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By Rob Stansel
Wine & Superfoods
Our mothers told us not to eat it. It was“ just garnish,” a sprig of green on an otherwise earth-toned spread, something to brighten the carnivore’ s plate, only to be scraped into the trash. Now it’ s eaten by the bushel and hailed as a leafy messiah: kale, wonder green of stand-and-stir culinary heroes like Rachel Ray, nemesis to the four-ingredient would-be warriors of Chopped. I know: kale’ s old hat, totally last winter. You’ re probably already hoarding a littleknown pseudo-seed from Mongolia, refusing to name your supplier, and waiting out the impending quinoa bubble, aren’ t you?
Well, I’ m still learning the ABCs of complete proteins( A is for amaranth, B is for buckwheat …), but if your refrigerator, like mine, is something of a mystery basket at the best of times, then perhaps you can relate to my conundrum: where did all of these“ super foods” come from, and what the heck am I going to drink tonight with my açaí and goji berry crumble?
Counter-intuitive, you say, to pour over Nutrition Facts tables until I can’ t distinguish sugar from sodium and then reach for a bottle of Grenache? Hardly. Antioxidants and polyphenols and the French Paradox and all that, remember? We drink wine because we love it; that it might just make for a healthy heart is, as I see it, a bonus. We eat“ ancient grains” because, well, Dr. Oz told us to. And let’ s face it, he’ s right: white rice is bland, red quinoa tastes better.
So if the super foodies are onto something— and even if they aren’ t— it falls on the wine nerds to investigate.
I’ m proposing that we play along with Francois Chartier, author of Taste Buds and Molecules: The Art and Science of Food and Wine, in embracing the“ nobility of bitter tastes”: sweets be damned, our palates are— thanks to our ancestors’ need to detect poisons in order to survive— designed for the bitters, and the super foods phenomenon is nothing if not a playground of astringent, nutty, earthy flavours. Bitter is in. But because food is generally the spoil sport of a pairing— wine tends to be easier on food than food is on wine— we’ ll need to choose our wines carefully. �
Super Pairings
Quinoa & toasted almonds? Pair to the nuttiness with a dry Oloroso sherry, like our Hidalgo Gobernador( Spain, $ 25.99)
Kale & curried apples? Pit some sweet against the bitterness with an off-dry Riesling, like our Tawse Sketches( Niagara, $ 19.99)
Avocado & rare tuna in your salad? Bring on the acid with a bone-dry Riesling, like our Zinck Pfersigberg Grand Cru( France, $ 28.99)
Pomegranate relish or blueberry salsa with your protein? Match the fruit with a ripe red, like our Damas Vineyards Fiddletown Zinfandel( California, $ 23.99)
Goji berry crumble? Add some fizz to the crunch with a Moscato, like our Innocent Bystander( Australia, $ 11.99)
48 http:// banvilleandjones. cornervine. com