Panko-fried yellowtail with truffle honey and sparkling sake

I honestly didn't know which dish to pick out of this extraordinary pop-up at The Dead Doll’s House Islington last week, hosted by wine importer Bibendum PLB who now also bring in a wide range of sakes. So I’m going for this one because it was the first and one of the simplest.

The meal was prepared in a corner of the private dining room by Endo Kazutoshi, former head sushi chef at Zuma and was one of the most spectacular Japanese meals I’ve ever had.

The dish was a couple of slices of incredibly fresh yellowtail tuna coated in panko crumbs, deep-fried and served with truffle honey and citrus zest.

Deep fried foods are always good with effervescent drinks and this gently sparkling Atago no Matsu sake from Nizawa Brewery was no exception. I knew umami was the perfect foil for sake but the sweetness of the truffle honey with the slightly sweet sake was a revelation.

The Nizawa brewery which was founded in 1873 was badly affected by the Great East earthquake and tsunami in 2011 and had to relocate but now has a state of the art new brewery with equipment that can apparently polish a rice grain down to 8% of its original size!

Apparently Atago no Matsu means ‘waiting love’ which is rather charming. Turns out it’s available on Amazon though at rather more than the prices you find in the states. Good sake has still to become affordable in the UK.

Apologies for rubbish pic. Very low light and a communal sharing board which made photography particularly difficult. (Excuses, excuses ... )

I was invited to the pop-up as a guest of Bibendum.

Manzanilla sherry and sushi

Sushi is possibly not the first kind of food you’d think of pairing with wine but turns out it’s surprisingly good with sherry.

Not the sweet treacley kind your nan used to keep in the dining room cupboard obviously but a fresh, tangy manzanilla served cold from the fridge as I discovered this weekend when I tried a number of experimental sherry pairings on a group of friends.

The sherry concerned was a Hidalgo La Gitana Manzanilla which normally sells for about £6-7 a half bottle but which is on offer at the time of writing at £6 for 50cl in Sainsbury’s. Fino sherry, being quite similar in flavour to sake, would obviously work too.

Given how easy it is to buy sushi off the shelf these days it would make a super-easy treat of a midweek supper. All you have to do is keep a bottle of manzanilla in the fridge which isn’t too much of a hardship ....

If this appeals to you see this list of other drink pairings with sushi

Contemporary sushi and Sancerre rouge

The best meal on my whirlwind tour of the Centre Loire* last week - and there was stiff competition - was a Japanese meal prepared by sommelier Juli Nakata-Roumet, the Japanese wife of the local promotional body’s director of communication Benoit Roumet

It was fascinating on so many levels I’ll be writing more about it but I wanted to single out one pairing as my match of the week

Juli had prepared a fabulous range of maki rolls (including some made with goats cheese that were surprisingly delicious) that I expected to pair best with one of the many sauvignon blancs we were tasting but in fact it was a red Sancerre that carried the flavours best.

The key, obviously, is the acidity and delicacy of the pinot noir grape. Although it was quite a full-bodied example (a 2012 from Dominique Roger of Domaine du Carrou) it had a suppleness and grace that didn’t in any way overwhelm the sushi.

I remember years ago a Japanese sommelier telling me that pinot noir was a good match for sushi and I was never entirely convinced. Now I know that - in the case of creative sushi like this, at least - he was right.

See my other pairing suggestions for sushi here.

* which includes Sancerre, Pouilly Fumé, Quincy, Reuilly and Menetou-Salon, Coteaux de Giennois and Chateaumeillant

Soft shell crab tempura maki and ‘Misty Mountain’ sake

I don’t that often order sake in a restaurant but when I do I wonder why I don’t drink it more often.

It was the perfect match for the modern Japanese ‘tapas’ I had at Kurobuta near Marble Arch the other day, especially with these fabulous soft shell crab tempura maki with kimchee mayo, a dish I’m already yearning to eat again.

It was also great with a really original ‘tuna sashimi pizza’ which had a crisp flatbread-ish base and with a dish of sticky miso grilled aubergine. Sake deals particularly well with sweetness in savoury dishes.

Needless to say I forgot to write the sake down, assuming they would have a drinks list on the website which they don't but the hugely helpful Aussie waitress I got on the phone told me it was ‘Misty Mountain’, a cloudy partially pasteurised Junmai sake you can also buy here. Apparently it also goes with blue cheese.

Kurobuta is a great place for a light lunch if you’re up the Marble Arch end of Oxford Street. They also have a restaurant on the King’s Road.