Wine and food pairings that work every time
In our previous article “Guide to classic wine and food pairings” we learned the six basic tastes – acid, fat, bitterness, salt, sweetness and alcohol. Now we learn how to put it all together.
The best way to do this is to remember a few classic combinations that work every time!
Here’s a list of some popular foods and the wines you can drink with them:
Meat
Most meat dishes, especially steak, taste best with full-bodied, acidic wines like Cabernet Sauvignon.
Meats like chicken and pork taste amazing with medium-bodied red wines such as Pinot Noir, which tend to have medium acid and a lighter flavour, as well as rosé or white wines such as Sauvignon Blanc and Chardonnay.
Fish
Most fish tastes great with white wine. Shellfish is especially good with Chardonnay.
Fatty fishes such as tuna, salmon and herring taste heavenly with acidic wines such as Sauvignon Blanc and dry, not sweet, Rieslings.
Italian food
Chianti is the ideal wine to go with pasta that has red sauce and it even tastes fabulous with pizza. Both the wine and the red sauce are acidic, which means that they taste awesome together.
Fried food
If the dish is fried or sautéed in a lot of butter or oil, choose an acidic wine, such as Chianti and Cabernet Sauvignon.
Asian food
Asian food often contains various heavy flavours, salt, and spices. This means that sweet wines such as Rieslings go well with most Asian dishes.
Dessert
Always choose sweet wine, such as Riesling or Moscato, with dessert. If the dessert is made from dark chocolate, you might want to consider a full-bodied red wine such as Cabernet Sauvignon to highlight the flavours of the chocolate.
This guide is by no means complete, but it can give you a head start in understanding what it takes to correctly pair wine with food.
At the end of the day, if you think that a particular wine goes well with something you’re eating, you aren’t wrong! There are no right or wrong answers in marrying food with wine.
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