Camel-meat goulash and a glass of the famed Bordeaux sweet wine Château d’Yquem could well be one of the worst food-and-wine combinations to be found at the restaurants of the Pullman Dubai Downtown hotel next year. The Pullman Hotels & Resorts chain, part of the premium portfolio of the global Accor group, has unveiled a global rebrand and a vision for a future in which, they say, culinary and mixology experiences will be at the very heart of the Pullman experience. As an example they highlighted the experimental bar ritual Unexpected Pairings, which will let guests draw cards from a deck and thereby assemble combinations of food and wine flavours.
Photograph: all.accor.com
This experience redefines the art of mixology and gastronomy, sparking curiosity, conversation and exchange through contrast, discovery and taste, explained the geniuses who dreamed up this eno-gastronomic circus. All of us who, on account of this redefinition – this act of giving things a different (non)sense – will not be travelling to the United Arab Emirates ought to be alarmed by the fact that a hotel of the same group also exists in Buzin near Zagreb. It sits close to the Vukomeričke Gorice vineyards, and perhaps they will offer us a card from a deck of mađarice (Hungarian-style playing cards) to pair traditional krpice sa zeljem (pasta with cabbage) or krvavice (blood sausage) with a predicate wine from the indigenous Dišeća Ranina variety, or one aged on fine lees. And there have indeed been such wines.
Cover photograph: Edson Junior on Unsplash
27.11.2025.
