Inspired by my stint in Shanghai, I often had friends over for dinner, after spending afternoons and evenings, or sometimes, even days, cooking up various culinary storms featuring the flavours of Shanghai and Sichuan, and these would invariably be washed down with wine pairings of all sorts…

I now live in a different part of town, but do return occasionally, to soak up the old-world charm of the estate with its Art Deco accented pre-war colonial public housing architecture, and of course, the wonderful food that can be found at Tiong Bahru Market.

Earlier this month, I had the opportunity to do something a little unusual. I had an “Alsatian Wine Brunch” at Tiong Bahru Market.

Now, what is so unusual about having wines with a meal at Tiong Bahru Market? Haven’t people already been doing this for a number of years?

The answer is a simple yes. People in Singapore have been matching their wines with their food at Hawker Centres since the idea was mooted by local wine personalities in the early 1990’s, but, they had invariably matched their wines with all-time favourites like Hainanese Chicken Rice, Dim Sum, BBQ Sambal Stingray, Chilli Crab and other serious dishes usually eaten during lunch or dinner.

This little excursion, would be a little different, as we were going to attempt to match a couple of Alsatian wines with some traditional breakfast dishes, something that was quite unheard of, as most people in Singapore tend not to touch alcohol before the sun sets…

Quite unintentionally, this little brunch also became a sampling of Singapore’s original Chinese immigrant cuisines, covering the Cantonese, Hokkien, and Teochew dialect groups, which make up the majority of Singapore’s Chinese population.

Taking part in this little excursion were, Etienne HUGEL, who runs the venerable house of HUGEL & FILS in Alsace, France, Jenny TAN, who writes the wine column for The Sunday Times, in addition to running THE FOOD CULT, a Food & Beverage Think Tank, and myself, the random academic, who would bring the wine glasses…

Etienne brought the wines, the 2007 Hugel Jubilee Riesling, an intense and racy wine with good ripeness, structure, minerality and palate weight.

This went beautifully with a Raw Fish Salad (which accompanied a serving of Congee, a thick Cantonese style rice porridge), which was made from thin slices of raw Wolf Herring, seasoned with a squeeze of Calamansi Lime, sliced red chillies, finely shredded Spring Onions (Scallions), shreds of ginger, and a lashing of sesame oil, with the freshness of the wine complimenting the citrus of the Calamansi Lime and delicate flavours of the raw fish.

Also well matched with the Jubilee Riesling, was the combination of Fried Fishcakes, especially when dipped in the tangy chilli dip. These included, You Tiao (deepfried dough sticks stuffed with fish forcemeat), Otah (spicy fish cakes), Fishcake and Fishballs. These, however, are technically not a traditional breakfast type food, but all day snacks…

The second wine, the heavenly 2001 Hugel Classic Tokay Pinot Gris Vendange Tardives, was sweet, ripe, slightly voluptuous, yet very elegant, and exquisitely balanced.

This was matched with Chwee Kueh (水粿), a Teochew breakfast snack, which can be described as bowl-shaped steamed rice flour cakes with a topping of finely chopped/diced salted preserved radishes that have been slow cooked in oil. This is usually served with a chilli sauce on the side, and in most cases, when the chilli sauce is combined with the radish topping, the sum becomes greater than the component parts… This paired beautifully with the Tokay Pinot Gris Vendange Tardives, with the sweetness of the wine foiling perfectly with the salty, spicy radish topping.

We also tried the dry version of Hokkien Hae Mee (福建虾面), a dish of yellow egg noodles normally served in a rich prawn and pork broth originating in Fujian Province and brought to Singapore via Penang, Malaysia. The dry version was served with a robust chilli sauce, and topped with boiled pork ribs, a pair of whole medium-sized prawns, a few sprigs of water spinach (Kang Kong), deep-fried shallots, and a few small cubes of deep-fried lard. The robust spicy flavours of the noodle dish were very well handled by the Pinot Gris, which tempered the fire with its sweetness and its vitality.

