So we've had a little lesson on tasting wine. Now it's time to begin our journey on how to pair food and wine; the basic task of putting food and wine together in a harmonious way. Too often, wineries and wine professionals have over-analyzed or rhapsodized about wine using unfamiliar, often esoteric language that can be intimidating. Add to this the fact that our cultural cuisine is ripe with a myriad of flavors and foods from around the world - what we are often faced with as consumers is confusion. We often opt for simpler beverages that take no thought. What’s a person to do?
In order to alleviate that confusion - I am going to take you on another cyber-sensory journey of wine and food that will make you a more SWIRL Savvy.
Think of wine as food in a glass. It is another component of the meal. In other cultures, specifically European and Mediterranean cultures, wine is seen as another course, as part of the meal; another flavor to be enjoyed. Theirs is a population essentially weaned from the breast to the bottle. They grow the food - they make the wine. There has to be something to this practice since, as a populace , they seem to live longer and have fewer incidents of heart disease and high cholesterol than we do here in the U.S. And, they have been doing so for centuries.
All of that being said let’s talk a bit about some food and wine pairing basics: First and foremost , Eat what you like and drink what you like. Flavor is 100% subjective. Just ask anyone with a child who won’t eat certain foods. What I liked as a child, I might not like today (like Gummie anything). When I was a younger drinker, anything other than Boone’s Farm Apple wine was too strong for me.
My palate has changed (thank goodness) and so have my choices. I have learned and read about and tasted enough to know what I like now. So- the bottom line is I drink what I like. There are certainly enough varieties and brands of wine that one could essentially drink a different wine with every meal. And sometimes you feel like crisp and dry and sometimes you feel like fruity and red. And sometimes you feel like a nut and sometimes you don’t! (I just threw that one in to see if you were paying attention).
Stick with the basic tenet that white food goes with white wine and red food goes better with red wine. This is a guideline that usually works. But, keep in mind the preparation of the protein, the other ingredients added to the protein and the texture of the protein. Take chicken for example. It can be sautéed, braised, roasted, grilled, fried, sauced or spiced. Even white meat and dark meat have a different degree of chicken-ness. Think of the bridge ingredients (the sauce, the spice, the starch) of the overall dish to help you pair the right wine.
This is where the ‘blurbs’ on the back label of a wine bottle come in handy. Use these as they give descriptions of the flavors, aromas and textures of the wine, and sometimes there are suggestions for pairing that wine with different foods.
Mirror flavors: If the wine is described as ‘toasty’ or ‘oaky’ you should pair it with a dish that is grilled. If a wine is described as ‘herby’ or ‘peppery’ then pair it with a dish prepared with herbs or a peppery dry rub.
Remember that the basic flavors identifiable to the palate are Sweet, Sour (or acidic), Salty, Bitter and Savory (or Umami). All of these basic flavors, with the exception of salty are important to wine.
Food changes the taste of wine and wine changes the taste of food. All wines are changed by the dominant taste in the food to a lesser or greater extent. That means that the first thing you put in your mouth will affect the next thing you put in your mouth.
Think about the last time you brushed your teeth before you had your morning orange juice. The orange juice tastes pretty bad, right? The dominant sweet taste from the toothpaste emphasizes the dominant sourness of the orange juice, making the OJ taste really sour. So, if you are eating a spicy dish (think Jerk seasoned or Thai spiced)and drink a big oaky wine (think California Cabernet), the spice will be accentuated and overwhelming. Next time you have that spiced dish, try a wine with more fruitiness and some sweetness like a California Riesling, which will counter the spice and take away some of the heat. (That is why rice is served with so many spicy cuisines like Japanese, Thai and Mexican. Rice is a palate neutralizer)
Body = Weight, Texture and Mouth feel. Body refers to how the wine feels in your mouth. This can easily be illustrated if you think about milk. Whole milk has a different mouth feel than 2% or skim milk right? So, if you think about the different types of white wine varietals, full-bodied Chardonnays have a different texture than a lighter, citrusier Sauvignon Blanc, or even a Pinot Grigio, right? So, it goes to say that if you pair like textured dishes with like textured wines, it should be a good pairing. (Example = Chicken Picata served with a lemony Sauvignon Blanc or zesty Bar-b-qued ribs served with a zesty Australian Shiraz)
In the weeks to come, we'll talk about food and wine. You will become the master of your own SWIRL Savvy-ness. We will go through some basic flavor profiles of both food and wine. We’ll learn how to sip, swirl, savor, and enjoy wines the way the good earthly winemakers intended us to do it. We will journey to some wine growing regions and learn about ‘terroir’, grape varieties, and the winemaker’s influence which all have an impact on the finished product. You will get some suggestions for some of my favorite sippers and learn how to pick out the pearls from the veritable sea of wines available to you.
If you have any questions or are in need of a wine epiphany immediately, you can email me or leave a comment.
