Apricot tart and Louis Roederer Carte Blanche

After two days in the Jura and 24 hours in Champagne it was harder than usual to come up with just one match this week* but I’m going for this combination of apricot tart and Louis Roederer’s demi-sec champagne Carte Blanche because it’s one you can reasonably easily replicate at home.

I’ve never been a huge fan of the demi-sec style as the higher dosage (added sugar) is often an excuse for an inferior product but really loved the delicately honeyed style of Roederer’s version. With a not-too-sweet tart where the emphasis was on the fruit it was a really delicious match.

It’s also relatively affordable for a grande marque: £32.99 online at Ministry of Drinks, £36.95 at The Whisky Exchange which also has a shop near Borough Market and £37.50 at Hedonism in Berkeley Square. (As with most champagnes prices vary quite a bit so shop around for the current best offer.)

*One of the other highlights was an old favourite, Vin Jaune and Comté - I’ve updated my list of Comté pairings here.

Bread and butter pudding with apricots and passito di Pantelleria

It’s tough to pick out just one wine match for from the dinner I had at Belmond Le Manoir aux Quat’ Saisons last week but I’m going for this sophisticated twist on a classic English pudding from chef Paul Heathcote which was paired with a passito dessert wine from the island of Pantelleria

Bread and butter pudding, which is basically a creamy mass of bread, butter and egg custard, isn’t that hard to match with dessert wine - it also goes spectacularly well with Sauternes - but the poached apricot Paul had served on the side provided the perfect link to this rich, marmaladey wine from top Sicilian producer Donnafugata.

Ben Ryé is their famous air-dried passito-style wine made from muscat of Alexandria grapes, known locally as Zibibbo. This was the 2013 vintage though it ages much longer.

The dinner - part of a series where TV chef Raymond Blanc is inviting back some of his most famous protegés to cook with him - also contained some other great pairings: goats cheese agnolotti with olives and honey with the 2014 O Rosal albarino from Terras Gaudas, braised turbot with asparagus and tarragon with Stéphane Aladame’s Montagny 1er cru ‘Découverte’ 2012 and Goosnargh duck with rhubarb with a 2010 1er cru Beaune ‘Reversées’ from Jean-Claude Rateau.

Paul’s signature black pudding with ‘baked beans’ (not Heinz!) and sweetbreads which kicked off the meal was also served with the albarino but he hinted it would have gone better with champagne. (The Laurent Perrier 2006 which was served as an aperitif would have been spot on.)

An amusing sidenote: apparently the bread the Manoir kitchen offered Paul was too good for the pud. He sent out for the bread he always uses - a Warburtons white sliced loaf!

The next events are on July 15th with Adam Simmonds, September 16th with Eric Chavot and October 21st with Bruno Loubet of Grainstore. Paul Heathcote owns two restaurants in Preston, Lancashire.

I attended the dinner as a guest of Le Manoir.

Roast lamb with a Douro red

Yesterday we had the family round for lunch and served a 2002 Douro red from Portugal with the main course of spice-crusted roast lamb with garlic and rosemary, roast potatoes (my youngest son managed to put away 15 but remains, annoyingly, as skinny as a rake) and in-season purple sprouting broccoli.

Now I know there are loads of reds which would have paired with that dish (Cabernet Sauvignon being an obvious contender) but the wine, a single vineyard Quinta do Vale Dona Maria made by Christiano van Zeller which came from English wine merchant Tanners was particularly delicious. It was soft and supple with rich, ripe bramble fruit: a sweet contrast to the cumin-dominated spicing and the slight bitterness of the greens or PSB as they now call it in the trade.

Sometimes it’s good to serve something that makes everyone sit up. My eldest son and his girlfriend are both doing wine qualifications so it was a chance for them to try a wine they hadn’t come across before.

For dessert we had fresh apricot pancakes I was testing for a book which I strongly recommend once they come into season. The apricot filling was laced with a gorgeous apricot liqueur made by the French firm Gabriel Boudier which really brought out the flavour of the fruit. (You can find it in Waitrose in the UK). It was so good I added an extra splash as I served them - plus a scoop of vanilla ice cream! (Well, it was the weekend . . . )

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