Finally, we tried the pairing of a few Nyonya Kueh (Straits Chinese or Peranakan Pastries) with the Pinot Gris Vendange Tardives, and happily, the wine managed to compliment Kueh Bingka Ubi Kayu (or just Kueh Bingka), a “cake” made from baked grated Tapioca (Cassava), but was over-powered by the Ondeh Ondeh, glutinous rice balls filled with Gula Melaka (Palm Sugar) and coated with grated coconut.

Etienne HUGEL who enjoyed the whole experience immensely, said: “I am posting this on my blog“, and he blogged about this experience of “Enjoying Singlish & Hawker Centre lifestyle”.  Jenny TAN followed close behind, writing in her regular column on The Sunday Times, about our experience at Tiong Bahru with “Alsace meets Asia“, and along the way, recommending the 2004 Hugel Jubilee Riesling as well.

And finally, the circle is now complete, with my perspectives of how the wines matched the food, as my little contribution to this very fun exercise…

To celebrate Singapore’s 44th National Day yesterday, a long time friend organised to have several foodie friends drop by to her humble abode to cook a “Red & White” themed dinner.

One of my contributions to the dinner party was a Red-Braised Pork dish which I had been meaning to try for a long time.

This recipe is adapted from Fuschia Dunlop’s treatise on Hunanese Cuisine, the aptly named “Revolutionary Chinese Cookbook“.

According to Dunlop, in Hunan, Red-Braised Pork is often touted as having medical virtues and is eaten as a health food, and, in the words of Chairman Mao’s nephew Mao Anping: “Men eat it to build their brains, and ladies to make themselves more beautiful.”

The recipe is originally from Chairman Mao’s nephew, and was supposedly the one Chairman Mao loved and ate frequently, to the extent of having had his Hunanese chef cook it for him in Beijing.  I have added a few water chestnuts to give it a nice crunchy contrast.

Chairman Mao's Red-Braised Pork

Chairman Mao’s Red-Braised Pork Recipe
(Serves 6)

Ingredients:

750g Pork Belly (Skin On)
3 tbsp Peanut Oil
3 tbsp White Sugar
2 tbsp Shaoxing Wine
30g Fresh Ginger (Old, Sliced with skin on)
8 nos Water Chestnut (Peeled and halved crosswise)
2 nos Star Anise
2 sticks Cinnamon or Cassia
3 nos Dried Chillies
Light Soya Sauce, Salt and Sugar to taste
a few lengths of Spring Onion to garnish
2 nos Fresh Red Chillies to garnish

Method:

1. Plunge the pork belly into a wok of boiling water and simmer for 3-4 minutes until partially cooked.  Remove and, when cool enough to handle, cut into bite-sized chunks.

2. Heat the oil and sugar in a wok over a gentle fire until the sugar melts, then raise the heat and stir until the melted sugar turns a rich caramel brown.  Add the pork, the water chestnuts and splash in the Shaoxing wine.

3. Add just enough water to cover the pork, along with the ginger, star anise, dried chillies and cinnamon sticks.  Bring to the boil, then turn down the heat and simmer for 45-60 minutes.

4. Towards the end of the cooking time, turn up the heat to reduce the sauce (if necessary), and season with light soya sauce, salt and a little sugar to taste.  Add the spring onions and fresh red chillies just before serving.

5. Finally, pour everything into a deep bowl, and decorate with the spring onions and fresh red chillies.

ENJOY…!!!

Such is the stereotype, that Champagne is relegated to the role of the tipple that is used for toasting at these celebratory occasions, and is rarely taken seriously as a wine, to be matched with meals and savoured for it’s finesse and complexity…

Interestingly, the most commonplace occasions other than celebrations where Champagne is imbibed, seem to be at the Night Clubs, where they are used to slake the parched throats of the not so young, but, trendy party goers, gyrating endlessly on the dance floors.

