Let’s talk about wine pairings.
Great food and great wine were meant to go together. Finding a wine pairing that works is like adding the final ingredient to the dish, one that brings out the best of both the food and the wine.
It’s no coincidence that countries like Italy, France, and Spain are renowned for their cuisine and for their winemaking. Over the centuries, their food and wine have evolved hand in hand. We don’t have that same long history here in the USA, but we are at an exciting point in the growth of our winemaking industry. California, Washington, New York, and Oregon are producing innovative wines that are among the best in the world. With greater access to more wines than ever before, and with wider exposure to a vast array of world cuisines, it’s time for Americans to discover the possibilities and principles of wine pairings.
A Different Mindset
Many Americans were introduced to fine dining, including the concept of wine pairings, in the mid-1900s by the inimitable Julia Child. In her seminal book The French Chef Cookbook, she offered this advice:
“When you are serving one wine only, it goes with the main course; when you have two or more at a feast, you start with the lightest wine and end with the heaviest and most full-flavored.”
Those simple rules of thumb are still perfectly valid, but perhaps the most important aspect of Julia’s advice was not her rules but her approach. She saw food and wine as intertwined, working together to create a harmonious, elevated experience. That mindset—seeing wine as a vital component of a menu, as much a part of the experience as the food itself—was a new idea to Americans.
We’ve come a long way since then. Today, Americans generally understand that a well-chosen wine can make a dish taste even better, and they see wine as a delightful (perhaps extravagant) addition to a meal. But the art of finding that perfect pairing is still a bit of a mystery to most people, the domain of sommeliers and aficionados.
But the thing is, there’s no need to stumble in the dark when it comes to wine pairings. A few basic rules and concepts can remove a lot of the guesswork in finding the perfect wine. Here are our top ten tips for making successful wine pairings.
Don’t forget the goal.
Before you get lost in the dizzying libraries of advice that are out there on which wines should go with which food, pause for a second and remember why you’re doing this. The whole point of wine pairings is to make both the wine and the food more enjoyable to you. That’s always going to be subjective…at least somewhat. Nearly everyone agrees that lobster goes better with a Chardonnay than, say, a Cabernet Sauvignon, but if you taste them both and prefer the Cabernet, then that’s a better pairing for you. Your palate is the judge, and don’t let any experts tell you that you’re wrong. (Just don’t assume that your guests will agree.)
2. The process can go both ways.
Although we generally think of a good wine pairing as the process of finding the right wine to match a dish, it can just as well go the other way. If you have a wine that you already know you love, or if there’s a new wine that you’re dying to try, it’s perfectly okay to look for a dish that will match your chosen wine. The same rules apply.
3. Stay in the right weight class.
You’ve probably heard the adage “white wine goes with white meat; red wine goes with red meat.” As a rule of thumb, that will steer you right most of the time, but not always. In order to know when the rule works and when it doesn’t, you must understand why it’s a rule in the first place.
The real issue has to do with weight—not physical weight, but how strong/rich/heavy the food and wine are. Think of your dish and your wine as two ballroom dancers that are going to tango together. If one is a light, delicate tuna salad, you don’t want to pair it with a rugged, full-bodied oaky Chardonnay. Sure, tuna is a white meat, and Chardonnay is a white wine, but their “dance” together is going to be a trainwreck. You’re going to taste the Chardonnay alright, but it’s not going to help the taste of your salad in the slightest.
Good dancers complement their partners, but they don’t overwhelm them. They are different, but equally matched. They have a push and pull between them: sometimes one stands out, and sometimes the other takes the lead. If they’re well matched, they both make each other better, and that’s the point.
4. Pair to the strongest flavor on the plate.
This is one of the reasons that the “White wine with white meat…” rule doesn’t always work. True, chicken is a fairly weak-tasting meat, so on its own it calls for a subtle wine to dance with. But what if you’re having a flavor-packed chicken curry or fried chicken with barbeque sauce? For dishes like those, a meek white wine like Chablis, Sauvignon Blanc, or Pinot Grigio is going to get bulldozed by the dish. It’s better to go with something from the lighter-bodied side of the spectrum of reds, like a Chianti, Beaujolais, or Pinot Noir.
