Malaysian food wine matching advice

WINE TALK
1

I am married to a Malaysian and so we get to eat a wide range of wonderful Malaysian dishes (curry, sambal, noodles, etc). The dishes range from spicy to fiery hot in the most part. Abundant use of hot chilis is a feature of the cuisine. I have some go to wine choices but would like to seek WB ideas to broaden my wine aperture. My wine pairing choices are;

  1. German Riesling (Kabinett & Spatlese)
  2. Rose from Bandol
  3. Rose Champagne

Generally I find the German Rieslings are the run away best choice. The residual sugar in the kabinett/spatlese wines works absolutely a treat with the hotter dishes. Guests who “do not like sweeter whites” invariably appreciate the pairing much more than they expected to. The Rose and Rose Champagnes work better with the milder dishes. Beer works well as well but that is not the advice I am looking for!

I have not really had much luck with red wines matching the hotter dishes. I have tried things like young Zins and young Aussie shiraz with the hope that the bigger more robust flavours would stand up to the chili onslaught. They are ok but no better than ok and I find myself going back to Riesling again.


SO… Any ideas for red wines to try with spicy Malaysian dishes???

TIA

brodie

2

Young ripe zins and new world syrah would probably be the best red options. I think “they are ok but no better than ok” is probably a fair way to describe the pairing - basically, it works well enough if you feel like drinking red wine with your dinner instead of always having white, and maybe a little better than that depending on what exactly is on a particular menu, but it’s not one of those terrific synergistic pairings.

I guess the other thing you could try is Beaujolais. That’s another low-tannin red with good fruit to it, so it shouldn’t clash with the Malaysian food.

By the way, good for you bucking wine geek orthodoxy about only having sweet whites and sparklers and beer with any kind of Asian food, and isntead exploring other options. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to have a tasty red wine sometimes even if it’s not the most optimal pairing possible with dinner that night. And it’s not as though 100% of sips of wine you have come seconds after a bite of food, so wine doesn’t have to be a complete slave to the meal, and instead can be enjoyed on its own two feet as well.

3

Search for a lower alcohol pinot, and as you taste them as you find them watch for a “cool” nose.

I know that’s a dipshit term, but there are wines that seem to produce a cooler sensation when I take a whiff vs. others.

They actually smell more like they are at cellar temp when they are at room temp compared to some other pinots…which may be simply an obtuse way for me being redundant and saying “Cool nose” and lower alcohol when they mean the same thing, but it doesn’t always play out that way.

I think I have found more frequent lower alcohol pinots in the Oregon selections.

So, lower alcohol Oregon pinot.

4

Taking a page from the German playbook, perhaps a spätburgunder from Baden?

Teutonic Wine Co. in Oregon also makes some outrageously low alcohol wines (some are as low as 10.5%) in an Alsatian/German style with noticeably leaner fruit than Burgundy and higher acidity that could work with spicy dishes.

5

Fascinating!

I had never heard of them!

Have you tasted?

6

First: Malaysian food… Yum…

Second: Due to all the spice and heat, Malaysian food tends to have the same aspects as Thai food when pairing with wine. You need sweetness to cut the heat and/or bubbles with low tannins. I would also personally recommend a Chenin Blanc based wine like Vouvray or a Sauvignon Blanc based wine like a Pouilly-Fumé. Alsacian Riesling would be very nice too.

Reds can be brutal especially if they are high in tannins so the best options of Pinot Noir and Beaujolais have been mentioned. Of course, any well aged red will do as long as the tannins have receded. Might want to consider a well-aged Vintage Port as well.

7

I’ve only had the 2011 “Laurel Vineyard - Bergspitze Weisse” Pinot Noir and the 2013 Laurel Vineyard Rosé. The 2011 pinot is all about acidity and minerality and the fruit is on the red side of the spectrum. I do, however, recall that it had a fairly elegant structure. I think it could actually age surprisingly well based on its acidity. The 2013 Rosé is more of a pleasant quaffer wine (as any good rosé should be) and is quite fruity, floral, and refreshing.

Hope that helps.

8

Tran…fascinating. Love this line [cheers.gif] et merci :

Due to all the spice and heat, Malaysian food tends to have the same aspects as Thai food when pairing with wine. You need sweetness to cut the heat and/or bubbles with low tannins.

9

Brodie,

Though I have to agree that Riesling is unequaled in the way it pairs with spicy Asian food, we have had reasonable success with slightly off-dry roses (the 2013 Domaine Fontsainte gris de gris we had this week comes to mind as an example, I believe it’s a Kermit import) and, believe it or not, inexpensive Spanish grenaches of the campo de borja class–served chilled. They’re fruity, generally low tannin and take well to cooling which also serves the spicy food quite well. Most of the bigger more serious wines I know you love (remember us from Alaska, and John & Annabelle?) disqualify themselves for the very reasons you love them and aren’t going to go there unless you can get Raz to back off the chiles a bit, and I’m sure that’s asking for trouble. :slight_smile:

10

Hi Jenise, great too hear from you. I may give the Campo de Borja a try this weekend as Raz is preparing Satay and her satay sauce could never be mistaken as being mild! And yes asking Raz to back off the Chilis is definitely not part of the wine pairing master plan

The other suggestions of low tannin Beajoulais has merit as well and will see what Specs has in store.

BTW, we will be visitin J&A in early Aug for a few days.

All the best

Brodie