Alternatively, Champagne is often poured at Cocktail Parties, where it is sipped, along with tasty morsels of finger food, canapés, and focused conversations.

Then, there are also the Hotel Sunday Brunches where many individuals are seen to be literally chugging away at the Champagne, like there wasn’t going to be a tomorrow…

The Champagnes that regularly appear at these “volume” outlets, tend to be from the larger producers, with the “Grand Marques” taking the largest cut in the pie that is the marketplace, due to their obviously larger available volumes, higher profiles due to much advertising, and their ability to muscle their way into the marketplace due to the strengths of their brands.

Due to the dominance of the “Grand Marques” in the marketplace and the marketing that enhances their desirability, these are the brands that people are most familiar with, and will ask for by name, something that is quite rare where regular wines are concerned.

Lower down in the pecking order of the Champagne market, there are specialist producers that produce Champagne on a much smaller scale, and sometimes, give the “Grand Marques” a run for their money, where quality is concerned.

These Champagnes very often only appear in smaller restaurants and specialist retailers, as they do not look for the same type of exposure, or sales volume as the Champagnes of the “Grand Marques”.

One such example is from the house of Champagne Marie Demets, a small producer from Guye-Sur-Seine, in the Southern part of the Champagne region, and, which used to supply grapes to Champagne Bollinger.

According to the available literature, Champagne Marie Demets was formed in 1987 when Marie Brement married Alain Demets.

Marie’s family have cultivated the land for many generations and Alain, who used to rent vines from the Brement family, took over the domaine on Marie’s father’s retirement.

This small grower produces all its Champagne from their own twelve hectares planted with mostly Pinot Noir.

I happened to encounter their Non Vintage Brut Tradition Champagne at a tasting, and I was so charmed by it, that I made an unprecedented purchase of a dozen bottles…

Champagne Marie Demets Brut Tradition NV

Made from 95% Pinot Noir, and 5% Chardonnay, from 100% Grand Cru vineyard sites, the Champagne Marie Demets Brut Tradition NV showed a vibrant medium gold colour, with a fine, persistent mousse.

On the nose, this Champagne displayed a distinctly creamy, and biscuity bouquet, with some hints of honey.

On the palate, it was dry, with pinot fruit that was rich, full flavoured, and fresh, with some yeast and biscuit notes, and, a light hint of nuttiness lingering in the finish.

This Champagne was beautifully balanced, with considerable elegance and finesse.  Furthermore, it was also absolutely delicious, and, eminently drinkable.

I have enjoyed this Champagne as an aperitif, and with simple pleasures like Cantonese Roast Pork (Siew Yoke), Deepfried Battered Whitebait, Deepfried Frogs Legs with Ginger Chips, Squid Tentacles with Salted Egg coating, and even Steamed White Pomfret Teochew-style.

From the case of 12 bottles, I now have just 3 bottles left, and I look forward to the day when the local importer here in Singapore (Lollapalooza Asia) brings in the highly acclaimed Marie Demets Brut Rosé NV.

In observing human nature, Pope John XXIII compared man with wine, commenting: “Men are like wine – some turn to vinegar, but the best improve with age.”

This, in my opinion, is an altogether accurate observation, as only the best wines (and people) with the pre-requisite characteristics do improve with age.

What then are these pre-requisites that allow a wine to improve with age?

The first factor to look at is the quality of the grapes.  This is usually expressed based on the year the grapes were harvested, the vintage.

The quality of each vintage is determined by environmental factors like the climate, and weather patterns.

The variable of influence by human intervention is also to be taken into consideration.   Factors such as irrigation (or lack of it), and yields from each vineyard can be controlled to give the desired quality of grapes.

Fruit intensity, acidity, alcohol, tannins, (and in the case of dessert wines, sugar) and the balance of all these components put together by using the appropriate winemaking techniques, contribute to the age-ability of a wine.

