Pairing: Wine of the Week, Siduri 2016 Santa Lucia Highlands Rosella's Vineyard Pinot Noir, soars with mushrooms

Our Wine of the Week, Siduri 2016 Santa Lucia Highlands Rosella's Vineyard Pinot Noir ($60), is suave, elegant and pretty, as pinot noir from this appellations typically is.

High fruit and floral notes suggest cranberry, pomegranate and Queen Anne cherry, which rise above a silken foundation with threads of black pepper, dried thyme and licorice root.

Acidity balances the wine and keeps you coming back for another sip. If you called it a knockout, you wouldn't be exaggerating.

Like all well-made pinot noir, this lovely wine is infinitely food friendly. It shares a quality found in black pepper: It can engage with a wide range of foods and flavors, retain its own character and never grow cloying.

And although you will enjoy the wine with almost anything that isn't too spicy or sour, certain foods will encourage the wine to soar. Rare lamb, rare duck, black olives, seared tuna, roasted beets, toasted pecans and wild salmon are all outstanding matches.

Add a bit of bacon, and the match is even better; the wine is astonishingly good with a classic spaghetti Carbonara.

Mushrooms are among the best matches of all, especially maitake, black chanterelle and Gourmet Mushroom's Trumpet Royale. Mushroom risotto, mushroom bread pudding, mushroom strudel and mushroom-bacon ragout over creamy polenta are delicious matches.

Today's recipe is inspired by the season's black chanterelles and by bread soup, which is so welcome in cold, rainy weather.

Serves 6 to 8 as a first course, 3 to 5 as a main course

4 tablespoons butter, bacon fat or olive oil

1 large or 2 medium yellow onions, cut into small dice

3 to 4 garlic cloves, minced

- Kosher salt

- Black pepper in a mill

8 ounces specialty mushrooms, preferably maitake or black chanterelles, broken into bite-sized pieces

3/4 cup dry white wine

8 cups homemade stock (chicken, duck or mushroom)

1 bay leaf

3 tablespoons chopped fresh Italian parsley

1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves

5-6 cups sturdy hearth bread, torn into small pieces

6 ounces (1½ cups) grated cheese, such as St. George, Vella Mezzo-Secco, Fontina or similar cheese

Put the butter or olive oil into a medium saucepan or soup pot set over medium-low heat, add the onions, and sauté until very soft and fragrant; do not let the onions brown. Add the garlic and sauté 2 minutes more. Season with salt and pepper.

Add the mushrooms, turn to coat them with butter, and add the white wine. Increase the heat to medium and simmer until the mushrooms begin to soften and the wine is nearly completely reduce.

Pour in the stock, add the bay leaf, stir and simmer gently for about 15 minutes. Taste, correct for salt and pepper and stir in the Italian parsley and thyme. Stir in the bread, remove from the heat, cover and let rest15 minutes.

To serve, use tongs to remove and discard the bay leaf. If the soup seems too thick, stir in about ½ to ¾ cup water and heat through.

Ladle into soup bowls or soup plates, top with cheese and enjoy right away.

Michele Anna Jordan is the author of 24 books to date, including “The Good Cook's” series. Email her at michele@micheleannajordan.com.