Smoked salmon always makes an appearance in our house around Christmas time. It might be a couple of slices with a little brown bread and butter before a more substantial meal or may be served as canapés with a glass of wine on Christmas day.
Sometimes I’ll make a pasta sauce with ribbons of smoked salmon and cream with freshly snipped chives and dill and we nearly always have fish on Christmas Eve, often including some smoked salmon in a smoky fish pie, rich and comforting.
Dry sparkling wines are the obvious choice if you are serving smoked salmon canapés. Choose something light and fresh in style with lots of citrus flavour. It acts like a squeeze of lemon and lifts the flavours both complementing them and providing a contrast to the oiliness of the fish.
Living in Anjou we’ll reach for a Crémant de Loire, one that has not spent too much time resting on its yeasty deposit so it retains all the zesty freshness that we are looking for. Our ‘go to’ Crémant for an aperitif is Leduc Frouin’s which is a blend of Chenin Blanc and Chardonnay.
Other areas of France also make Crémants (Alsace, Bordeaux and Limoux for example) or you could splash out on a bottle of Champagne or even a bottle of sparkling wine from the UK (which is making some top quality but expensive sparkling wines these days).
I like a still wine if I’m serving smoked salmon as a starter. We recently enjoyed a bottle of Arnaud Lambert’s Clos David 2010 that would have been the perfect pairing. This Chenin comes from a north facing site in the village of Brézé and has incredible tension and acidity. Despite being 8 years old it retained a beautiful freshness and vivacity that was almost mouthwatering.
I would switch grape varieties if serving it with a rich creamy sauce. A Chardonnay that has had some time in oak (not new) would be a lovely match. It could be a classic white Burgundy or you could look further afield to a Chardonnay from Australia or Argentina.
