A chef and a Master Sommelier serve up the perfect pairing

The Menu

• Jumbo shrimp cocktail with guava-horseradish cocktail sauce

• Grilled mahi-mahi over a crimini mushroom risotto with thyme and agave-nectar-glazed baby carrots finished with a cilantro-lime aioli

• Cassava, calabaza and coconut pone with a rum-infused tembleque, spiced grilled pineapple and mango, banana caramel sauce and dasheen crisps

The Wines

I’d love to serve Seghesio 2011 Arneis, Russian River Valley, Sonoma, California (seghesio.com, $24) with Chef Ryan’s first course. Arneis is indigenous to the Roero hills in the northwest corner of the Piedmont region and translates to “little rascal.” In California, it was a rarity until the Seghesio family planted their first Arneis vines in 1992.

For his grilled mahi-mahi and crimini mushroom risotto, Sattler 2010 Zweigelt, Burgenland, Austria (erichsattler.at, $19) would work beautifully. Zweigelt, a hybrid of St. Laurent and Blaufränkisch, is a red wine grape variety developed in Austria by Fritz Zweigelt in 1922. Cloudy Bay 2008 Late Harvest Riesling, Marlborough, New Zealand (cloudybay.co.nz, $25, half bottle) is a great choice for Chef Ryan’s dessert course. The fruit for the Late Harvest Riesling was handpicked in small bunches to ensure that the botrytised grapes were intact. The full flavor and richness of these grapes was extracted by a two-month fermentation and then aged for eight months on its lees. The result is a gorgeous wine with aromas of honeysuckle, quince paste, mandarin and lemon rind. The flavors are rich and well balanced with notes of ripe mango, papaya, lime and pink-grapefruit marmalade on the long, luscious finish.

Ryan Brown

South Florida native and yacht chef Ryan Brown, started working in restaurants at age 16. He graduated from the Florida Culinary Institute and honed his skills as a line cook and sous chef at 32 East in Delray Beach. Brown then opened the Latin/Caribbean restaurant Sol Kitchen, also in Delray, but in 2006, he decided to get into yachting and has never looked back. These days you will find him freelancing on M/Y Murphy’s Law. He usually lets the region dictate the menu. “Spiny lobsters can be every bit as good as Maine lobsters,” he says, “especially when grilled and basted with lime and butter on a beach.”

Virginia Philip

One of only 204 professionals worldwide to hold the title of Master Sommelier,Virginia Philip knows wine inside and out. Her discerning palate and encyclopedic knowledge also earned her the American Sommelier Association’s title of “Best Sommelier of the United States.” At The Breakers Palm Beach, Philip oversees the beverage selection of the resort’s nine restaurants and bars and 14 wine lists. She owns Virginia Philip Wine Shop & Academy in West Palm Beach, a great place to please and train your palate.