40 day aged fillet of Black Angus beef with Henschke’s 2010 Mount Edelstone Shiraz

This has been one of the most difficult weeks ever to pick my match of the week but this, by a whisker, was it.

It was part of a skilfully put together Henschke wine dinner at Allium brasserie in Bath where every dish complimented the wines perfectly.

Boldly the chef Chris Staines had decided to serve a cheese course instead of dessert in order to show off the 2009 Hill of Grace that was the highlight of the evening but as a pairing it was pipped by two other dishes, the salmon and the beef.

The salmon, which was was served blackened with wasabi oysters, pickled vegetables and ponzu jelly was matched with a very young, fresh crisp vintage of Julius Eden Valley riesling while the beef was accompanied by smoked onion, braised ox tongue and roast cauliflower - deeply savoury notes that lent the rich Mount Edelstone a velvety maturity.

Interestingly all the Henschke wines are now made from organically grown, biodynamically treated fruit - an eloquent rebuttal of the idea that all biodynamic wines are wild and weird.

I attended the dinner as a guest of Allium.

Peter Gordon's beef pesto and Pencarrow pinot noir

I found myself back in an old haunt last week - Peter Gordon’s The Providores in London’s Marylebone High Street. As the bar was crowded we went up to the restaurant and treated ourselves to the à la carte*

This was a classic from Peter’s Sugar Club days - a dish of incredibly tender beef fillet with a warm chard, courgette and beetroot salad with a garlic dressing, green pesto and kalamata olives. It was great with the wine I was drinking, a bright, fruity 2011 Pencarrow Pinot Noir from Martinborough that I’d chosen as a versatile option with the myriad flavours that Peter puts on the plate but I suspect those ingredients, especially the garlic, pesto and olives would have made almost any red wine sing.

Pencarrow turns out to be an introductory range from the prestigious Palliser estate which accounts for the quality. You can currently buy it as a bin end from loveyourwine.co.uk for £10.99, on special offer from the New Zealand House of Wine if you buy two bottles, and £12.79 from Noel Young wines. (Check wine-searcher.com for other stockists.)

*Great food but not a cheap option. We spent £130 for 2 for 3 courses, 1 side and 2 glasses of wine. If you're looking for a casual supper I'd stick to the Tapa Room downstairs. The winelist in both is excellent though.

Mini Yorkshire puddings with rare fillet of beef and Central Otago Pinot Noir

A student gathering is not the first place you’d think of finding a good wine pairing or, indeed, a drinkable wine at all but the talk I gave last week at the University of Bristol Wine Circle produced some great combinations.

The food which was prepared by recently graduated student Emma Barlow was pretty impressive too. I think most of us would feel well pleased with ourselves if we’d managed to rustle up such posh canapés as the mini Yorkshire puddings with rare fillet of beef, creamed horseradish and pea-shoots on the right.

With it we’d paired a mature 2002 Haut-Médoc, Chateau Lamothe-Bergeron which I thought a little austere though have to admit the majority of the students disagreed with me. I preferred a younger, more lively Central Otago Pinot Noir 2010, the Yealands Estate ‘Chancet Rocks’ which confimed my belief that pinot is a particularly good match for fillet steak.

The truth is that both would be fine with beef though I think the Bordeaux would drink better with a roast dinner and the pinot would be the better party wine.

Other good pairings were a Western Australia Sauvignon-Semillon called Allegory with some parmesan and rosemary shortbreads with roast cherry tomatoes, feta and black olives and a 2011 Sauvignon de Touraine with filo tartlets filled with smoked chicken, mango and coriander.

Those Bristol students know how to live . . .