What Wine With Japanese Cuisine?

Fridays on the BottleBlog will feature a food-related article, wine pairing, or travelogue. Today, we join Woodbridge Wine Manager Debbie Miller Nelson for Japanese!

My colleague Mark Ricca wanted to go out for sushi, so I invited him to my favorite Woodbridge place, Yoshi on Pearl Street in Woodbridge. He said, "You bring a bottle and I’ll bring one and we can decide what works better." Mark was predictable. I knew he would bring a red Burgundy as he is always waxing poetic about the synergy between the two (she says rolling her eyes), so I decided to go with the classic sake. At the restaurant, Mark brought his Reidal suitcase with his own glasses. It definitely brought more than a few stares and curious peeking. Some customers I had just helped a few hours earlier in the store were there and were checking out our wine selection as was the staff at the restaurant. As Mark unpacked his suitcase, we quickly became the dinner show.

We ordered everything from chef rolls with jalapeno to mild sashimi, a fried item and edamame. We shamefully ran up a very hefty bill and no, we paid for it ourselves! So when the food arrived it came down to the wine showdown – red Burgundy (Pinot Noir) or sake (Rice Wine). The showdown was Meo-Camuzet Marsannay Rouge 2006 ($41.99) against Eiko Fuji Ban Ryu NV ($18.99). Which paired better? The answer is BOTH. The Burgundy was surprising to me. Mark was right on! I thought the spicy food would kill it, but it didn’t. The chilled sake was clean and delicious and worked with all of the flavors presented before us as did the Burgundy.

So, it comes down to this. What do you like to drink?? Go with your personal preferences and see what pairs well. In this case, the classic stereotype and the odd man out both worked amazingly well!! And in the end, we both had an amazing meal!