Tonight I’m trying out Waitrose British Free Range Char Siu Pork Medallions. I’ll serve them with homemade ‘Korean carrots’ – basically a quick sweet and spicy pickle of Jullien carrots -, smacked cucumbers – Lao Gan Ma, salt, sesame oil-, Vadasz Kim Chi, broad rice noodles.
I asked Chat GPT for a Waitrose wine pairing to go along. It steered me away from red towards off dry whites, especially Riesling or Gewürztraminer. I love Riesling and this was more or less what I had in mind anyway. I asked for a specific region or label. Ultimately, at my local Waitrose the selection came down to Dr Loosen ‘Grey Slate’ Mosel Riesling 2025. It was even on sale! I know Dr. L’s is a pretty big and reliable house to buy standard Riesling from – especially off-dry styles. Let’s see how the pairing went:
Well, I’ll be honest, I think I have a decent palette for wine, but I never picked up the big vocabulary needed to accurately describe the wine itself. Here’s my experience of this pairing. The wine was what I expect from a Riesling in this price category, it was young and effervescent – possibly the most effervescent Riesling I’ve seen, it was more like a Vinho Verde, almost sparkling. I’m terrible at naming the aromas, so let’s just say it had a slight sweetness and pleasant blossom notes. It had a lovely rich mouthfeel, just shy of syrupy. The important element in this pairing is the acidity balance, it was off-dry enough to stand up to the spices, but acidic enough to cleanse the palette and match the acids in the vegetables. I wonder if something a little sweeter and more aromatic would have fared better, the Gewürztraminer perhaps, but I’ve been burnt by overly sweet Gewurtz before and didn’t want to risk it.
Overall, I’d say this was a thoughtful if not overly creative pairing. On the other hand, I often just throw my hands in the air when trying to pair Asian dishes with wine and just buy some Budvar, so it was as good as any attempt I would have made without consulting a sommel-AI.
Leave a Reply