When the wine lengthens the dessert and the dessert lengthens the wine

Wine and dessert are not a marriage well matched in many restaurants, although they could perfectly coexist together. The connection between the two seems evident and both provide a “fantastic world of sweet experiences” if you know how to make the right pairing. Three top-level pastry chefs such as Albert Adrià, Jordi Butrón (Espai Sucre) and Fátima Gismeno, winner of last year’s revelation pastry chef, pooled their wisdom at The Wine Edition of Madrid Fusión Alimentos de España to find the perfect ‘vinomio’ between these two enemies intimate: dessert and wines.

“Knowing how to combine them is not an easy task”, recognized Adrià, but knowing what “the connections that work with the flavors” are is becoming more and more important, added Jordi Butrón. To get this ‘vinomio’ Ferran Centelles, former sommelier of elBulli and co-founder of Wineissocial and Outlook Wine, selected six of the best sweet wines “not counting those from the Canary Islands and sherry” to carry out a tour “of the freshest and with less oxidation in both desserts and wines” in search of the perfect pairing, being aware that “sweetness tends to reduce the flavor of dishes”.

The first wine selected was the sweet ice wine Enero, from Bodegas Alto Landón. Coming from the highest part of Cuenca, almost bordering Teruel, this 100% petit monseng is made with frozen grapes. A sweet wine without yeast and sulphites and very fresh. «For all these reasons, nothing better than a black sesame and yuzu sponge cake made in the microwave. Very aerial and humid that is put at the service of the dessert”, says Albert Adrià, creator of the dessert. And the fact is that for the cook “this sponge cake smells of citrus fruits and black sesame”.

A Muscatel of Alexandria from Bodega Bentóniz was the next to look for a ‘partner’ at the table. The Ariyanas Terrenos Pizarrosos from Malaga found a partner with a mango, passion fruit and vanilla dessert on a choux pastry, to which a liquid part with gelatin and a white chocolate and vanilla ganache is added. “Being a sweet wine, it needs the power of mango and passion, which, together with acidity, combines and balances the flavours,” says Gismeno.

The third non-oxidized wine was an Ojuel Supurao. A Tempranillo Garnacha from La Rioja with which they wanted to recover the tradition of bringing grapes to the houses and hanging them up to drink during the winter. Those that were left over were used to make the wine that the family consumed the rest of the year. For this reason, Butrón opted for a chocolate that he would only make “to drink it with this wine”. “It has a Christmas flavor, familiar, with sweetness and acidity. By affinity, there is a nuance of Christmas compote, mulled wine, cinnamon, clove… A tailor-made suit », he emphasizes. And another chocolate was made by Butrón for a more oxidized wine such as Dorado de Rueda, a Rueda I de Albeto 100% Verdejo. «This chocolate is a caricature, an exaggeration of what can be found in wine. Manchego cheese dairy products in the form of a cookie (which gives it a touch of salt) with a vanilla caramel».

The six chosen wines.

Fátima Gismeno was in charge of finding a dessert that would marry Fondillón Monovar, a 100% muscatel wine from Bodega Monova in Alicante. The pastry chef from La Mancha opted for the hazelnut as the protagonist because “the wine is very alcoholic and you had to add a nut to it.” The dessert itself was all hazelnut, with a crunch, a toffee and a little cocoa sprinkled, with a milk chocolate mousse with a creamy hazelnut.

And to finish, a fire wine, the Dolç de Foc, from Gallina de Piel. A conceptual wine from Abadal, Picapoll, Mancebo, Malvasia. A reinterpreted mid-nineteenth-century recipe that spends 14 hours boiling over dry holm oak wood and of which there are only 258 bottles. “A fiery wine could only share a table with an ice cream,” revealed Adrià, who “opted for a three-ingredient mole ice cream in which fruit, spices (without onion and garlic) and chocolate stand out.” An ice cream that put an end to a delight for the senses that confirms that “wine lengthens dessert and dessert lengthens wine”.