome this past week is how white wine seems a better match for the local food than red does. Even with red meat like lamb? Strangely, yes.
Paul A Young Shropshire Blue and walnut chocolate truffles with Taylor’s First Estate Reserve port
Port and stilton is one of the classic wine pairings but does it work if you pair a port with a blue cheese chocolate?
Wine with cheese: Gorgonzola and Vin Santo
You know that port goes with Stilton, right? Well, here’s another good variation on the pair-sweet-wines-with-blue-cheese rule: a glass of Vin Santo and a creamy Gorgonzola.
Oscietra caviar and Galvin at Windows’ White Snapper
Last week was (highly unusually) a big week for caviar - and caviar substitutes which I ate on two successive nights paired with everything from vodka to beer. Decadent or what?
Wine and cheese: Rosemary and ewes’ milk cheese and (very) old white rioja
Last week I hosted a tasting for Wines of Rioja at Cambridge Wine Merchants. You never know quite how these things are going to work out on the day but happily most of the matches were spot on.
RSSLatest post
Orange wine and pesto trapaneseMost popular
12 great wine pairings with salmon
My latest book
How to Drink without DrinkingNews and views
What to drink in a heatwave
About Fiona
About Matching Food & Wine
Work with me
