A Pleasant Surprise

You hear quite a few wine pairings with Chinese/Asian cuisine these days. And just a few days ago, I received an email from Lifestyle Asia saying that they will be having a new biweekly column on Asian food pairing with new world wines called "The Flavours of Asia". Tastings and pairings will be done by local experts with the finest palates invited by Moët Hennessy Asia Pacific.

I've actually done a few at KEE where we hosted dim sum lunch and paired with various different wines, with wine makers explaining why it works and with the chefs commenting on how he got his inspirations on matching spring rolls with a glass of light pinot gris.

Anyways, before I get too far off topic, this post is about an awesome discovery for me, one of the few posts about chinese food & wine pairing. Apparently, the Chinese Thousand Year Old Egg (皮蛋 / Pidan) with pickled ginger pair rather well with red wines (and sweet whites too). This is of course not a new discovery/delicacy as Yung Kee (famous for their thousand year old eggs as well as roast goose) has been serving their guests this combo for awhile.

But is an 'omgosh' moment for me. Reaction was "@*$#&(#_)*^&%@&$)@!".

Red wine & pidan wor. Dim duk ga. cannot la! But if Yung Kee is serving this proudly, there's gotta be some truth behind this.

I finally had a chance to try it tonight and it was indeed a very pleasant surprise. Why I think the flavours work together is because of science. Through preserving, the thousand year old egg has a higher alkaline level (higher pH balance makes this a 'base'). And that's why when you eat it with the pickled ginger, which has a low pH balance and is a 'acid', the base and the acid neutralize each other, creating a very well-balanced taste. The wine in this case is the acid.

For this combo, you should drink midrange red wines, with medium to full bodied. Don't go break you bank and buy yourself a pricey red wine. I have a bottle of Spanish wine from the Rioja region - LAN, Gran Reserva, 2003. I first took a bite of the egg without the pickled ginger and then took a sip of wine. The wine took away the very pungent and sharp taste of the thousand year old egg. You know sometimes these Pidan can leave your throat kinda dryish? The wine took away that sensation. And what did the egg do to the wine? Well, it decreased the tannin of the wine and so I didn't have that funny coating in my mouth. I guess you can compare it to wine and cheese. The 2nd bite I added the pickled ginger which was so much better! An explosion of very complex flavours in your mouth, swirling around. The pickled ginger brought out more flavor from the Pidan, and then you have the flavor of the wine ... that was my confirmed 'omgosh' moment! The pickled ginger is equivalent to the quince jelly or the grapes that come with the cheese platter. Pidan is the Chinese cheese in this case.

Try it. Is quite tasty!

I apologize for not being able to give you a better description on this flavor combo. I just don't have the words to describe it!! JUST TRY IT.

But taking a bite of the pidan and then quickly take a sip of wine isn't a very classy thing to do. You get that mucky lip print around the rim of your glass and you can't slurp your wine with food in your mouth. The whole thing can get messy.

And so, this calls for brainstorming a dish that would incorporate red wine, pidan and pickled ginger.

Think, think, think.

You can't cook the pidan because you need the gooey, creamy yolk for this to work. I don't know if you make a thick red wine reduction sauce and drizzle it onto the pidan will have the same effect as drinking the wine since cooking takes away the alcohol in the wine and I don't know if this will change the pH level of the wine. You can't just reduce the wine half way and still have the 'sauce' very watery. You don't want your dish to look like as if the pidan is drowning in watery grape juice. Presentation counts. I also thought about soaking the pidan in red wine for days just like the traditional 'tea leaves eggs'. I could give this a go.

But if I can think of a dish that can preserve the original state of these 3 ingredients, that would be great, wouldn't it? And THANK YOU to watching way too many episodes of Heston's Feast, having eaten at Bo Innovation and having been around Chef B while working at KEE ... I've got it. I present to you ...

Thousand Year Old Egg with Red Wine Caviar and Pickled Ginger Crisp

I coloured it cause it looks nicer. This is my food diary btw.

Basically, you use the molecular cuisine techniques and turn the red wine into 'caviar' - which I do know how to make, but I just don't have the ingredients to do it. So when you bite into them, breaking the very thin layer of 'skin' encapsulating the liquid, you get a burst of red wine in your mouth, along with the pidan and pickled ginger. Present this on a tiny little Chinese soup spoon. Is like that Xiaolongbao @ Bo Innovation by Alvin. This little drawing of mine doesn't show how you can turn pickled ginger into pickled ginger crisp because I don't know how!! But I am pretty sure you can turn anything into crisp by extracting the flavor and just do some molecular thingy to it.

People, get me a molecular gastronomy cooking kit please!!!

p.s. I wonder if cheese would go well with Chinese Xiao Shing wine or Wu Liang Yi.