German Wine’s Still Best For Cantonese Food

I have said it before and I am saying it again, in my opinion there are no better wines to suit Cantonese food that German white Rieslings. They have exactly what is needed to compliment the delicate flavours of the food and, in particular, Cantonese dim sum style foods as the wines themselves are fairly delicate wines too but have complexity and an intrigue that makes food pairing so interesting (and you know I’m not a huge fan of food pairing!)

Yesterday, a couple of us sat down for a long Cantonese lunch in Jasmine, a Maxim’s owned restaurant in Hong Kong’s Festival Walk (a shopping centre built pretty much on the land where once my primary school stood back in the 1980’s!). I used to work for this company too and, strangely enough, never remember their food being so good – oh wait, maybe that’s because I was eating staff meals….

Anyway, I digress. Sitting down with a fellow wine aficionado and Martin Palmer of Thomas Palmer Fine German Wines we wanted to see what wines from the Nahe region of Germany would be like when paired with some of the most traditional styles of food that comes from our city – dim sum (something I have always considered breakfast or brunch but am slowly changing my mind).

Traditional 'har gow' dim sum

The Nahe region of Germany is small – only 4,300 hectares, about 4% of the size of Bordeaux – and of the 400 wineries in the area there only 9 are classified as VDP (Verband Deutscher Pradikats), the ultimate sign of quality German wine. In the past, the region was subject to volcanic activity that has resulted in a varied landscape with a wide and diverse topography.

A good proportion of white wines made in Nahe are dry, that is with 9 grams of residual sugar or less, and are made from the Riesling grape. Many of the wines are labeled “GG” meaning Grosses Gewaechs (great growth), a term used for wines made in 1.Lage (akin to Grand Cru) vineyards that must be handpicked, and have a quality level no less than Spaetlese and cannot exceed a production of 50hl/ha. Wines made from 1.Lage vineyards are comparable to the quality of some of the best wines in the world.

Ordering traditional dim sum such as ‘char siu’ (BBQ pork), ‘har gow’ (shrimp dumplings), ‘char sui sou’ (BBQ pork pastries), turnip cake, seasonal vegetables and many others we got into the lunch which, was not itself an exercise in tasting per se, just a casual lunch with five bottles of wine from VDP producers and one bottle of Sekt from producer Ratzenberger in the Mittelrhein region close to Nahe.

This sparkling wine is produced in about the same quantities as something like Salon in Champagne and is considered a Premier Cru sekt, made in the same style as champagne from only hand-harvested grapes with the wine itself full of good acidity and subtle textures and flavours. It paired very nicely with a semi-raw beef dish with Mirin dressing (something more Japanese than Chinese actually).

The first white was from the Tesch winery, the Tesch St. Remigiusberg 1. Lage Riesling 2011 – winemaker Dr. Martin Tesch was named German winemaker of the year 2012 last year. The wine, in a screwcap to maintain quality and freshness is very clean, dry and fresh and paired very well with the ‘har gow’. These wines are not made in large quantities (only around 500 cases per year) and only 50 cases of this wine are made available to the Hong Kong market annually.

Moving on, we had what would become my personal favourite of the day, the Dr.Crusius 2011 “Top of the Rock” 1.Lage Riesling, an Auslese with a stunning mouthfeel, great fruit and a touch (a hint only) of sweetness on the palate. This 400 year old winery makes some simply incredible wines and this one in particular paired exceptionally well with the sweet and fatty ‘char siu’, BBQ pork (but does not work well with things like sweet and sour pork – you have been warned)!

The Gut Hermannsberg “Steinterrassen” 1.Lage Riesling 2011 too had just a touch of sweetness and was very nice with both the BBQ pork pastries and the turnip cake (add a little chili sauce to the turnip cake and it does amazing things to the wine). This wine is made from steep stone terraces on the banks of the river and is the last estate in the area that can be dated back to Prussian ownership.

Shaefer-Froehlich wines have incredible aging ability so opening a 2010 as we did could be looked 

upon in the same light as sitting down to a steak dinner with a 2010 Bordeaux (ones I can't afford now thanks to …. oh, don’t get me started on Parker again!), except that with the whites, they are still very drinkable at a young age. We had the Shaefer-Froehlich Felseneck 1.Lage Riesling Grosses Gewaechs (which was also the most expensive bottle of the lunch) which was rich and complex with a super-long finish. This wine can be compared to the quality of something like a DRC Montrachet and according to Martin is “like a classical orchestra on your palate”. Made by the 2010 German winemaker of the year there is only an annual allocation of 30 cases to Hong Kong.

Finally, we ended up the lunch with a Kruger-Rumpf Binger Scharlachberg 1.Lage Riesling Spatlese 2010 which was sweet and delightful (normally I’d say the sweetest wine was my favourite and although this wine is, hand-down, incredible to drink, I stick to my guns and still say the Dr. Crusius was my fav!). This wine is amazing as there are only 80 cases made per year and only a tiny allocation is sent to Hong Kong - making it one of the rarest wines in the city. The wine itself paired very nicely with a deep fried bean curd and orange marmalade dish and, weirdly, went very well with a Cantonese classic, sweet and sour pork (it also goes well with creme brulee!)

Yesterday’s lunch only goes to prove what I had already learned over the last couple of years that German Riesling really is the best pairing wine for dim sum and, arguably, Cantonese food on the whole. I could certainly not have gone through six bottles of Bordeaux red or California Chardonnay at lunch with this food as that would have probably meant passing out or bursting. The wines (and the food) are so light and delicate that you do not feel overly full at the end of a tasting like this and you are well-able to function for the rest of the day (although there wasn’t much of that left by the time we finished)! Next time you’re heading out for dim sum with friends or family, grab yourself a quality German Riesling to have with the meal – you really will not regret it as it adds so much to the meal.

The wines in the piece are all available in Hong Kong from Thomas Palmer Fine German Wines
www.finegermanwines.hk . All wines can be purchased on line and delivered to your home or office. For more information contact Martin Palmer at martin@finegermanwines.hk