You need to look beyond the meat and ask, “What are the strongest flavors on this plate?” Those are the flavors your wine will need to dance with.
5. Look for similarities.
The obvious way to find a good pairing is to look for food and wine that share similar features. Along with similar weights, they may have matching flavor profiles. This type of pairing is known as congruent pairing. The idea is to amplify and enhance the shared flavors.
When you enjoy a sweet wine like Port, Sherry, Moscato, or Sauternes with your dessert, that’s a congruent pairing. So is a creamy Chardonnay matched with a cheesy, creamy pasta dish. Pinot Grigio works well with light, delicate fish dishes, and a bold Cabernet Sauvignon tastes great with a porterhouse steak. It’s not the only factor to consider, but when a wine has components or flavors that are similar to your food, they can often make a good pairing. This is especially true when the food and wine share subtle flavors that you want to emphasize and bring to the front.
6. But sometimes you should look for differences.
This may seem like a contradiction of what we just said in Tip #5, but hear us out.
A pairing where the food and wine have few similarities is known as a complementary pairing. Why would you ever want to put together food and wine that clash? Well, you wouldn’t, but being different is not the same as clashing.
A good complementary pairing brings out the best of both wine and food while minimizing the faults in the other. Their differences work to each other’s benefit. Think about one of your favorite foods to eat. What are its dominant flavors? Is it salty, fatty, acidic, sweet, or spicy? What could make the experience of that dish even more enjoyable?
For example, if you enjoy a spicy Thai dish, you may have noticed that the last bites never taste as good as the first bite. Right? Is there a wine that could ramp up the experience and keep that pleasure going all the way to the last bite? Yes! An off-dry Reisling, with its slight sweetness and high acidity, can cut through the heat and give your palate a break. The contrast can help make the food seem even more flavorful and surprising with each bite. Similarly, a sparkling wine (e.g. Cava, Prosecco, or Brut Rosé) can refresh your palate with its bubbles and balance out the spice with its slight fruitiness. Your spicy Thai dish is probably more than adequate to hold its own; it doesn’t need a wine to ramp up its flavors. Instead, it needs a wine to serve as a contrast.
To take another example, let’s look at an American classic, the hamburger. (Wine with a burger? Absolutely!) For a traditional burger with just meat, lettuce, pickle, onions, and tomato, the dominant flavors you want to match are the bold meat, the tangy pickle, and the sharp onion. To enhance those flavors, you might choose a Zinfandel with peppery, smoky notes and a little spiciness that plays nice with the beef and pickles. But if your burger has stronger flavors like bacon or jalapeno, you might want to go the other direction and choose a complementary pairing. In that case, a fruity Zinfandel would still work but for different reasons. Its sweetness would temper the jalapeno’s spiciness while its acidity helps cut through the bacon’s fattiness, refreshing your palate between bites. A Syrah, Malbec, or Cabernet can also make great dance partners for a tasty bacon burger.
7. Choose a wine that’s sweeter than your food.
Choose a wine that’s sweeter than the dish, especially when you’re dealing with foods that are already sweet. This is as close to an absolute rule as you will find in the infinitely complex world of food and wine. Sweetness in food will make a dry wine taste bitter, and it can also make the food taste cloyingly saccharine. Avoid both problems by making sure that the wine is just a little sweeter than what you’re eating.
8. Know your tannins.
Tannins are natural compounds that come from the grape skins, seeds, and stems as well as from oak barrels. Red wines tend to be higher in tannins, which gives them a slightly bitter, astringent flavor and a dry, gritty mouthfeel that makes you pucker. Here’s the cool thing: tannins bind to proteins and fats in your food, which not only softens the tannins and makes the wine taste smoother, but it also makes the fat less greasy and more balanced in your mouth. That’s why wines that are high in tannins, like Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah, or Malbec make fantastic dance partners with fatty foods like steak, mac and cheese, and that glorious bacon burger. But that’s also why tannin-heavy red wines don’t go with spicy or acidic foods; those foods just makes the wines taste harsh and bitter.
