Wine and Food Matching – fact or fantasy?

The bad old days of white meat white wine and red meat red wine are long gone, (which is just as well or I would never be able to eat fish or chicken. J )Now people generally eat and drink whatever combinations they enjoy with no recriminations or criticism.

There are some great traditional matches; my favourite is a big red (or Vintage Port,) some strong cheese, fresh bread rolls and fruit. No matter what the cheese or red, this combination seems to work well, but what about more scientific matching.

Frequently in wine reviews and magazines you see some interesting comments and suggestions. For example, “this wine will be ideally suited to the ligaments of the left knee cap from the spotted hair nosed doe doe bird which has been poached in Italian truffles and juice of yellow pomegranates which have been glazed with honey from the endangered short winged Antarctic Wasp. Get the picture?

Recently I was luck enough to attend a dinner where five vintages of Dalwhinnie Shiraz and five vintages of Dalwhinnie Cabernet were served. The dinner was held at one of Canberra best restaurants and they did a very good job of matching the food to the wine. However one thing became very obvious during the dinner. All the wines went with all the food as you would expect; however with every course one of the wines seemed to be a better combination with the food than the others served. All the food and wine combinations were very good, it just seemed that one was more than a match; it was a complimentary situation where the sum of the whole was greater than the individual parts.

So how easy is this food and wine matching to achieve. It’s very easy to find food and wine combinations that don’t clash. For example a young fruit forward big Shiraz without a lot of obvious tannin actually can be enjoyed with Thai food. The wine can stand up to the hot chilli heat quite well. Try it; you will be pleasantly surprised how well it works.

The previous example was a case of looking for a match that did not clash. Now lets try to make it a bit harder. How about an average match? An aged Cabernet Sauvignon goes well with BBQ salmon or tuna. Also fairly easy, so lets get a little bit harder. How about a good match? A big red and a rare steak, also very easy!

Where this gets hard is where spices and sauces are introduced. There are an infinite number of flavour combinations that can be introduced to food by the addition of sauces etc, and the more complex these additions, the harder it is to find a good match to the dish. Likewise, the flavours in wine can also be pretty complex, so trying to find a good match for two complex but different sets of flavours becomes very difficult indeed. Sure you can find a match, but finding a good match in these circumstances is a lot harder. And finding a sublime match where the sum of the whole is greater than the sum of the individual parts is usually “some good management” combined with a huge dose of good luck.

That’s probably why cheese, bread and fruit matches so well with a big red. The food flavours are simple. Frankly, it’s not worth getting a nosebleed trying to gain the perfect match, keep it simple and enjoy the wine. If you need to have intricate food flavours, don’t expect miracles; just enjoy the food, the wine and above all the company.

Keep drinking,

Ric