As mentioned earlier, only the best wines improve with age.  This means that the vast majority (95%) of wines that you will find in the market, are NOT meant for ageing (for any meaningful period of time anyway…), and are designed (by both winegrowing and winemaking techniques) for current consumption.

In the process of ageing, the primary fruit characteristics of the wines change from fresh, ripe, flavours (eg. tropical fruits in white wines, and berry fruits in red wines) into tertiary type flavours that remind one of honey, nougat, truffles, mushrooms, forest floor, tobacco leaf, etc.  Typically “brown” flavours, as I like to call them.

Acidity in wine tends to remain as a constant, and keeps the wine from feeling flat, and flabby.  However, a lack of fruit in the wine will leave the wine tasting quite austere and mean.

Tannins in red wine will clump together, and form a deposit of sediment, leaving a once young, astringent, and perhaps mouth-puckering wine, transformed into one with a silky smooth texture.  However, one has to note that sometimes, the tannins may outlast the fruit (due to either a poor vintage, or over-extraction during the winemaking process), leaving a wine that may be silky smooth in the mouth, but totally lacking in flavour!

For dessert white wines, the fruit intensity, and the sugary sweetness tends to fade, and is replaced with complexity provided by both tertiary type flavours and a certain mouth-feel that can sometimes be described as ethereal…

So, with all these factors playing against each other, how does one decide when a wine is ready to be savoured at its peak?

Well, these so-called peaks really depend on what one looks for in wines.

If you enjoy red wines that are bursting with fresh, ripe, fruit flavours, and are big, bold and with a tannic grip and texture, then you do not need to age the wines that you buy.  You may enjoy them once you have purchased them.

If you enjoy red wines that are somewhat more evolved, and with a relatively smooth texture, but still showing lots of fruit flavours, then perhaps ageing your wine for between 5 to 8 years may be suitable.

If you enjoy really smooth red wines that display mainly tertiary flavours, then you might want to wait perhaps 15 to 25 years.

Of course, all these estimates will also depend on a few more variables.  One has to remember to look at the grape variety, origin, and the vintage of the wine.

One has also got to remember to store the wines at the proper cellar temperature of 12º Celsius, and not to place the wines in the cupboard above the kitchen stove…

Tasting The Rewards of Patience

“Mr. Tulkinghorn sits at one of the open windows, enjoying a bottle of old port. Though a hard-grained man, close, dry, and silent, he can enjoy old wine with the best. He has a priceless bin of port in some artful cellar under the Fields, which is one of his many secrets. When he dines alone in chambers, as he has dined today, and has his bit of fish and his steak or chicken brought in from the coffeehouse, he descends with a candle to the echoing regions below the deserted mansion, and, heralded by the remote reverberation of thundering doors, comes gravely back, encircled by an earthy atmosphere and carrying a bottle from which he pours a radiant nectar, two score and ten years old, that blushes in the glass to find itself so famous, and fills the whole room with the fragrance of southern grapes.” — Charles Dickens, Bleak House.

1963 Brown Brothers Milawa Estate Shiraz

Tasted in 1996 at a dinner hosted by Ross BROWN at King River Café in Oxley, just down the road from the Brown Brothers Milawa Estate.  This wine was my first experience tasting a well aged Australian red wine.  This wine also sparked my interest in “older” wines.

Dry, with dried sour plum notes and hints of cocoa, earth, leather and dried tobacco leaf.   Medium-bodied, with balanced acidity, and with a silky smooth texture.  Finished long and dry.

1964 Grands-Echézeaux, Domaine de la Romanée-Conti

Tasted on the eve of the Millennium, at a dinner party hosted by a few very, very generous friends, who wanted to end the 20th Century with some of the finest wines of the century.  This was by far the most memorable wine that evening.  This is also the red Burgundy that I’ve enjoyed most, and still remains unsurpassed to this day.

