Weekly Wine Notes From Brian Kemmerle
Bentley’s Wine Steward, Brian Kemmerle regularly offers his insight and experience to help select the perfect wine to accompany Chef Derek Ridgway’s dishes. Here is Brian’s recommended food and wine pairing for this week!
This week’s featured pairing involves our very own Columbia River: King Salmon. The chefs roast it on a cedar plank and baste it with a sauce of Dijon mustard, honey and tarragon. The salmon is then served with a Yukon Gold potato salad finished with prosciutto and fennel.
Usually I like to pair a red wine with Salmon, especially an Oregon Pinot Noir, however the sauce the fish is paired with lends itself more to a white wine. If we were in Alsace, France I would match this up with a Grand Cru Gewürztraminer or Riesling, a local version would work just fine BTW, but since we are in Oregon I thought a barrel fermented Chardonnay would match nicely.
The wine is the 2008 Pudding River Barrel Fermented Chardonnay. Made here in Salem, Oregon with the early ripening Dijon clone of Chardonnay, this wine displays plenty of richness without excessive weight or low acidity. The wine has aromas of pineapple and tangerine with a touch of macadamia nut on the finish. The oak is very well integrated in this wine you barely notice it but you would miss it if it was gone. Cheers!
