Wine with Food
FINDING THE RIGHT WINE TO MATCH WITH DIFFERENT CUISINES AND FLAVOURS IS BOTH AN ART AND A SCIENCE, BUT IS A LOT EASIER THAN YOU MAY THINK WITH SOME KNOWLEDGE OF THE BASICS. TAKE THE GUESSWORK OUT OF YOUR NEXT PAIRING WITH THESE SIMPLE TIPS.
When it comes to pairing and matching wine with food, the goal is to create a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts; elevating your enjoyment by enhancing the flavour of the food, the flavour of the wine, or both.
The first rule to remember is that there are no rules: eat and drink what you enjoy most! Understanding the flavours that make up a varietal, however, and overlaying them with the varietal’s taste profile (determined by its acidity, tannins, dryness or sweetness and body) will help you develop greater insight into your favourite food and wine pairings and how they complement each other.
These principles have informed every pairing you’ll find suggested in this book.
THE ELEMENTS OF WINE
While our tastebuds can only truly capture four sensations – bitter, salty, sour and sweet – our nose can detect and discern thousands of different scents, which lets us taste hundreds of distinct food flavour nuances.
Your senses are your first key to unlocking the full enjoyment of wine. Swirl your glass to open up its aromas, take a deep inhale, and sip your wine. Hold it in your mouth and let it hit all the parts of your tongue, so you can get a fuller picture of the flavours present in the wine. Here’s how those flavours typically present to your palate:
Primary flavours
Grape-derived characters including fruit, flowers and/or herbs.
Secondary flavours
Fermentation-related characters such as cream, bread, mushroom or butter, as well as any oak and/or winemaking artefact.
Tertiary flavours
Characters that develop through ageing and oxidisation, including vanilla, nuttiness, coffee and tobacco, plus sweetness and caramel notes, lanolin and leather.
Often, wine flavours will express themselves as an amalgam of qualities. For instance, lemon and sugar notes can present together as lemonade, or caramel and coffee imparting a toffee character.
In Divine Unions, we’re focusing on Australian wine profiles, which can differ from their overseas counterparts in flavour due to our local terroir and climate. Our wine-first approach to pairing is intended to give you all the information necessary to find a great match not only for the recipes within these pages, but for most any meal you may wish to prepare and share with family and friends.
Varietal Taste Profiles
SWEETNESS
Not to be confused with fruitiness, sweetness refers to residual sugar left over from the grape juice following fermentation, and is most commonly associated with white varietals. It can also refer to how ripe the grapes were when picked, and is detected by the tastebuds at the front of your tongue.The less sweet a wine is, the more it moves into the dry category, including mediumdry and off-dry categorisations.
Sweetness
From bone dry to very sweet.
Sugar
Fruitiness
Sweet Spices
Acidity
Tannins
ACIDITY
How ‘tart’ a wine is relates to its acidity, which can be assessed by how much it makes your mouth water or ‘pucker’. It’s why white wines are often categorised as crisp and refreshing. Low levels of acidity make wine feel ‘flabby’ in the mouth.Too much acidity, on the other hand, can leave it tasting sour. Acidity tends to be higher in lighter-bodied wines, adds length, and helps build a wine’s structure and potential for ageing.
Acidity
Degree of tartness, crispness, or zest.
When done right
Refreshing
Tart
Zesty
Fresh
When gone wrong
Dull
Flat
Sour
Sharp
BODY
The ‘body’ of a wine refers to its mouthfeel (or its viscosity), and how intense its flavours are. Often referred to as the ‘weight’ of the wine, a full-bodied wine has a notable thickness, and will coat the sides of the wine glass when swirled.The more lighter-bodied a wine is, the more alike it is to water in terms of how it ‘feels’ in the mouth. Medium-bodied wines fall naturally somewhere in the middle.
Body
How heavy or light a wine feels in your mouth.
Tannins
Sweetness
Alcohol
Acidity
Carbonation
TANNINS
Tannin is sourced from the skins, seeds and stalks of grapes.They impart a subtle bitter flavour but their major influence is on the texture or mouthfeel of a wine. Smooth, soft, rough or chewy are terms that describe a wines tannin profile.As a rule, the darker a wine, the more tannin it has, and the bolder it tastes.While white wines have small amounts of tannin, their structure is largely the result of acidity.
Tannins in red wine
Bitter, grippy and drying sensation in wine.
Thick skin grape
Longer maceration
Oak ageing
Younger wine
Key pairing principles
The overarching goal with any wine and food pairing is to achieve balance, where the wine and food work in harmony without one overpowering the other. Consider the following combinations to find a balance that suits your palate best.
SAME + SAME
Try to match the weight and intensity of your wine with foods of comparable depth and flavour: light-bodied wine + light dish, full-bodied wine + heavy dish.The same applies to textures and flavours: earthy wine + earthy food, etc.
OPPOSITES + OPPOSITES
Alternatively, aim to create contrasts. The crisp acidity of a white wine balances a creamy sauce to refresh the palate, for instance. Or, pair a dish with simple flavours with a complex wine to enhance the overall flavour experience.
ACID + ACID
Foods that are high in acidity require a wine similarly high in acid, or full-bodied enough to complement its effect on mouthfeel and flavour, to enhance the food’s natural acidity. If it’s a low-acidity dish, a squeeze of lemon with it can create balance with an acidic wine.
HEAT + SWEET...
Spicy dishes can accentuate the tannins and alcohol in red wines, intensifying the heat of the food – choose more fruit-forward reds that are lower in alcohol instead.
...AND SWEET + SWEET
If your dish is sweet, your wine should be at least as sweet, or sweeter than what it’s being paired with.
TANNINS + FAT
Fats act to soften the intensity of tannins, resulting in a smoother, softer mouthfeel. Protein and fat in meat also help balance tannins, bringing out the fruit in the wine and the savoury characters of your chosen cut.
ACID + FAT
While fat adds richness to food, how it coats the tastebuds can make it harder to perceive the nuances in delicate wines. Matching rich, fatty foods with wines high in acidity helps make food feel less heavy, cleansing the palate and whetting your appetite for more!
SALT + ACID
Salt tends to magnify most flavours and tastes, and makes a great partner to wines with high levels of acidity. Be mindful of pairing salty food with wines high in tannins or oak, as they may clash unpleasantly and amplify the alcohol flavours present in your wine.
Other considerations
Match the wine with your food’s most prominent element
Fine-tune your wine pairing by identifying the dominant aspect of your dish: the sauce or seasonings used, for example; and matching around that, rather than its main ingredient.
Be mindful of the cooking method
How your meal is cooked can help determine your pairing. Full-bodied reds are great with barbequed and slow-cooked foods, light whites with grilled and poached foods, for instance.
What grows together, goes together!
Time-tested combinations are a great place to start exploring wine and food matches: think French varietals with French food, or Italian varietals for Mediterranean dishes.The same applies locally, with pairings like Hunter Valley-produced Shiraz and beef a prime example.
The flavour experiences made possible by pairing wine with food are infinite. Sharing and enjoying them with people you care about is one of the richest, most rewarding pursuits available to anyone who appreciates the impact that sense and taste can have on life. From all at Selector and from our good friends in the world of Australian food, we wish you a delicious journey.
Paul Diamond, Selector Publisher