Complex, red cherry and raspberry fruit with hints of undergrowth, lovely balanced acidity, a medium body, and with a very clean, pure finish.  Absolutely ethereal!

1971 Château Coutet, 1er Grand Cru Classé, Barsac

This was the first and only case of wine that I bought off the London secondary market in 1999.  First tasted in 1999, and several times later with consistent notes.

Sweet, with ripe candied peaches and Crème Brulée notes.  Lively and well balanced, finished clean and long.  Definitely quite stylish and very enjoyable.

Unfortunately, I don’t have any more left…

1969 Kopke Colheita Port (1998 Bottling)

There are several main styles for Port; Portuguese, English, German, French and Dutch. This wine is in the more elegant Dutch Tawny style, and is aged in large wooden vats for a very long time.

I bought this particular bottle during one of my trips to The Netherlands in 2001, and shared it with a group of wine-loving friends over dinner in October 2006.

Medium sweet with balanced acidity, medium weight and great concentration of dried raisined fruit notes mixed with caramel, spices, nuts and a hint of smoke.  Finishes long and dry.  Quite exquisite.

1945 Graham’s Vintage Port

Tasted in 2004 whilst I was Cellarmaster at Raffles Hotel during the 2004 Edition of Raffles Hotel’s Wine, Food & Arts Experience.  The tasting, conducted by Graham’s owner Paul SYMINGTON and moderated by Serena SUTCLIFFE MW, featured seven vintages of Graham’s Vintage Port from each decade of the 1940’s to the 2000’s.

The 1945 was immensely rich despite its age.  Still showing luscious ripe plum fruit supported by complex spice notes, and displaying both lively acidity, and rich, treacly textures.  A truly hedonistic wine.

This wine was also memorable, because it was one amongst the series that was double decanted at 2am in the morning, about 12 hours before the tasting.

Tasting The Folly of Inertia

“We may lay in a stock of pleasures as we would lay in a stock of wine, but if we defer tasting them too long, we shall find that both are soured by age.” – Charles Caleb Colton

1971 Zeltinger Schloßberg Riesling Aüslese, Winzergenossenschaft Mittelmosel - Wehlen, Mosel-Saar-Ruwer, Germany

1971 Zeltinger Schloßberg Riesling Aüslese, Winzergenossenschaft Mittelmosel – Wehlen

One of three bottles that I won in a Melbourne auction at Langton’s in 2000. It was only in 2006 that I finally managed to make it back to Melbourne, to catch up with some friends, and to collect the wines.  Tasted in September 2006, whilst having dinner with a group of wine-loving friends at the excellent Sel de la Terre restaurant on Toorak Road, South Yarra.

Still relatively pale in colour for its age. Almost dry, with sour plum and prune flavours, and loads of mineral notes and hints of dried grass (straw).  Delicately structured, with fine acidity and a dry finish.  Rather thin and still alive, but only just so.

1963 Wynns Coonawarra Estate “Hermitage”

This is another of my purchases from Melbourne, this time when I was there for the Wine Australia show in 2000.  I had always thought that this bottle would be quite a risky buy due to its age.  However, I decided to take that risk, as I had previously tasted another 1963 (the above-mentioned Brown Brothers Milawa Estate Shiraz) in 1996, and it was still very much alive then.

By the time I remembered that I had this bottle and had tasted it in October 2006, the wine was just barely alive.

Very dry, with loads of tea leaf characteristics and hints of earth, leather and other animal notes melded together with hints of underlying sweet fruits.  Smooth as silk and very clean on the finish. Unfortunately, marred by volatile acidity.

Yung Kee Century Eggs with 2002 Telegramme Chateauneuf-du-Pape

About a month ago, whilst on my way to a dinner that featured amongst other dishes, a Century Egg Salad, I decided to make a detour into a wine shop to pick up a couple of bottles of wine to try with dinner.

