MEMORIES of Easter Sunday in Connecticut, the United States, are still fresh in my mind, especially the wonderful smells of fresh flowers and roasted meats emanating from the kitchen. Easter in our home was all about the family, food, wines and the celebration of rebirth.

Easter Sunday was the official start of spring and all the optimism and new life it brings. Of course, as kids we participated in Easter egg hunts and consumed copious amount of chocolate.

One of the most important decisions for my father each Easter was to pair the bounty of dishes to be served with the appropriate wines. He usually chose three or four different wines depending on the dishes. In my column this week I'll introduce some of the most popular Easter foods and pair them with ideal wine companions.

Roasted ham

In the US, roasted ham has become one of the most popular Easter dishes. Long ago before there was refrigeration, pigs were often slaughtered in the fall when the animals were fat and the meat that wasn't consumed fresh was usually cured. The cured hams were ready to be enjoyed right about the time of Easter and over the years it became a tradition to roast a large ham for the Easter meal.

Today many hams are prepared with a sweet glaze to offset the saltiness of the meat but this also makes them a challenge to pair with wines. The most reliable wines to pair with glazed hams are good German or Washington State Rieslings or Gewurztraminers. Both these varieties make aromatic wines that have ample fresh fruit flavors with enough sweetness balance the saltiness of the ham while not being overwhelmed by the sweet glaze.

Hogue Cellars and Chateau Ste Michelle are two Washington State producers that offer flavorful Rieslings and Gewurztraminer wines that will embellish the best of Easter hams. An unoaked Chardonnay also works well with glazed ham as long as the glazing isn't too sweet and if you must have a red, then I suggest a California Zinfandel with a fruity and slightly spicy character.

Lamb

Lamb of almost any kind is one of the perfect and versatile meats to enjoy with a good red wine. Technically, lamb is meat from sheep that are less than a year old. Some of the best lamb I've tasted is from Europe, often only four to six weeks old, with Scotland, northern Spain, central and southern Italy and Pauillac, France, all having some of the best lamb in the world.

In the US, the state of Colorado also has excellent lamb. In Shanghai, lamb from New Zealand or Australia can be quite good and the lamb from the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region is getting better and better. But no true gourmet would ever experience a beautiful lamb dish without a rich and generous red wine.

Older or more gamey lamb or mutton is best with a full-bodied wine with good ripeness like a Shiraz from Barossa in Southern Australia. The generous fruit of these wines nicely covers or mitigates the pungency of the lamb while the savory blend of pepper, brambles and other titillating aromas and flavors add flavor dimensions to the meat.

Younger lamb with its softer texture and more subtle flavor is perfect with a Spanish Tempranillo red wine. The fruit of the wine embellishes the flavors of lamb dishes while the tannins cleanse the palate and facilitate digestion. Your wine also need to have a finish that endures as long as the flavor of lamb in your palate. Top Rioja wines like Marques de Riscal Rioja Riserva, Sierra Cantabria Rioja Reserva and Muga Rioja Reserva all make perfect partners to baby lamb.

Chocolate

As they are two of my favorite things in the world, I've written extensively over the years on pairing chocolate with wines. Because there are so many different styles of chocolate there are also a wide range of wines that can be successfully matched with chocolates.

A beautifully feminine approach solution is to enjoy a sweet Italian sparkling wine Moscato d'Asti with delicately white chocolate or milk chocolate. The subtle sweet flavors of the wine complement rather than overwhelm the equally subtle flavors of the chocolate. The perfume-like aromas of the Moscato wine and sweet chocolates will please the nose while the gentle bubbles and pleasant acidic finish of the wine offset the creaminess of the white and milk chocolates leaving your palate refreshed.

Two Moscato wines from top Piedmont producers that you can readily find in Shanghai are the Michele Chiarlo, Moscato d'Asti and Pio Cesare, Moscato d'Asti.

Serious chocolate connoisseurs often prefer dark chocolate with a high percentage of cocoa. These intensely flavored often slightly bitter chocolates are less sweet than white or milk chocolates and therefore can be enjoyed with less sweet wines like the heady and fruity red wines such as Californian Zinfandels or Italian Amarones.

Over a century ago the famed French oenologist Emile Peynaud proved that alcohol itself tastes sweet and heightens the sensations of sweetness in a wine. Therefore it's no surprise that these very fruity Californian Zins or Italain Amarone red wines with 15 percent or higher alcohol provide the necessary sensations of sweet fruitiness to pair well with gourmet dark chocolate.

The smooth tannins in the wines also tend to pleasantly accentuate the slightly bitter or even spicy nature of some dark chocolates providing even more pleasing stimulations to the palate. To optimize your dark chocolate experience, I suggest trying Amarone wines from the reputed Veneto producers Zonin and Masi as well as one of the premium Zinfandels from the specialist California producer Seghesio.

Fortified wines are also marvelous with chocolates. Sweet Sherry or Port are fortified wines that have between 18-22 percent alcohol and they offer the broadest range of synergistic pairings with the widest range of chocolates. Even the bitterest dark chocolates with very high cocoa percentages won't overwhelm these Iberian stalwarts.

A good sweet fortified wine has the power and generous fruitiness as well as the persistence to stand up and to sooth the most extreme chocolate sensations.

Many chocolates also have dried fruits or nuts in them and these ingredients have long been the preferred partners of sweet Sherry or Port wines.

Recommended wines include the very budget-worthy Graham's Fine Ruby and if you want to splurge a bit more try the Graham's 10-or 20-Year-Old Tawny.

Two superb, yet also remarkably great-value, Sherries are the sweet Lustau East India Sherry and even sweeter Pedro Ximenez San Emilio Solera Reserva. Both when paired with chocolate make a wonderful ending to a perfect Easter feast.