Wine and Food: Red Wine and Spice!

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Matching Wines with Spicy Oriental Cuisine: Part two, red wines

This month we report on red wines, many of which are available all over the world, but we tell you where you can get them in UK high Street Wine Merchants and Supermarkets.

If you've already read last month's article on matching white wines with curries and other hot styles, you may wich to skip the next couple of paragraphs which set the scene for our tasting.

We took over The Oriental Cuisine restaurant for the evening to test out some theories about matching wines with spicy Oriental food. The restaurant does Thai, Malaysian and Sri Lankan cuisine, so we were able to try out a number of different combinations. We assembled nearly 30 keen gourmets, some of whom belong to a very active wine club, and others who are studying for British wine trade qualifications.

We began with a plate of Oriental Hors d'oeuvres, consisting of Malay satay, Thai fish cakes, taufoo stuffed with mince fish, prawn toasts and spinach vadai. After that we had Tom Yum fish soup with generous prawns and squid rings, flavoured with lemon grass and a touch of chilli. The main dishes were a mild Thai mussaman beef, a medium Malaysian chicken Rendang and a fairly spicy Thai green curry with tiger prawns. We had a whole raft of vegetable dishes, the most notable of which was rather like a Sri Lankan version of the popular Turkish aubergine dish, Immam Bayildi.

Which type of red wine is best?

With the reds we compared three main types: lighter wines, especially made by carbonic maceration and served cool, with fruit driven Merlot/Cabernet Sauvignon styles against spicy so-called Mediterranean styles.

Lighter styles of red wine

What is it that gives good Beaujolais its gluggablity factor? The answer is the same as with any good wine: good quality fresh ripe fruit. But there's something else, and that's the particular style of wine making called carbonic maceration.

Whole bunches of grapes are tipped into the fermentation vessel and the sheer weight of the bunches crushes the bottom layers ever so gently. Fermentation begins to produce carbon dioxide gas which is the natural by product of the yeast acting on the juice as it coverts sugar to alcohol. The upper bunches are now in an atmosphere of carbon dioxide. Another kind of fermentation then occurs inside the whole grapes, bursting them open, while the lack of oxygen helps to retain the fresh fruit flavours.

Wines made by this method are designed for drinking soon after making. In Beaujolais this is taken to extremes in the production of commercial Beaujolais Nouveau. But these fresh fruity red wines, which can be served slightly chilled, (at cellar temperature rather than fridge temperature) are an excellent accompaniment to spicy foods, particularly where meat is involved. Unwin's have a good range of Beaujolais. You don't really need to go for the top Beaujolais Crus to drink with a curry, but we did find that Unwin's Julienas from E. Loron at 6.99 had vigour and grip on the palate and it stood up to the Thai beef curry rather well. Beaujolais from Georges Duboeuf, the so-called King of Beaujolais, is always reliable, and the Duboeuf Beaujolais Villages 4.99 has just that gluggable quality that's needed. Thresher's, which includes Wine Rack and Bottoms Up, stock most of the Duboeuf range. Sainsbury's also have a good range of Beaujolais, especially good is their Beaujolais Villages, Les Roches Grillées, 4.95

New World Bojo takes off

Beaujolais is made from the Gamay grape. A close relative that has been developed to cope with a rather hotter climate is Tarrango. Brown Brother's Tarrango is everything you'd expect from an Australian version of Beaujolais. The fruit is generous, but there's a briskness about it that suits curry spices so well. We recommend this wine very highly as an ideal red wine to go with hot spicy food. The bottle we tried cost 4.59 from Waitrose.

From South Africa comes a brilliant Bojo style wine from the renowned estate of Cyril and Charles Back, whose Fairview Estate wines have a well deserved reputation in the UK. Simply described as 1995 Gamay Noir and selling at Tesco for a modest 3.99, this is a juicy fruity number that took on the Thai Red Spiced grilled lamb with the ease and grace of a Springbok fly half.

From Chile, via Majestic Wine Warehouse the Carta Vieja Tinto just about slips into the lighter red category. At 2.99 a bottle it's really good value and some tasters liked it as much as the Tarrango.

Tesco's wine department also has a great selection of inexpensive lighter style red wines from which we found two that made a particularly briliant pairing with the hot stuff. Tesco's Dorgan from the Pays de L'Aude in Southern France is instantly recognisable because of its rather pretty label depicting the wild flowers that grow in the vineyards. It only costs 2.49 a bottle. Again, serve it slightly chilled and it will refresh the palate after a heavy spice assault. Even better is Tesco's excellent Austrian red from a most reliable maker, Lenz Moser. Don't be put off by the name: Blauer Zweigelt is Austria's most prolific red grape variety and it makes a lovely refreshing wine that our tasters voted the best light style to go with a curry. Lenz Moser's Blauer Zweigelt is available from Tesco's at 3.79 a bottle.

