Even if you are not a vegetarian you are going to want to read this entire post. First off, you can easily follow the recipe and use chicken. Second, you can also pick and choose from three different sauces.
Sweet & Sour, Orange or Lemon
Lastly, I will give you a fantastic wine pairing. Your taste buds will want to have this pairing on speed dial.
As the title suggests this recipe is vegetarian. My vegiversary ( the anniversary of when I became a vegetarian)is coming up in January. I stopped eating meat 8 years ago when I was pregnant with my daughter. Her Plants has been a vegetarian for 28 years. Dave and I were chatting a couple of weeks ago about cravings. I asked if he was ever tempted to eat meat at any time during the last 28 years. He said that he kind of wanted some turkey at Thanksgiving way back, but that was it. I on the other hand, get tempted by something so horrible I hesitate to say. Here it is, my dirty dark secret craving: Chinese chicken balls. It doesn’t happen very often and I’m not interested in actual chicken. It’s the Chinese part. The sauce bit, and the gooey dough.
I have found a way to make a Vegetarian version that is so finger licking delicious it should be illegal. In fact, I think vegetarians and chicken eaters everywhere are going to write poetry in my honor once they’ve tried this recipe and the wine paring. Your life is about to change forever! Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Ok, now let’s talk wine. In 2005, I worked as a winemaker’s assistant at a charming winery in Beamsville, Ontario called Angel’s Gate. I got to work on a wine called Süssreserve Riesling. Süssreserve is a German term that literally means sweet reserve. The technique of adding back a portion of unfermented Riesling grape juice to the wine after fermentation was developed in Germany but resurrected at Angel’s Gate. The Süssreserve adds natural acidity and creates a wonderful complexity to go with the wine’s racy minerality.
If you don’t have access to this wine be on the lookout for an off-dry Riesling from Germany or even New York State. Ask your wine merchant for a wine that has less than 18g/l of residual sugar. You want a wine with some sweetness, to match the recipe but you also need enough acidity to balance this whole food and wine experience.
Let me know if you have any questions or comments, as always I ‘d love to hear from you. Cheers in Love and Wine, Kellie.
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