In times of financial constraints and consciousness of health, younger consumers are finding novel ways of recreation. Sooner than shell out for a full meal, or spend an evening drinking, some are sampling the delights of wine with ice cream.
It may sound counterintuitive, as conventional wisdom holds that a wine should be sweeter than the pudding it accompanies. This is easily accomplished when eating cheese; it’s less so with a concoction comprising, at base, milk, cream and sugar. Yet a trend appears to be emerging where ice-cream parlours pair their offerings with wine; or perhaps it is wine bars who are branching into ice cream. Regardless, the combination is flourishing online and in chic establishments in London and Paris.
• Wine and ice cream, the pairing that has Gen Z going wild
The juice of fermented grapes has been relished since antiquity. So has ice cream. Alexander the Great was reputedly partial to ices mixed with honey and nectar. But the treatment of ice cream as a pudding is distinctively modern, coincident with the invention of commercial freezing techniques. Ice cream is savoury as well as sugary.
There are many varieties in what is thought to be the first book devoted entirely to ice cream, L’Art de bien faire les glaces d’office; ou Les vrais principes pour congeler tous les rafraîchissements (1768), by a chef known as Emy. There are recipes for ice cream made with rye bread (compare to today’s brown-bread ice cream) and with truffles (fungi, rather than chocolate). The master chef Auguste Escoffier, who adapted traditional French cuisine to modernity, was famed among much else for his asparagus ice cream.
Light and medium-bodied fruity wines, such as pinot noir, would in principle be well-suited as an accompaniment to such delicacies. The pairing should be sampled, even by the sceptical, at least once in a lifetime.
