Match of the week

Sweetbreads with mushrooms and Dog Point pinot noir

Posted by Fiona Beckett (Google+) on June 9 2022 at 08:09

One of the great pleasures of living in Bristol over the past 15 years has been the friendship I’ve struck up with chef Stephen Markwick and his wife Judy.

In fact Stephen’s restaurant Culinaria - now sadly closed - is one of the reasons we moved to Redland, just a 10 minute walk away. I then went on to work on two books with him one of which, A Well-Run Kitchen is still in print and you can buy here.

Anyway I’m lucky enough to be invited to eat at their place from time to time and last week he cooked a mindblowingly good meal of sweetbreads with a creamy mushroom sauce with new potatoes and broad beans from his allotment. Knowing what he was making I took along a 2017 Dog Point pinot noir with which it went absolutely perfectly.

It’s tempting to feel that you need to drink a top burgundy with a classic dish like that but good New World pinot with a bit of bottle age often eclipses it - certainly for value. (The Wine Society is selling the 2019 vintage for £26 although the 2017, if you can find it, is more like £32)

By the way if you feel a bit squeamish about the idea of sweetbreads the umami-rich sauce, which is the key to the pairing, would work equally well with chicken.

For other good pinot matches see The best food pairings for pinot noir

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