Joining in the celebrations during this the ninth International Sherry Week, Ekstedt at the Yard put together a special set pairing menu matching dishes highlighting the Scandinavian cooking techniques of Michelin-starred chef Niklas Ekstedt with four of Lustau’s top-flight Almacenista sherries.
The menu kicks off with one of Ekstedt’s signature dishes from his Stockholm restaurant where everything is cooked entirely using charcoal, smoke and ‘natural heat’ — oyster flambadou with smoked apple and beurre blanc nasturtium – which is paired with a Manzanilla Pasada de Sanlucar (Almacenista Manuel Cuevas Jurado).
In this, his first venture outside of Stockholm, the focus is also on wood-fired cooking which lends itself well to the savoury, nutty flavours of these long-aged sherries that are produced in tiny quantities.
The smokiness really comes out in a dish of birch flamed chanterelles with black truffle, caramelised cream and flambadou lobster, this is matched (set against) with a very concentrated, rich and deliciously complex Palo Cortado (Almacenista Cayetano del Pino y Cia).
Ekstedt’s head sommelier Klearhos Kanellakis, formerly of 67 Pall Mall before he joined the team here, says this tasting menu of sherries is a first for them and a one-off. However, he is looking do more of these wine evenings in the future and this particular pairing of chanterelles and lobster with Palo Cortado (a sherry that already features in their decent by the glass offering (£12) — is something he’d like to feature to open up customers’ eyes to the rich possibilities that fine sherry offers, matched with their style of food.
Sherry’s food friendliness is also something which Lustau brand ambassador Federico Sánchez-Pece Salmerón is keen to promote. Introducing the wines and explaining to the mix of trade and paying customers, that Lustau is the shipper of these wines, buying and ageing small stocks of Sherry (often just a few barrels) from independent sherry artisans, ‘Almacenistas’ and bottling a small range of these authentic wines unblended, thus preserving this tradition and giving consumers access to these rare and genuine wine treasures. This pairing menu was put together with the help of Lenka Sedlackova MW.
Ekstedt at the Yard is part of the 153-room five-star Great Scotland Yard Hotel which first opened in 2019 after a £75m revamp of the former Metropolitan Police Headquarters.