Knowing what the menu was, I decided to look for wines, which I thought, would match nicely with the other dishes, whilst totally ignoring the Century Egg dish.

Now why would I ignore the Century Eggs and not attempt to match any wine with them?

Well, this decision goes back to the time when I was a student at Hotel School a little more than 20 years ago.  At Hotel School, we were introduced to the principles of food & wine matching, and amongst those principles expounded, was a list of food items that were deemed to be “unmatchable” with wine.  Amongst the food items mentioned, were, artichokes, asparagus, and eggs.

Thus, was this the reason why I had totally ignored to attempt matching the Century Eggs with wine?  Perhaps so, as I had been programmed earlier in life to avoid matching eggs with wine…

Anyway, it happened that one of the bottles I brought for the dinner was opened first, and was sipped as the apéritif.

This bottle was the 2002 Domaine du Vieux Télégraphe “Telegramme” Châteauneuf-du-Pape, a once-off release of the famous Domaine du Vieux Télégraphe Châteauneuf-du-Pape, which was declassified due to the washed out 2002 vintage.

Grape varieties used for the wine included mainly Grenache and Mourvédre, and may have included Syrah and Cinsault in the blend.

The wine had quite intense sweet red fruit flavours, with hints of white pepper spice, and exotic ginger blossoms, a moderately fresh acidity, a medium to full-body, really soft, silky tannins and quite a long dry finish.

It wasn’t particularly complex, but very pleasant, and enjoyable at that moment, when served at a cool 16ºC.

When the first course of Century Egg Salad, which consisted of Century Eggs from the famous “Yung Kee” shop in Hong Kong, and pickled ginger from China, was served, I decided (for academic reasons) to try the wine with the Century Eggs to see if there would be any reaction worth noting.

To my surprise, there wasn’t an unpleasant reaction, and the wine actually went quite nicely with the Century Eggs, with the sweet red fruits, freshness and soft, silky tannins complementing the custard-like texture and mild flavour of the Yung Kee Century Egg.

Another foodie CL, who was seated at the same table was surprised at my reaction, and tried the pairing as well, and agreed that it was quite a pleasant and interesting match.

However, however pleasant and interesting the match was, it still wasn’t quite the “marriage made in heaven”…

At this point, before anyone starts crying foul, I must state that not all Century Eggs are the same.  Century Eggs do come in all sorts of colours and degrees of flavour, depending on where they come from, and how old they are.

Characteristics do range from those with amber gold whites with rather delicate flavours, to darkly coloured ones with oozing yolk, emitting ammonia fumes that can bring tears to your eyes.

The version from Hong Kong’s “Yung Kee”, is on the delicate side of the scale, and thus, would be more amenable to matching with wine.

So, after reading this, should you start to burn all your books on food & wine matching?

I think not, as most theories and principles of food & wine matching are quite general at best, and you might have to read into the context of where, and when the book you refer to was written.

To me, one should not to state categorically that all Century Eggs are quite impossible to match with any wine, it is just that a perfect match hasn’t been found yet…

On an end note, I’ve taken a look into both the 1986 and 2002 Editions of Hugh Johnson’s Pocket Wine Book, (the 1986 I bought many years ago, and the 2002 was a gift from someone for Christmas some years ago…) .  The venerable 1986 edition states: “Eggs: These present difficulties: they clash with most wines and spoil good ones.”, whereas, the 2002 edition’s comment on eggs with wine is quite different; “Eggs: Not exactly flattering for white wines, but try soft, unoaked Chardonnay, subtle white Burgundy, or California Chardonnay with omelettes, quiches, etc.  Reds clash bitterly with the yolk, especially hard-boiled.  Beaujolais or other Gamay may cope.  Other ingredients may be the things to match.”

I’ve basically picked up two differing editions of the same author’s work from differing decades to show you that principles or theories regarding food & wine matching do change with time.

Therefore, I encourage readers to try anything and everything with wine, even food items that are seemingly “impossible” to match.