Yesterday was a brief hiatus from Vietnamese cooking, in the interest of a trip to the State Fair for some fried stuff. It has been a busy week, so I have mainly been eating leftovers from the weekend. I am, however, planning a small dinner party tomorrow night with a few friends. I’ll write more about that menu later, with pictures.
In planning for the meal, I wanted to look into appropriate wines to serve with a Vietnamese meal. As you’ll probably remember, there is a heavy French influence in Vietnamese cuisine. In my reading, I’ve seen that it is more appropriate to serve wine than beer with a Vietnamese meal. That’s great news for me, since I don’t really like beer anyway. And better news yet, the best wines to go with this type of meal are sweet white wines – my favorite!
I haven’t done a lot of exploration on my own beyond pinot grigio, so I went to my local wine shop Barley & Vine for some inspiration and assistance. Back in the spring, I won a $25 gift certificate in a fundraising raffle which I hadn’t used yet. Before going shopping, I looked up some ideas online and found the following suggestions for a Vietnamese pairing – riesling, pinot gris, gruner veltliner, rose (from Rhone Valley suggested), vouvray, and sancerre. When I explained what I was looking for, I ended up purchasing the following 2 suggested wines; Steininger Gruner Veltliner Kamptal, and Leitz Rudesheimer Drachenstein Riesling (recommended as a “not too sweet” Riesling). They’re chilling as we speak, and I look forward to trying them with the meal tomorrow!
Vietnamese proverb: Good wine must drink together with good friend
