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A Bitter & Sweet Pairing

 

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Iranian food meets Turkish wine? How often does this happen? Hopefully more and more often now if this Bitter & Sweet pairing inspires anyone!

My friend Lorraine introduced me to The Caspian Chef some time ago. She tangentially knows him through a cousin and thought I would appreciate his style. I immediately fell in love with his recipes and way of cooking. So, when his cookbook, Bitter & Sweet came out, she got it for me.

Apparently, The Caspian Chef – otherwise known as Omid Roustaei – and Lorraine’s cousin ‘do enjoy a wine of an evening’ (imagine you’re hearing this delivered in my friend’s plummy British accent). So, we thought it would be fun to pair a number of recipes from the book with Turkish wine.

Bitter & Sweet

Omid Roustaei’s first cookbook, Bitter & Sweet promises ‘Global Flavors from an Iranian-American Kitchen.’ While yes, Roustaei weaves in stories about his youth in Iran, this is no ‘this was how we did it in Iran so follow this recipe exactly’ book. As the subtitle promises, it’s global flavors. In the intro, Roustaei says:

“…I want to inspire curiosity … encourage you to experiment, not only with Iranian ingredients and techniques but also with the range of cuisines that I’ve been fortunate enough to explore during my culinary career.”

His recipes take traditional Iranian food and add twists, like chimichurri sauce with tahini and feta pesto. He also provides notes and substitutions throughout for those who cannot access specific ingredients or who prefer vegetarian or vegan options. In that spirit of experimentation and exploration…I may have adapted some of Roustaei’s recipes. Some out of necessity because there are so many things that we cannot get here. However, as he included a chapter on improvisation and intuition as part of cooking, I feel like he would approve. 

The Menu

To really dive properly into the cookbook, I chose three vegetable dishes, two mains, a dessert, and a drink. 

Pomegranate and Cucumber Salad

I stayed pretty faithful to the recipe here. The pomegranates I got weren’t quite ripe, so I added a dash of nar ekşisi (pomegranate vinegar) to the dressing. 

Grilled Corn with Tahini Chimichurri Sauce

My only change was to dry pan fry frozen corn. Corn on the cob is available and still in season, but it’s just easier to eat it off the cob.

Roasted Carrots with Feta Sumac Spread

No changes needed! Absolute perfection. The feta sumac spread alone is amazing.

Sour Cherry Rice with Petite Meatballs 

My only regret is that I didn’t make more meatballs! Will 100% be making again. And again. This was also the first time I’ve ever dared to make a tahdig. I’ve been terrified of these for years. Delighted to say that it came out beautifully!

Peach Saffron Chicken Stew

I should have used more peaches! Always more peaches.

Cardamom and Rose Water Cupcakes

Here is where I really diverted. I just really hate ingesting rose water. So I substituted with orange blossom water. I also used to many more pistachios, folding them right into the batter. And while these are called ‘cupcakes’ they’re more muffin-like in texture and the lacking of frosting. In the end, I turned this into a double layer cake and added orange blossom water mascarpone frosting. 

Boulder Chai

So delicious. I made it with his suggested coconut milk substitution. As I dislike maple syrup, and it costs an absolute fortune here, I subbed that with a combination of rock and black sugar. 

While we associate certain dishes with certain cultures: pizza and Bolognese with the Italians, chicken tikka masala with India, baklava with Turkey…so many of these dishes wouldn’t be possible without influence from other countries. The tomatoes for pizza and Bolognese sauce for example are native to North America and didn’t make it to Italy until the 16th century. Chicken tikka masala was invented in the UK! And baklava…well I’m not touching that one. Bitter & Sweet is a great example of the good that can come out of a cultural melting pot.

Wine, similarly, has been shaped by multiple cultures and countries. So, I was pretty sure we could find some Turkish flavors to pair well with Roustaei’s recipes.

Vinkara Mahzen Narince, 2019

The Vinkara Mahzen* Narince is redolent of baked tree fruit, luscious peach, nutmeg, vanilla, and walnut aromas. On the palate dry, medium body with really nice, linear acidity. Flavors are baked tree fruit, apricot, baking spices (in a spicy but not sweet way), and flowers, with hints of caramel and cream. Medium long finish of vanilla custard. 

I thought this specifically for the chicken and peach stew. Between the richness of Narince and the aging Vinkara does with this in oak and acacia, I figured it would be a lovely counterpart to the caramelized peaches and sauce in which the chicken stew cooked. I was right.

*Since the label change it’s “Rezerve” not Mahzen, but since I had the old label, I went with the old name. 

Heraki Akuarela Çal Karası, 2020

Heraki Akuarela Çal Karası offers red fruit and earth with raspberry, sour cherry, maybe cranberry, along with forest and tobacco. Low tannins with medium plus acidity and highish alcohol (14%) that wouldn’t know if you hadn’t read the label. Flavors burst with raspberry, thyme, pepper, earthy forest floor and a touch of forest spice. 

As soon as I saw the sour cherry rice and meatballs recipe, I knew we needed either a Çal Karası or a Kalecik Karası. Their generally silky mouthfeels, low tannins, and red fruit flavors would compliment a dish with cherries. Indeed, it did. The Akuarela Çal Karası was beautiful with this. The dish reminded me of a similar dish I found here at Local Grill – vişneli kebab. It’s one of my favorite Turkish dishes.

Arcadia 333, 2013

I unabashedly love sweet wine. Not the sickly, saccharine, Blue Nun-like wines many people assume sweet wine is. But properly-made sweet wine with almost searing acidity to balance the sweetness and rich, multi-layered flavors. Such is the Arcadia 333 which is, no competition, my absolute favorite Turkish sweet wine. Made with partially botrytized and partially late harvest (think Hungarian szamarodni) Sauvignon Blanc, the 333 is remarkable. 

So remarkable, in fact, that Houston-based Michelin star restaurant March has it on its tasting menu for the restaurant’s current Levant season (although the 2016, not the 2013).

The color of good Scotch (or what I imagine Scotch – which I don’t drink – should look like), this is a powerhouse wine with 16.5% ABV, beautiful laser-like acidity, and a complex mélange of flavors including orange blossom top notes over orange marmalade, dried apples, ginger, toffee, and toasted hazelnuts. I’ve paired this wine before with orange blossom water based desserts with great success so, I knew as soon as I saw the recipe for the cardamom rose petal “cupcakes” that I was going to a) sub the rose water for orange blossom and b) pair it with the 333.

The moral of the story? Clearly get a copy of Bitter & Sweet and drink more Turkish wine!