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What to Drink with Dinner

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Posted By: chefkyle24 | March 24, 2010 | 2 comments

One of the most identifiable crazes in the culinary world today is food and wine pairing.  To the novice foodie/wine enthusiast, many wine tasting menus may as well be Egyptian hieroglyphs telling stories of Horus the sun god. It seems everyone is jumping on the craze and it is probably one of the few trends to continue to stay with us.  As food becomes more intricate, and vintners continue to make untraditional blends. How does one make any sense out of this without devoting a lifetime to the study of food and wine? To understand how to make any sense out of all this food and wine mumbo jumbo, we must look at the history of food and wine pairings, the regions indigenous ingredients and then compare them to today’s  menus and list of worldwide ingredients that are readily available at any time.

For centuries, wine connoisseurs have been pairing wines with food.  Wine pairing was extremely straight forward  a few hundred years ago.  For example, because of Germany’s climate, soil, and grape type, they tend to produce many sweet grapes, resulting in sweet wines.  This is a great pairing for the charcuterie and spiced sausages that they would produce. Not to mention the cabbage and vinegars used in their cooking, the sweet wines brought balance to the food.

If we look at Italy for example, home of the ever popular “Pinot Grigio”, we will see that the light lemony characteristics go great with southern Italian cuisine, lots of seafood (fish, shellfish, octopus), the tomato based sauces and pastas, as well as many of the soft cheeses produced in the area, primarily goat’s cheese.

In Spain, the cuisine has more spiciness to the food, as well as a large amount of earthy flavors, and North African influence, lending the wines to be more spicy, earthy and dry.

France, with their delicate flavors, and many complex food pairings lends an open door for many of France’s most famous grapes (Chardonnay and Pinot Noir) to showcase their best qualities when paired with food.

So, what does this mean? I can only drink Spanish wine with Spanish food?  Not hardly! This does help, if you are going for a more authentic wine tasting, however food and wine interact in so many ways- the flavors they create are entirely opinional.  I have seen people drink Merlot with a Hog Snapper Francaise (lemon butter sauce) and as a chef, I would never even dream of doing that. However, the people loved it. Perhaps they had the palate of the backside of a cow, or the genuinely enjoyed it…either way they were happy and paid their bill so I can’t complain!

Wine has many components to the flavors that it produces.  It all starts with the grape variety. Is it a Chardonnay, Zinfandel, Pinot Noir, Pinot Grigio, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, etc? Is it a blend? Is it a classification such as a Bordeaux and you have no idea what that means?

There are an immense number of rules for wines. What they can and cannot be classified as, and this differs from country to country.  So we will focus on the basics.

Wine produces “base flavors” such as acidic, dry, spicy, sweet, earthy.  In any one wine, you will be able to pick out scents and flavors that you will recognize (such as apricot, grapefruit, strawberry, lemon, oak, butter, cigar, ash, etc.) However, those are the 5 main “base flavors”. Why and how does wine produce these “base flavors?” It all depends on the grape and the process, but the juice and the fermentation process create acidity and alcohol. Depending on whether or not the skins are in the wine during fermentation and if they are, for how long will decide on the amount of tannins, or dryness/spice /earthy characteristics the wine has. Also, the time that the grape was picked will decide on its sweetness, or sugar content.  The later a grape is left on the vine, the more sugar it builds, resulting in a sweeter wine. In contrast, if the grape is picked immature, it will be highly acidic and not sweet at all. Not to mention the aging process, and if they were aged in oak barrels, or stainless steel barrels.

White wines generally produce lighter and more delicate flavors then red wines do. Therefore, they should be drank with light and delicate foods such as chicken, fish, vegetables, risottos, etc.  Now this is where it gets interesting.  It all depends now from this point on the technique used to cook the food and the seasonings/sauce/ side dish that accompany the meal.

Red wines produce drier, robust flavors. They should be drank with heavier foods such as red meats, stews, and heavier/earthy vegetable and starch sides.

It all depends on the individual; there is not too many right or wrong answers.  However there are guidelines and here are a few:

1. Red wines generally pair better with hard cheeses, white wines with soft cheeses

2. Pinot Noir is the red wine for a white wine drinker.  It can be paired with seafood, as it is amongst the lightest and fruitiest red wine. However, I do recommend Pinot Noir being paired with a heavy/oily fish, such as tuna, salmon, swordfish, or sea bass

3. If a dish has a spicy undertones, go for a more earthy wine such as a Malbec

4. Zinfandels tend to have a slightly sweeter/spicy side (compared to Merlot and Cabs), which allows them to pair well with Italian style food with tomato sauces, game, and cheeses.

5. Mushrooms pair well with red or white. My favorite is Chardonnay full of oak, or a nice earthy Cabernet.

6. When earthy herbs are used go with a mild wine, that will bring out the flavors of the earthiness such as a Malbec, or Merlot

7. When a seafood dish has a lemon butter based sauce, please try a Pinot Grigio, or an un-oaked Chardonnay. A traditional will do the trick, but give it a shot.

8. If the dish is more tropical, throw a Sauvignon Blanc into the mix and see what happens.

9. Champagne with Oysters and Caviar, that is the one thing you should never veer away from!

These guidelines should help you to begin your wine and food pairing process, figure out from here what you like, and go for it!  The key is to enjoy the  food, the wine, and the company! Cheers!

1. 

   Aaron Van Gossen March 25, 2010 at 8:29 pm

   What a great article. Excellent advice for the wine novice. I did a wine tasting of ice wines and sweet German wines paired with Thai food. Awesome pairing. I’ve also heard Champagne goes well with, believe it or not, popcorn. The sweetness of the Champagne compliments the saltiness of popcorn very well. But baked Brie and Champagne was our favorite holiday treat.

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