Match of the week

Carpaccio of venison with Mollydooker The Boxer shiraz

Posted by Fiona Beckett (Google+) on February 3 2014 at 08:45

My match of the week is not in fact my match of the week which was some sublime sashimi and koshu at the Japanese embassy but as that pairing has featured before I’m going for my second best this week*.

It was which was one of a number of food and wine matches at the Australia Day tasting devised by chef Roger Jones who is spearheading the new Dine Australia campaign.

The dish was a carpaccio of venison (in other words raw meat) with foie gras toffee and parsnip and date mousse, designed as a pairing for shiraz. Unfortunately I didn’t spot the fact that it included foie gras which I don’t normally eat but the point was that the meat was rare and the accompaniments rich and sweet which is what you want with a full-bodied young shiraz.

The wine should have been Ben Glaetzer’s Bishop but I thought you were supposed to grab any shiraz you could lay your hands on (obviously not having the brightest of afternoons . .) and filled my glass with the 2012 Mollydooker The Boxer shiraz on a stand nearby which actually worked very well.

The other pairing of steak tartare macarons with salted caramel I wasn’t quite so keen on - just too sweet with an already super-ripe wine. So some sweetness but not too much with shiraz is the message.

See my other pairings for Australian shiraz here.

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