Gewürztraminer with Thai Food

Last night we had five people around for Thai food.  We do this every couple of weeks and it provides a good opportunity to try a number of different wines matched to the food.  Of course, what is Thai food?  For four to six people, we would have about eight different selections of food, including noodles, seafood, beef curry, chicken, pork along with springs rolls, rice, etc.  Therefore, the most important thing to remember is that if we have multiple dishes and types of food, we need either (1) multiple wines, or (2) a wine that will match easily with many different dishes.

In my second ever wine blog written on 29 March, 2012, I wrote about what wine to have with Thai food.  That evening we had a Riesling which matches up well because Riesling usually has a bit of sharp edge to it and works well for a white wine with ethnic food, especially Thai food in my opinion where I like a bit of sharpness to start with and then followed by a smoother Shiraz with some of the other dishes.

If we have a few people over though and a few dishes, then I would like to have maybe two whites and one red wine to go with Thai.  That way you can vary what you want to achieve with the whites and I usually would choose a Hunter Valley Shiraz, which is not too heavy (like the big Barossa Valley Shirazes) and contain more peppery or spiced flavorings for the red.

However, a few of us were still recovering from having been sick recently and one was not drinking, so we only opened one bottle of a white wine.  It was the 2008 Gewürztraminer from The Little Wine Company.  This is a spectacular wine and has aged beautifully in the several years since I bought it and a perfect match for Thai food, especially tonight as we had several seafood dishes on the menu.

I would describe this wine as off-dry or semi-dry, with a beautiful sharpness to it that goes really well with Thai food.  It should really be classified as a dry wine, but a bit of sweetness from the citrus flavors and almost candy-like drops or chews comes through to make it appear semi-dry.

One of our friends is having us over for Malaysian and Indian food in a couple of weeks and I have set aside another few bottles of this great wine to share with them.

The Gewürztraminer is a secondary white grape and there is not a lot of it to be found in Australia.  Most of the Gewürztraminer I drink comes from the Alsace region (like the Hugel Gewürztraminer).  I have had a few Gewürztraminer's in Australia and the 2008 Gewürztraminer from The Little Wine Company really stands out!  This is a magnificent wine for the money.

As a side note, Suzanne and Ian Little are really nice people (as are most of the people in the wine industry in the Hunter Valley!), and I remember a most special night two years back where we had a 5-course degustation meal with matching wines at the Little Wine Company, with Suzanne and Ian Little, Andrew Thomas, Andrew Margan, and a few other great Hunter Valley wine makers where each wine maker rotated tables with each course.  The food, the wine, the company and the discussions that evening were special!