Champagne and food: Pairings that pop

Clockwise from
the top: Comté,
Chaource, Pecorino
and Explorateur – all
friends of Champagne.

Imagine you’ve been given a good bottle of Champagne: what do you pair with it? Maybe I’m doing you an injustice but my guess is that, whatever the style, you’re going to be pouring it as a prelude to a meal rather than as an accompaniment.

You wouldn’t be alone. Even the pros don’t always seem to appreciate the differences in style. Earlier this year, when I helped judge the Champagne Deutz trophy at the Constance Festival Culinaire competition in Mauritius, I was taken aback by how many of the participating chefs seemed to regard the hugely complex William Deutz Brut 2013 (£165 Averys, The Whisky Exchange) as a simple, fresh aperitif-style fizz.

Admittedly the pairing was with an amuse-bouche, but nonetheless the winning entry (by chef-owner Maurizio Oster from Michelin one-star Zeik in Hamburg) of a sea urchin ice cream with cucumber salad and Champagne foam, while delicious in itself, seemed, to this judge at least, better suited to a younger, brut nature cuvée.

Feel the difference

The obvious thing to say about Champagne when it comes to pairing it with food is that it’s about texture – the palate being refreshed by the stimulating sensation of bubbles, ready for the next mouthful. Not all go as far as, for example, Champagne Mumm this summer in Paris, at a dinner with chef Sato Hideaki of Michelin three-star Ta Vie in Hong Kong, who handed us swatches of different fabrics to feel and compare with the wines we were tasting. But it’s almost always the case that Champagne goes with fried food such as fish and chips, schnitzel and arancini, and acts as a foil to creamy sauces such as the one I had last year at a Champagne Leclerc Briant lunch at Jeremy Lee’s Quo Vadis in Soho.

Age is also a factor. The autolytic character (complexities developed as the wine ages for a period on the residue of spent yeasts in the bottle) of most vintage Champagnes makes them a good match for umami-rich dishes and ingredients such as roast chicken skin, truffles and aged Parmesan cheese.

Keep it dry

Sweetness – or the lack of it – should also inform your decisions. The fashion for no- or low-dosage styles (extra brut, brut nature) make them especially suitable for raw and other delicate seafood and vegetable dishes. Thinly sliced fish like sashimi and carpaccio, or tartares, oysters and caviar (with which until recently I preferred vodka) all go brilliantly with these drier styles.

At the other end of the spectrum, you don’t necessarily need a demi-sec Champagne with a dessert. Rosé can provide the delicate fruit that will offset  creamy pud such as a cheesecake, panna cotta or mousse. At the Mumm dinner again, Hideaki paired a mousse of white peach and blanc de noirs with the Mumm, RSRV Rosé Foujita (£69.75 The Whisky Exchange; US$105 Mumm Napa), which has only 6g/L of residual sugar. Similarly, Jun Tanaka of Michelin one-star The Ninth in London has been matching a summer berry citrus and vanilla cheesecake with Lanson’s Le Rosé Création 67 (£48 The Finest Bubble) as part of his collaboration with the house.

Cheese with ease

Speaking of cheese, do you ever think of pairing Champagne with a cheeseboard? It makes a good New Year’s Eve treat, particularly if you devise a Champagne-friendly selection such as Chaource (from the region), some triple-cream cheese like Explorateur and Pecorino with truffles. It’s also great with mature Comté and, as I’ve mentioned, Parmigiano Reggiano. Or try a glass of vintage with a Vacherin Mont d’Or on its own; works better than a red.

Champagne, particularly blanc de blancs Champagne, is also a match for tricky-to-match eggs, especially softly scrambled with butter and served with smoked salmon. (Frequently better than smoked salmon on its own, especially with toast.)

With anything or nothing

Of course it’s not just about pairings. Champagne has built its market and reputation as an occasion wine, a guaranteed mood-lifter. ‘We find that customers don’t just pair Champagne with their meal,’ says Leonid Shutov, founder of Bob Bob Ricard and Bébé Bob, where luxury cuvées make up half their Champagne sales that are not accounted for by house Champagne. ‘Obviously, the choice of Champagne is in itself an indication that something of an occasion or celebration is involved. Granted, for non-vintage brut the threshold may be quite low – just getting to the end of a working day or week may be enough of a victory to justify reaching for a glass of Champagne.’

In many ways it mirrors the ‘hi-lo’ fashion trend (pair something posh with something cheap and simple). I’ve drunk Champagne at his restaurants with Russian-style dumplings, chicken Kyiv and lobster mac and cheese – dishes you could equally well serve at home and arguably should, given the price of Champagne in restaurants.

Champagne also goes with burgers (Wagyu beef if you’re pushing the boat out), pizza and sandwiches… Whisper it: almost anything that goes with a lager will go with Champagne, too.

So don’t save your fizz moments for aperitifs and Michelin-starred dining – enjoy Champagne whenever the mood takes you. Even on your own. After all, that’s what half-bottles are for.

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