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When it comes to matching wine with food, you’ve probably heard the general wisdom: white with fish, red with steak. From there, things get complicated — especially when many in the business are now saying there’s really only one rule: Drink What You Like.
This is a seismic change from the Good Old Days, when ordering a pinot grigio with your steak might have gotten you booted from the restaurant. If you can’t go wrong by drinking what tastes good to you (rules be damned) some tips of the trade could still help — especially if you don’t know what you like.
Art Bryan, owner of Chicago’s Red Head Piano Bar, offers 5 things every dude should know about pairing wine with food.
Tip 1
Cooking Counts
The way food is prepared has as much influence on what wine you might enjoy as what the food actually is. Take chicken and pork, for example.
The higher acidity in white wine often works well with foods cooked with oil. If you order chicken or pork that’s been baked or sautéed, you might be better off with a chardonnay.
On the other hand, take that same piece of meat and toss it on the grill. The grilling adds a whole other flavor dimension, making your dish heartier, and may call for a medium-bodied red, such as a pinot noir.
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Hot pan, hot oil = chardonnay
Grilled = light-to-medium red
Tip 2
Special Sauce
As much as cooking is going to change the food/wine dynamic, so will sauces, and will break any notions you had about what you can drink with pasta.
Many people think pasta belongs only to white wine — and if you’ve got a pasta dish made with a rich cream sauce, you might be right. In this case, if chardonnay works for you, the oakier the better. The oakiness will give the wine more flavor, and help it stand up to a meal made with heavy cream.
But change that to a tomato-based sauce (even a tomato cream sauce) and a light, fruity red — be it pinot noir, or sangiovese — may give your taste buds something to write home about.
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Cream sauce = an oaky white
Tomato sauce = a light red
Tip 3
Salad 101
If you’ve got a plate of particularly pungent veggies in front of you (say, anything involving green onion, endive, or parsley), or your greens are covered in a dressing with a vinegar and oil base, you may have the most luck finding a winning combination by going for the most herbaceous white you can find — be it a sauvignon blanc, pinot grigio, chardonnay.
The richer the salad, the richer you may want your wine — even if it takes you across the border to the reds. Toss on some egg, meat, and cheese (say, a Cobb salad) and a pinot noir might make for a better companion.
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Heavy on the veggies = an herbaceous white
Meat and cheese on the greens = go red
Tip 4
Under the Sea
Like salad, you may hesitate ordering red with fish. Yet while there are plenty of seafood dishes that may pair best with a light white wine, you may be surprised that some work best with red.
A light, white fish (such as sole, flounder, haddock, or cod) might match up best with a similarly light white wine (pinot grigio, chardonnay, sauvignon blanc, Chablis, or even a rosé).
Add heartier fish to your plate (say, salmon, sea bass or monkfish), especially when prepared with a tomato-based sauce, and you may find yourself enjoying a pinot noir, sangiovese, or even a merlot.
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Light fish = a light white wine
Hearty, steak-type fish = a fuller-bodied red
Tip 5
Just Desserts
Who doesn’t want dessert first? Not only is it entirely appropriate to start your evening with a sweet, crisp dessert wine, but you can drink much more with dessert than white.
Starting with a sweet wine is a great way to open up your pallet for the dinner ahead, and while some desserts call for your usual suspects (a muscat, for example, or anything that says “late harvest” on it), you may want to keep drinking what you had with your steak.
If your sweet tooth cries out for chocolate, you may find that your glass of that full-bodied cabernet sauvignon needs refilling.
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Just remember: learn by drinking, and you’re never wrong.
