Match of the week
Grilled ox tongue with radishes and Mr Thirsty vin de soif
As soon as I heard Will Lander of The Quality Chop House and Portland had opened a new restaurant, Clipstone, I couldn’t wait to check it out - and I wasn’t disappointed.
Prawn tagliolini and Poggio San Polo Rosso di Montalcino
If there’s one thing you might think you could be sure of it would be that you should drink white wine with a seafood pasta dish like this. But, you know what? It was this silkily delicious red that went swimmingly.
Fillet of beef with 2009 Pio Cesare Barolo
Beef and red wine is a blindingly obvious match but it gets more interesting once you think about the cut and the way that it's cooked.
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.
Aubergine parmigiana with Nero d’Avola
I’d already flagged up southern Italian red wines as a good pairing for aubergine (or eggplant) but it was good to be reminded just what a great match nero d'avola can be, especially with aubergine parmigiana
Saint-Nectaire with Domaine Matassa Cuvée Alexandria 2012, Côtes Catalanes
While orange wines are becoming more common I’m still not sure most people know when and with what to drink them so here’s a pairing that worked really well from a dinner I hosted for Bar Buvette, one of my favourite Bristol haunts, last week.
Pike and crayfish pithivier with white burgundy
If you’re looking for a match for a serious white burgundy you couldn’t do better than this elaborate pike and crayfish pie or tourte de brochet, bisque écrevisse as they billed it at the Château de Montreuil last week.
Artichoke barigoule and grüner veltliner
So maybe Austria’s signature grape grüner veltliner is the perfect pairing for tricky-to-match artichokes?
Lotus root stir-fry and chrysanthemum tea
It seems invidious to pick out just one wine pairing from my visit to the Okanagan valley last week (of which more in due course) so I’m going for the first drink I had on my arrival: chrysanthemum tea at a brilliant Chinese restaurant called Chef Tony in Richmond, the town just next door to Vancouver.
Dassai 50% unfiltered sake with lamb cutlets with Korean spices
I imagine you all know how well sake works with sashimi but it came as quite a surprise to me - wagyu aside - how well it could handle red meat and spice
Three surefire pairings for pinot noir
Most of the time, as you’ll have noticed, I feature the more offbeat wine pairings I’ve come across in my match of the week slot. This week I’ve been reminded of the virtue of some that seldom go wrong.
Mango shrikhand with Floris mango beer
Last week I did another pop-up with Bristol chef Romy Gill - this time at the Butlers Arms in Sutton Coldfield which is owned by Twitter friend Chris Giles and his wife Paula.
Root beer and fried chicken and waffles
I’m always on the lookout for interesting matches with alcohol-free drinks and this just inched it over a really good cider pairing at the Hang Fire Southern Kitchen yesterday.
Manzanilla sherry and sushi
Sushi is possibly not the first kind of food you’d think of pairing with wine but turns out it’s surprisingly good with sherry.
When you can pair asparagus with red wine
The idea of partnering asparagus with wine is contentious enough but red wine? Surely that won’t work?
Roast kid and dry Mavrodaphne
As it was my first Easter in Greece - which was celebrated a month later than that of the western Christian church this year - what could I focus on but what to drink with a Greek Easter lunch?
Is this wine the perfect match for Thai food?
Thai food is particularly difficult to match with wine. Not only do you have the heat to contend with but the tricky sweet-sour flavours and - as with many Asian cuisines - several dishes on the go at a time.
Sukiyaki Wagyu and red burgundy
I’d have been hard pushed to explain exactly what sukiyaki was before I had it this week at Jason Atherton’s swish new restaurant Sosharu in Clerkenwell.
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.
Lamb mechoui and 2007 Chateau Musar
This, I think, was the standout pairing from our Honey & Co wine club on Sunday and a great illustration of the difference a dish can make to the way a wine tastes.
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