My grandfather’s grandfather invented kippers. The family tradition is that if he had not sold the patent for his method of making smoked herrings to Woodgers of Newcastle-upon-Tyne in northeastern England for 200 pounds, we might all have been rich beyond the dreams of creosote. Imagine a penny-a-fish royalty on every kipper consumed on the Flying Scotsman by an Agatha Christie hero fleeing northwards, and the ching soon starts to add up.
Great-great grandfather cut a swathe through the 19th century. There is a daguereotype photo showing him with full set of Victorian whiskers and a long-stemmed “churchwarden” clay pipe. He served on the ship on which Napoleon was carried off to his final exile on the island of Saint Helena, he had a son called Elijah, and his wife is said to have been the first person ever to own a steam trawler.
All of which probably explains my lifelong predilection for smoked fish. Proper kippers are not easy to get in the Twin Cities, but it is a truth which deserves a wider currency that a certain well-known chain of bagel shops will sell you a side or packet of pretty good smoked salmon for a pretty good price, and they sometimes have specials around Christmas.
A lifelong taste for smoked fish naturally precipitates a lifelong search for good wine to go with it. The wine must, of course, be white, light enough to allow the taste of the fish to come through, strong enough in the nose to blend with the smoke, and sufficiently acid to cut into the oils which are meant to be so good for you and some say were the secret of the braininess of Jeeves, the perfect gentleman’s personal gentleman.
Much of the pleasure of such a search comes from trying. When you set out for Ithaca, pray that the way be long, as the Greek poet puts it. But there is one spot on this quest, inexpensive and consistently pleasing, to which I find myself returning regularly. It is Rosemount Chardonnay, all the way from Australia, a fine masculine wine with a powerful flavor, consistent enough to suggest to one lady drinker the persistent charm of honeysuckle. Certainly it has nose enough for the smoky taste of kippers, and strong road-holding qualities on the palate. It is generally available for less than $10 a bottle, and there is not a headache in a hogshead of it.
Australian wine has come a long way in the last generation. The crimes formerly committed under the label “Australian Burgundy”—once satirized as Chateau Downunder—are a thing of the distant past. Wines like Rosemount Chardonnay taste good. They have to; it is a fact that Australians drink twice as much wine per head as inhabitants of the United States. They also sell well; Rosemount is the largest selling brand of white wine in Australia.
In England, where it has been popular for nearly 20 years, “strine wine” has a reputation for reliability. California wine-makers penetrated the British market a few years earlier than the Australians, but got off to a poor start by selling there the lesser products of that great state, notable mostly for their fancy carafes and strong aroma of burnt matches. The Aussies must have guessed they would lose money underestimating the taste of the Great British Public; theirs is wine which no one could dislike. I will back Rosemount Chardonnay against kippers and smoked salmon any time. Only those who spend Christmas Eve at Ingebretsen’s on Lake Street will be able to say if it can stand up to lutefisk.
Oliver Nicholson is a classicist at the University of Minnesota, and former Secretary of the Wine Committee at Wolfson College, Oxford.
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