Cape Town - Chocolate and cheese? Please. Wine pairings have taken on a new tone.
These offbeat pairings are geared toward enhancing the wine experience for connoisseurs and novices alike.
Delheim
Word has it that back in the day there was a snail problem in the Winelands and an old Delheim winemaker’s wife started using the pests in her cooking.
Years later, Delheim was one of the first estates to introduce a food companion to their wines. But that doesn’t mean they’re stuck in old ways – no worries, no more snails. Rather, their innovative pairings are a response to the trends and times.
“Delheim has always been here to try to make wine accessible to the general public,” says sales manager Johan van Dyk.
And they’ve done the trick – with cupcakes.
“What’s more fun than saying I’m going to have cupcakes and wine?” Van Dyk says.
Well, possibly pancakes.
“For the season we wanted something a bit warmer that gives a wintry feeling.”
Enter a savoury and sweet trio that works like a starter, main and dessert.
Reg Holder, Delheim’s winemaker, says wine isn’t just something to drink, it’s a lifestyle – and food is part of that.
“A wine completes a meal, and a meal completes a wine,” he says. “I think a person can have a much more fulfilling experience when they can have something that really goes well with that wine.”
Indeed, each wine’s soft elegance is enhanced with that second sip – the one that comes after the first savoured bite.
A wholewheat pancake, filled with salmon trout and cream cheese and topped with caper berry shavings whets the palate. This light and fresh snack is matched with a delicate floral pinotage rosé. The main is a hearty Karoo lamb shank pancake with caramelised onion, picked up with the blackcurrant and rich dark chocolate flavours of the cabernet sauvignon. The treat in this trifecta is the pickled pumpkin pancake, paired with the estate’s eminent Edelspatz nobel late harvest – the intense apricot sweetness marrying delightfully with the tartness and spices of the pancake.
You can stop there, surely satiated. Or you can top up with their crafted cupcakes for an “impromptu party in the mouth”.
Delheim has taken a worldwide trend and offered a uniquely South African twist. A rooibos cupcake infused with lemon and topped with a cream cheese and honey icing is paired with their unwooded chardonnay. Exotic pomegranate is brought home with the pinotage rosé (the wine’s floral notes work wonders with finger-licking cream cheese icing).
The citrus and mineral notes in the chardonnay freshen the palate after the tartness of an African makataan (wild citron melon) cupcake. The pickled pumpkin makes a return in this decadent foursome, this time in a dense, spiced cupcake set off by Delheim’s dark berry pinotage.
When Holder talks about the pairings, he starts with the wine. He talks about the cultivar, the sense of place, the vintage. It’s clear the work has been done: These pairings are mouth-ready.
After all, Holder says: “It’s not a tasting – it’s an experience you’re having.”
R75 for each pairing.
Somerbosch Wines
At Somerbosch Wines, a simple pairing isn’t quite enough. Here, red wine isn’t just matched with ice cream, but is in the ice cream as well. “It’s about finding the characters of the wine in the ice cream,” says marketing associate Werner Swart. “What do you find in the wine and can you find it in the ice cream?”
Marius Roux, owner and winemaker, explains that red wine – with strong flavour and berry vibes – lends itself to ice cream, although he admits his wife was the inspiration.
But flavour is subjective here.
“What we want to see is if you really get the connotation, the same flavours in the wine that you get in the ice cream,” he says. “Does it transfer?
It does. The warmth of red wine meets its frozen match in elegantly understated berry flavours.
Each of the four varietals are reduced to a concentrated extract and mixed with a home-made anglaise. The resulting melt-in-you-mouth ice cream in shades of purple and ruby highlights the notes of each wine. Added pepper and cinnamon enhance the flavour in its frozen form. This does wonders for the shiraz – the spicy characters of the wine become more pronounced in the dark currant and clove ice cream. The less intense merlot’s deep cherry flavour translates into a soft creaminess. The pinotage is distinctively sweeter, its full-bodied, velvety aromas pick up nicely in a very berry ice cream. And the cabernet sauvignon plum and black pepper overtones contend with a robust sugariness and reserved creaminess.
“There’s just something about red wine,” Roux says. But there’s something about ice cream, too. What a pair. R40 for each pairing.
Arugula
Fine dining isn’t often associated with the Afrikaans culinary experience. But from behind the front lines of the “boerewors” curtain, Neil Swart says that’s a misconception, and he’s got the dishes to prove it.
Like his home-made creamy mozzarella between two layers of seared aubergine, topped with rocket, mint, and chilli pesto. Thin almond slices and a buttery crouton add a delicate crunch.
Swart, head chef and owner at Arugula Bistro & Bread in Bellville, calls it family fine food – “fine dining quality but family-orientated”. His menu caters to the local community, but once a month he partners a wine seller for an evening of decadence: a five-course meal matched with five especially selected wines.
“A lot of people here don’t just want plain old food – they want something like this,” Swart says.
And “this” is certainly not “plain old food”. Take, for example, his salmon from this month’s event. The sweet miso glaze on the delicate fish is set off by the robust and smoky, sweet potato paste. This, Swart paired with Hillcrest’s rosé.
“A lot of times we do quite alternative pairings,” he says – like red wine with white fish (gasp).
“The rosé with salmon was a good pairing – the sweet tanginess from miso worked well with the flavour from the rosé.
“But the surprising one was the smokiness from the puree.”
The evening moves on, and clean, simple flavours in creative combinations abound. Swart has a way of making the ingredients speak for themselves.
Succulent pork belly with oh-so-smoky bacon is served with a nicely textured pea and truffle quarry sauce, and paired with a curranty, oaky merlot.
The sesame-marinated short rib’s subtle smokiness is perfect with seared sweet onion and crispy gnocchi. The accompanying Bordeaux blend is described by the wine seller as “rich, full and complex – and elegant”. It is all of those things.
Dessert is vanilla cheesecake with a layer of dark chocolate jelly, thin ginger crumble crust, orange marmalade and pecans. Plus butternut ice cream. The Robbenzicht pairing provides a smooth blend, relaxed and rich to wind down the night.
For Swart, it’s bliss.
“When I do a food and wine pairing I really get to do new stuff and try new ideas,” he says.
For the neighbourhood, it’s also bliss. “They can come and enjoy a really good wine and food experience and don’t have to drive into Cape Town,” he says. “And it doesn’t break the bank.”
And all behind the “boerewors” curtain.
“I just believe there are people here who like the finer things in life,” he says.
Anne Steele, Cape Argus