Tuesday 3 May 2011

Glorious gammon - and a 1969 bottle of wine

Easter is a time for family in our household, so we all got together to enjoy a sumptuous repast to celebrate the occasion. My mom is a fabulous cook, and has been teaching me how to conduct myself in the kitchen for many years. She put a wonderful menu together, which we enjoyed with a very, very special wine...

Starter: Prawns in avo halves with a creamy mayonnaise dressing
Main: Gammon with a delicious creamy mustard sauce, served with seasonal veggies and mixed salad
Dessert: Raspberries coated with Demarara sugar and spooned over vanilla ice-cream

And the wine we enjoyed was a 1969 Nederburg Select Cabernet, which my Dad bought many years back for R14.99 (very expensive at that time!) This particular wine was quite difficult to get hold of, but my Dad, a wine conniseur and collector, managed to buy a few cases, and drinks a bottle every now and then on special occasions.
It was truly an amazing wine for its age - although past its best, the fruit had held itself together remarkably well, and it had a very smooth finish.

BBC Food has a wonderful and super-easy recipe for a fantastic mustard sauce to pair with gammon:

Creamy mustard sauce

Image: cookstr.com
Ingredients:
150ml double cream
2 tsp grain mustard
1 Tbs fresh, chopped parsley

Method:
Pour the cream into a saucepan and bring to a simmer, then stir through the mustard and chopped parsley.

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