Kokova Magazine

The renowned Ambrette restaurants in Margate and Rye have announced the return of their popular gourmet wine tasting evenings, in conjunction with the Cranbrook-based wine and cheese merchants, Perfect Partners.

Wine and food connoisseurs have three dates to chose from, all Sundays: 27th January, 12th May and Sunday 8th September 2013, beginning at 7pm.

Acclaimed chef patron Dev Biswal will be serving a six course tasting menu with matched wines chosen by Perfect Partners co-owner Richard Clarke at £49.99.

The Ambrette is hoping to dispel the myth that you cannot drink wine with Indian food and that beer is the preferred accompaniment. Matching the right wine with the right flavours is simply a matter of chemistry.

Dev Biswal grew up in Calcutta and trained at the Dubai Sheraton before moving to London at the age of twenty-six in 2003 for spells at Mangoes and Eriki.

He became a partner in The Indian Princess in Margate in December 2006, becoming patron and re-branding it as The Ambrette in 2010.

The reason why wines do not pair well with a curry from your local take-away is because most of these curries are highly flavoured with cooked onion and garlic containing sulphur compounds such as allicin, diallyl disulphide and diallyl trisulphide.

These clash harshly with the taste molecules present in most wines.

Dev Biswal

Richard Clarke, studied Mechanical Engineering at Cambridge University, but was enticed into the food and wine trade with Jacksons of Piccadilly in 1972 as buyer of French cheeses, then wines, because of his rudimentary French gained from having spent a month working on a farm in Normandy.

At Jacksons, Clarke was mentored by their wine consultant Harry Waugh, one of the first Masters of Wine and director of Chateau Latour, one of the great wines of Bordeaux.

In 1988 Richard and his wife Rosemary bought Perfect Partners, Cheese & Wine Merchants of Cranbrook.

The quality of most wines worldwide has improved hugely, but they still demand rigorous selection - some of the traditional wine regions disappoint, but the new areas astound at great value. Our philosophy is to find quality wines, irrespective of label or country, that represent good examples of their grape variety and provenance at a fair price.

Richard Clarke, co owner of Perfect Partners

Dev Biswal will feature on BBC Radio 4's Food Programme on Sunday 3rd February. The programme reports on how many senior citizens are eschewing traditional Sunday roasts, in favour of fine Indian dining, taking advantage of The Ambrette's Senior Privilege Card, entitling them to 2-for-1 lunchtime dining.

Dev will also be seen giving money saving tips on two series of Channel 4 TV's 'Supercrimpers Challenge' being broadcast in February and March.

In one of the programmes Dev shows a pensioner how to prepare a gourmet 3three-course meal for six people for less than £20. The starter is a nutritious nettle soup, foraged from her garden.
www.theambrette.co.uk