Dinner Party 1
Our dinner party today starts with Delicious Garlic Prawns, followed by Juicy slow cooker Turkey Breast with roast pumpkin, spinach and feta salad and finished off with Creme Brulee.
Each month we will be pairing our dinner party menu dishes with wines from Phil Smith of “The Wine Depository”
Garlic Prawns
Paired with Santadi Villa Solais Vermentino Sardinia 2019 $29.00
Garlic prawns is a boldly flavoured dish with the beautiful texture of prawns. This means you want to pair with it a wine that is aromatically equal and has a lovely mouthfeel too. I have loved Vermentino for a very long time for it aromatics and mouthfeel. Villa Solais comes from the island of Sardinia, Italy and is made to be paired with the wonderful seafood they source around the island. The perfume is apricot kernel, with floral and briny notes. The palate offers a silky feel and lovely acid to be nice and clean on the finish. Don’t chill this wine down too much, or you’ll lose all that gorgeous character.
Juicy slow cooker Turkey Breast with roast pumpkin, spinach and feta salad
A perfectly cooked, juicy turkey breast is a real treat. For this dish, I have looked at the accompaniments too. The sweetness of roast pumpkin and feta with the savoury spinach sounds great. To pair, I have chosen the Barbera grape. It is known for its plush black cherry and red berry fruits, but it also has a savoury streak that makes it perfect for this dish. Mordrelle makes a great example in Langhorne Creek, South Australia. The soft tannins and mid-weight palate will compliment rather than compete. Mordrelle Barbera is not a wine that you need to decant; open it when you start preparing (maybe even pour a little glass for yourself), and it’ll be perfect for serving when you plate up the Turkey.
Paired with Mordrelle Wines Barbera Langhorne Creek 2019 $34.00
Creme Brulee
Paired with Chateau Deux Bauge Riesling Strathbogie Ranges 2020 $31.00
Cracking through the top of a crème Brulee is like jumping into a whole world of flavour. The key to matching a wine to a sweet dish is that the wine should be less sweet than the food. For that reason, I have chosen a late harvest Riesling from Strathbogie Ranges Victoria. The three key quality features are the opulent weight of the wine on your tongue, the brilliantly complex late harvest Riesling flavours, and the acidity that stops it from being a massive sugar bomb. The simple but tasty Crème Brulee will be enhanced by the complexity of the wine, and the acidity will add some cut through with the sweetness of the dish. Serve this wine nice and cold. And if you don’t finish the whole bottle, leave it in the fridge for a couple of weeks with out fear of spoiling.