March is going out like a lamb with two tasty religious feasts to see the month to a close. Holiday gatherings will abound with culinary harbingers of spring (see: the aforementioned lamb) and whatever your denomination, you can supplement your celebrations with a bottle (or two) of wine.
Area shop owners have weighed in on the possibilities, providing you something to sip from the Seder feast to Easter Sunday. Jyoti Mehta – of Brookline’s The Wine Press – and Kimberly Scott – of The Wine Bottega in the North End – have plucked a handful of pairings from their shelves to match tables both traditional and not this season.
If you’re prepping a classic Seder, you can fill more than just Elijah’s cup with a little help from Mehta and The Wine Press crew. They’ve got a slew of kosher vintners in store, and the owner herself recommends a couple Recanati wines. “Their Cabernet Reserve isn’t simply a good kosher wine, it’s a great world class Cabernet,” she explains. For lighter fare, Mehta suggests Recanati’s Yasmin white blend, a Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc that has “delicious acidity balanced out with good texture, making a perfect pairing for roast chicken or matzo ball soup.”
Over at the Wine Bottega, Scott offers another matzo ball pairing, backed by some personal credentials: “If there were a matzo ball eating contest, I would win.” The Wine Bottega owners focus on natural wine, which often struggles to overlap with kosher specifications. (“There is an irony of pure wine being unpure, for sure,” says Scott, referring to some kosher wines that are boiled and heavily processed.) For the non-traditionalists celebrating, but not necessarily keeping kosher, she suggests the 2015 Sanguineto Rosso di Montepulciano, made by a “70-year-old boar-hunting woman who makes her own sausage” to play off the “impeccable texture of a good matzo ball” and the “schmaltzy liquid,” or, as she puts it, “the stuff dreams are made of.” The wine is “light and soif-y while also having this savory life force pumping through it that’s addictive,” sure to keep the night different from all other nights.
For Easter eaters (and for general spring merriment), Mehta recommends an Alsatian white, Schoenheitz Edelzwicker from the Wine Press. “It’s a blend of all the noble varietals from Alsace (Chasselas, Sylvaner, Auxerrois, Riesling, Muscat, Pinot Gris, and Gewurztraminer). This wine has lots of aromatics and notes of stone fruits making it a great pairing for a variety of Easter foods like ham.” She also has a glass for spring’s other major protein: lamb. The Wine Press team has been “crushing on the grape Carnignan lately with its great balance of fruit notes, earth and spice without being too tannic” and the Petit Pissares from Priorat, Spain is a Grenache/Carnignan blend that has “the fruit and body to stand up to a gamey dish like lamb, but is soft enough to keep the palate refreshed.”
Scott seconds the notion of balance. “So you’re talking about the combination of bloody, sweet, and earthy up against bitter and verdant veggies wrapped with a big bow of fat. Easter food is not lean, nor should it be!” She suggests “wines that have a bit of snap in them” to keep pace with the feastly foods. Her choice? The 2016 Lamoresca Vino Rosso, a blend of Nero d’Avola and Frappato from Sicily. The medium-bodied red has “zippy fresh cherry flesh, humming a tune around some earthy, freshly-picked weedy wild roses.” Talk about a spring bouquet.
Whether you’re kicking it Old Testament-style or New for your weekend fetes, going ham or going lamb, you’ve got something delicious to raise to your nearest and dearest.
