©2007, The Birmingham Post
Enjoying fine food and wine is one of the great pleasures of life. Leading restaurants throughout the world celebrate the partnership as an indispensable aspect of creating a dining experience for their guests to remember. Great chefs work hand-in-hand with their sommeliers (wine stewards) to discover the perfect marriage.
Their aim is to make the food enhance the wine and vice versa. Such pairings make the sum of the parts greater than the whole; thus 1 + 1 = 3.
There are three logical outcomes to any good-and-wine matching scenario. The first is where the flavour of the food dominates the wine, the second, where the wine overwhelms the food and, finally, where both are in equilibrium. Obviously, it's the final option that we seek to achieve, but following the road-map is not always easy.
The first rule is to think regionally. "If it grows together, it goes together". In other words, "when in Rome, do as the Romans do". It's a traditional approach, but according to some sommeliers, you're half-way to a perfect pairing. Two examples, which immediately spring to mind are Moules Mariniere with a glass of Muscadet, or Spaghetti Bolognese with Chianti. There are countless others.
The second rule is to allow your senses to guide your choice. The adage "serve red with meat and white with fish" places the emphasis on the "protein" element of the dish. This often makes sense, because fish can make a red wine bitter or metallic, and the tannins in red wine cut through the fat in meat. As a rule of thumb, it works better with more simple fare, such as plain meat and two veg, but has limitations.
Today, cuisine tends to be more sophisticated, and with influences from further afield, the primary flavours may come from the sauce, seasoning or cooking technique. In this case, it is more crucial to take the most significant feature of the dish itself, and then compare or contrast it with the most significant feature of the wine.
The most important consideration of the modern approach is to match the weight of the wine to that of the dish. For example, a full-bodied Chateauneuf-du-Pape is ideal with a beef casserole, and a fresh, light salad demands a crisp dry white.
The second factor is flavour intensity. Think of it as the volume control button on your hi-fi. A delicately poached trout has a light flavour, so calls for a wine with a light touch, such as Mosel Riesling, whereas barbecued spare ribs in sweet-and-sour sauce cry out for a full-blown Californian Zinfandel.
The third rule is to balance flavour. There are two approaches, and the first, the safe choice is to look for complementary characters. For example, the gaminess in a young oaked red can mimic well-hung game, and the quince-pear flavours of a sweet Chenin Blanc, from the Loire Valley, can echo the taste of an apple or pear tart.
The second approach is to contrast. When it works, it's sublime, but when it doesn't, it's a disaster. Salt with sweet is exemplified by Roquefort cheese with Sauternes and, surprisingly, a light Asti Spumante can withstand the weight of a heavy Christmas pudding. A rich, acidic Rheingau Riesling is superb with fatty duck or goose.
The basic principles can be refined when pairing with the main four taste characters; sweet, bitter, sour and salt. One can compare savoury dishes with the sweeter elements in the wine, for example, pork and apple or duck and cherry. With desserts, though, the golden rule is to ensure that the wine is as sweet, if not sweeter than the dish.
Bitter foods, such as grills, work with tannin. A grilled chop is ideal with a tannic Bordeaux. Alternatively, bitterness can be contrasted with fruity, full-flavoured wines.
Foods which are sour have high acidity, so demand wines with equal, if not more acidity. That's why Italian reds from Barbera or Sangiovese (Chianti) go so well with tomato-based dishes. Finally, salty foods can be counter-balanced with acidic, sweet or even sparkling wines.
There are other considerations, too. Whilst the tannin in red wine can complement fatty dishes, it can clash with eggs or salt, and can become bitter and metallic with fish. If the meat is on the dry side, such as the white meat from turkey, it can appear drier still. That's why I prefer low tannin Pinot Noir with poultry, to claret.
With toast and vanilla characters, oaky wines tend to work extremely well with the robust flavours of grilled dishes. Yet the buttery characters, particularly of an oaked Chardonnay, make an ideal pairing with buttery and creamy dishes.
The texture and temperature of a dish will also have a bearing. Just as we prefer light, fresh dishes in the heat of summer, and hot, warming dishes in winter, so will our preference for wine. Red Burgundy goes splendidly with roast chicken, but perhaps a Rosé would be more suitable with a chicken salad.
Finally, choose a wine to match the occasion. Fine cuisine demands fine wine. Foie gras is recommended with Sauternes and Lobster with great White Burgundy, but imagine how inappropriate these partnerships are for an al fresco lunch, an event which requires young, immediate fruity flavours, to combine with the more simple fare.
My acknowledgements to "What to Drink with What You Eat", by Karen Page and Andrew Dornenburg, an American husband-and-wife team, both passionate about pairing food and wine. (Bullfinch Press ISBN 978.0.8212.5718.0).