Before leaving the light reds, what about the eternal compromise, rosé? Ideally, it should combine the fresh acid of a white, with a dash more fruit and structure. Served cold, the total effect should surely provide a foil if not a relief to overheated taste buds. Unfortunately, we tried only one, but it turned out to be a roaring success: Sainsbury's Vin de Pays de L'Ardeche, Grenache Rosé, 2.99. I went straight back and bought a few bottles to drink in the garden - really refreshing!

Classic Claret style from Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot

We didn't think there would be much point in trying expensive clarets (nor even Burgundies) with curry. But we did try some very nice wines, including some very good ones from Chile. But the rich fruit driven styles didn't seem to gel with this sort of food. Indeed some cominations produce a sort of metallic tang which was certainly not there when the wine was tasted alone before it met the spices. The Carta Vieja range from Majestic Wine Warehouse produced a chardonnay that we thought very highly of last month when we talked about the white wines. The Carta Vieja Merlot, 3.59 had a lovely plummy soft fruit that most of us felt was rather wasted on all but the mildest offerings that our chef could muster.

Spicy reds: Shiraz and Zinfandel

The question is, does a spicy red work best with spicy food, or do all the spicy flavours fight? On the whole we found that spicy reds did work well, and the most successful were the Zinfandels. There are some good ones about, and the prices are very reasonable. Price is important in this context, so although one of my favourite spicy wines is Chateau Musar from the Lebanon (available from Thresher group), I didn't include it in the tasting even if, in my opinion, it's worth every penny of 8.99.

The Syrah (Shiraz) grape is the well spring of Rhone Valley wines and is more and more planted in Southern France where it has steadily usurped the boring Carignon variety. Having said that, most Rhone wines are made from several varieties, indeed up to thirteen are allowed in Chateauneuf-du-Pape. Unwin's have a really lovely Crozes-Hermitage, from the Northern Rhone, and this one is made from Syrah which shines through clearly with a terrific depth of damson fruit and smoky spice. Frankly, I thought it was realy too good to waste with the really hot stuff, but there were plenty of other tasters who reckoned it was just the ticket! Unwin's Crozes Hermitage 1994 Louis Mousset, 5.99.

Wines from the Eastern Mediterranean are beginning to capture the imagination, and Kourtakis's beautifully presented Vin de Crete fulfils its visual promise in terms of flavour. Slightly hot and dusty, with cloves and plummy fruit, this made quite an impression, and refused to be put down by even the hottest of the curries. From Waitrose and Tesco for 3.15, try it anyway, you're unlikely to be disappointed.

Zinfandel: for a head on spice assault!

Of all the spicy wines, the Zinfandels probably showed up best of all, given that we purposely tasted examples that were chosen for value for money. Quite frankly, I'm amazed that we in Britain can enjoy such good wines from so far away at such reasonable prices. Zinfandel is a varietal whose home is California, but the Australians are also beginning to hit the spot, producing wines that are dark, rich, complex blockbusters. Sebastiani's 1995 Zinfandel, Nathanson Creek, Sonoma Valley Ca. has a good pongy nose and plenty of fruit and spice - surprisingly enough for a wine whose colour is really quite light. Red spiced lamb was coped with effortlessly without a hint of conflict. It's stocked in the UK by Tesco's, 3.99. For the same bargain price there's a rather deeper coloured Zinfandel Arciero Paso Robles from Thresher Group. A strong flavour of blackcurrants and cinnamon distinguished this from its peers.

Majestic has an excellent Zinfandel from Ehler's Grove, 4.99, which quite a few tasters rated the tops, but there was a vocal faction that singled out another well made wine from Cartlidge and Brown stocked by Waitrose, at the same price.

How about hedging your bets and trying a combination of our two favourites, the Gamay from Beaujolais, and the Zinfandel from the USA? Yes, you can enjoy the product of both grapes in the same bottle with Canyon Springs Gamay/Zinfandel Blend. Who the heck found this one? Waitrose, with five Masters of Wine in its buying team must take the credit. For 3.99, it has just the right balance of gluggability and spice to match the hot flavours of Thai Green Chicken, or Sri Lankan meat curry.