A nice bit of blue cheese with the right wine is one of my favourite ways to end a meal. It’s also a good excuse to open a sweet wine or that bottle of Port you’ve been keeping at the back of the cupboard.
Salty blue cheeses are the perfect match with a sweet wine or Port as the sharpness of the cheese complements the lush decadence of the wine. With the ideal pair, both the wine and the cheese will taste better.
Safe bets include Tawny Port, Tokaji Aszu from Hungary and Coteaux du Layon from the Loire.
Coteaux du Layon Domaine Forges (Waitrose, £10.99 for a 50cl bottle). This is made from Chenin Blanc grapes from Anjou in the Loire Valley. The area provides the perfect microclimate for growing ripe grapes with very high sugar levels. The steep slopes give shelter from the wind and the nearby Layon river helps to create the foggy mornings necessary for botrytis to form. Botrytis cinera is the ‘noble rot’ that reduces the moisture in the grapes thereby concentrating the sugars. You’ll often pay a premium for a good sweet wine, but this one is a bargain!
Croft Reserve Tawny Port (Majestic, £14.99). Tawny is a lighter style of Port having been aged in barrels for longer to soften out the wine. The Croft is a great all-round Tawny…it’s particularly accessible and approachable and, at £15, it doesn’t break the bank. It’s lovely on its own at the end of the meal, or with pecan pie, or (of course) a big wedge of blue cheese.
If you’re totally agin the sweeties, you could always substitute a Gran Reserva Rioja or even a young Sauvignon Blanc which would have the required acidity to sit alongside the cheese.
Campillo 57 Gran Reserva Seleccion Especial Rioja 2012 (Inverarity One to One, £29.99). This is a doozy, and one of my favourite wines tasted this year. It’s packed full of flavour and has the character to stand up to the strongest of blues. Cheers!
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