We Followed My Advice ... And It Worked

Back a few days before the New Year, I wrote about what to eat on New Year's Day with a southern style New Year's Day meal. We followed my advice.

Understand that this is not the first time we have followed my pairing advice. We usually do. But, this was different. I was telling us to drink an oaky California Chardonnay that had gone through full lalolactic fermentation. That's not something we drink very often. Oaky and buttery and full-bodied and often not so clean, this is just not typically our style of white wine although it is an exceptionally popular style in American households.

And, then there was the food. Ham. We almost always drink Pinot Noir with a ham. It's a pinkish meat, certainly not white. We never consider Chardonnay with ham. Collard greens. Okay, this is a food that should not be consumed by human beings. Correction. This is a substance that should not be considered food by human beings. But, it's acidic. And, we have learned Chardonnay and acid often don't pair well.

But, I had thought through it. So, I went downstairs and found a rich, oaky, buttery Chardonnay that had been aged in new American oak and gone through full malolactic fermentation ready to hear that John really doesn't know a lick about pairing and should be fired as the house sommelier.

One of us tasted the wine without the food and asked if I was sure about this. I hesitated, but said we should try it.

We did. And we liked it. The wine nicely calmed the collard greens, as well in fact as hot pepper sauce does. The richness of the Chardonnay handled the ham. The wine was perfect with cornbread and made the black-eyed peas tolerable. 

Success.

I kept my job.