9. Know your safe bets.
If you’re ever feeling unsure of a wine pairing or don’t want to take the time to figure one out, you can always fall back on the following list of safe bet wines. These wines are what wine expert Kevin Zraly calls “user-friendly wines” because they will pair will with almost any dish. They are all light- to medium-bodied with a fair amount of fruitiness and acidity.
This list borrows heavily from Zraly’s list in his book Windows on the World: Complete Wine Course.
Rosé Wines
White Zinfandel
Almost any rosé, especially a dry rosé from Provence
White Wines
Pinot Grigio
Sauvignon Blanc
German Riesling
Champagne and sparkling wines
Red Wines
Chateau Ste. Michelle Merlot
Chianti Classico
Rioja Crianza
Beaujolai-Villages
Pinot Noir
Any one of these wines has enough “weight” to dance with most dishes without being overpowering. As Zraly suggests, this method of pairing can work especially well when ordering wine for the whole table. Any wine on this list will probably go well with almost any dish that anyone ordered.
10. Think regionally.
Sometimes you can find a fantastic wine pairing by using an approach that feels a little like cheating. Instead of searching through all the wines of the world to find a dance partner for a specific food, first look at the wines that are made in the same region as the dish. Just as centuries of human experimentation have produced cuisines from the ingredients that grow naturally in a particular place, that same place produced wines that went well with their food. Take a hint from all those generations of experience. It’s no coincidence that Chianti goes so well with Italian pasta dishes or that Argentinian Malbec and Bonarda are made to dance with steak.
Where can you learn the characteristics of a particular wine?
The easiest way to learn about a specific wine is to hop online and Google the brand name, wine type, and vintage (year) (e.g. Bogle Vineyards Merlot 2021). Wine Folly is a fantastic online source for general wine-related information. Go to their “Grapes” page to learn about the characteristics of different wines.
The Vivino website/app is a hugely popular source that rates and reviews specific wines. The fact that it draws from millions of users means that you can get a pretty good sense of how popular a wine is as well as how it tastes. One downside with Vivino is that most of its reviewers are casual drinkers, so you can expect the scores to skew high for wines that are sweet and/or approachable. Use Vivino as a general guide, but cross-reference it with Wine Folly or Wine-Searcher , which gives critical reviews.
Of course, the most fun way to learn about a wine is to try it for yourself paired with something delicious. Restaurants and bars with a curated selection of wines will be happy to help you learn about their featured wines and to find a successful pairing. The Tasting Room in downtown Salt Lake City has over 200 labels you can enjoy by the bottle or by the glass. They also offer wine flights and tastings with suggested food pairings.
BONUS TIP: Consider a few of our personal favorites.
We took a poll here at Bacchus and asked for our team’s personal favorite wine pairings. Here are the wines they love to match with specific dishes.
Steak a spicy, full-body Cabernet
Charcuterie board Sauvignon Blanc or a red blend like Bordeaux
Salmon or branzino Chardonnay with more body to complement the fish
Trout unoaked Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, or Reisling
Ceviche Pinot Grigio
Tacos Cabernet, Malbec, 2019 Corona Light (thanks, Gary)
Pasta with white sauce dry Reisling, Pinot Grigio
Pasta with red sauce fruity Italian Chianti, Brunello
Light salad Pinot Noir, Sauvignon Blanc, Rosé
Chocolate dessert Ferrari-Carano Merlot
Dark chocolate Port
Lemon/fruity dessert Moscato, Sauvignon Blanc
Aperitif Vermouth, White Sherry
Anything sweet Sauternes
Almost anything at all! Chateau Ste. Michelle Indian Wells Merlot
For information on how we can help you create a menu of perfect pairings, please contact us at 801-898-2535. And, in the words of Julia Child, toujours bon appétit!