Swirl Girl’s Pearl for today: I just love this wine. It is the Bonterra Vineyards Sauvignon Blanc. Retails for about $13.00 in your local grocer or wine store. It is 100% Organic which means it is made from grapes that are farmed using sustainable farming techniques without the use of herbicides, pesticides, or fungicides. It has wonderful citrus and tropical aromas and flavors that remind me of tropical fruits. Goes great with pastas, soups, seafood of all types - Or just in the glass by itself as an afternoon Swirler!! I don’t know about you, but if I can do something good for the environment while I am enjoying something delicious and refreshing.....I get double points for the day.
Monday, July 26, 2010
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Cyber Wine 101
Have you ever tasted wine? Oh sure you have...but I mean really taste it. Tasting is no more than concentrating on what’s in the glass. Paying attention to your own senses is the only way to discover your true taste in wine, and YOUR taste is the only thing that matters. I am going to take you on a cyber wine tasting - (keep your arms and legs inside the ride at all times!) so sit back and enjoy the ride!
First, get yourself some wine. Go ahead…I’ll wait. There. Now, pull out the cork, unscrew the cap, or unplug the tap – and pour it into your glass. I have no issue with the vessel in which the wine is stored and poured, but I do think it is important to drink out of a real glass. You don’t want to taste plastic, do you?
So- now you’ve poured the glass of wine. Be it white, red or pink, bubbly or still – it’s in your glass. Now, give it a SWIRL. Why - you ask? We SWIRL to release aroma. That wine has been sitting in a bottle for some time. It has travelled many countless miles for many countless days. It needs to stretch; to catch some air and awaken from it’s slumber. Re-introducing air into the wine by banging it around the sides of your glass will help re-oxygenate and release the grapey goodness or aroma . Aroma refers to the wines natural grape scent.
Second, put your nose to the edge of the glass and take in a sniff. This is your first real taste of that wine. That’s right folks, our primary sense of taste is in our noses. Your taste buds can only discern 5 basic ‘tastes’(sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and savory) but your nose can detect virtually thousands of ‘flavors’. Flavor is the combination of taste and smell. Your sense of smell also is a the most powerful trigger to your memory and emotions.
Just think, when you have a cold and are all stuffed up – nothing really tastes that good, does it? A bowl of hot steamy bowl of chicken soup with rich savory broth is just about the only thing that works, right? You probably can’t remember what Grandma’s Chicken Soup tastes like, but you can remember the feeling of warmth and goodness that came from it. Right? I thought so. One of my favorite aromas is Thanksgiving. If you are like me, all I have to do is say the word Thanksgiving and you smell roasted turkey, pecan pie and sweet yams right now, don’t you?
Okay, we have SWIRL’d . We will now try to identify bouquet. Bouquet differs from aroma in that aroma is the scent of the grape and bouquet is the scent of the matured wine itself. Can you identify any aromas? Do you smell apples, lemon, strawberries, yeast, florals, spices? Aroma isn’t just classified as one element, but rather a combination of elements.
For example:
Floral (jasmine, rose, violet..)
Fruit ( cherry, raspberry, peach, apple, lemon, fig…)
Spice (clove, cinnamon, pepper, licorice, mint…)
Vegetable (mushroom, tea, straw, bell pepper…)
Earthy ( smokey, dried , coffee, hay, leather…)
Wines that are considered complex, have one or more of these aromas combined to define it’s bouquet. Do you recognize any particular aromas in your glass of wine? ( And yes, yummy can be considered an aroma in my book! ) More importantly do these aromas remind you of anything in particular? Do the aromas trigger any emotional response?
Now look at appearance of the wine itself. There is a wide range of colors of for red, whites and rose wines. The important thing here is that the color of the wine and its clarity should be appropriate to the type of wine it is and the age of it the wine. If you have a red wine that is tinged with brown and is murky or cloudy - you may have a suspiciously old wine that may have past its prime.
Now on to the tasting part; Although you’ve already had your first taste with your nose. If you can, try to inhale just a little before you bring the wine to your mouth to further aerate it. Let the wine wash over your tongue and linger a bit. Swallow.
Take a mental note of a few key things about your taste:
• Body: the weight of the wine on the palate. Wines are typically described as ranging from light- bodied to full-bodied. Like as in a ‘2% is different than skim is different than whole milk’ kind of way.
• Acidity: The amount of crispness or tartness in the wine. Think lemon. Think citrus.
• Fruitiness: Yes, grapes are fruit. But the amount of fruitiness in a wine is an indication that the flavors are derived from the grapes themselves as opposed to the winemaking process or the barrels in which the wine was aged. And what kind of fruit do you taste? And to what level of sweetness is its intensity?
• Tannin: Found in red wines. That gritty, pucker at the back of the cheeks thing that happens when you drink red wines. Tannins are present in grapes. Next time you’re peeling a few grapes for the kids, take the skins and rub them against your teeth. What you feel is tannin. Red wines are made by leaving the skins of the grape in contact with the white juice that flows from the crushed grapes. If you drink a lot of iced tea or cola, you might be familiar with the sensation of tannins.
• Balance: The ratio of wine’s key components: body, acidity, fruitiness, and tannin and alcoholic strength. A wine is said to be balanced when no one single component stands out against the rest.
So you have SWIRLED, sniffed and tasted. Now what? The best way to know what you like is to experiment. I am an equal opportunity imbiber! I want to know! Here is a little homework for you until next time…
Try a few wines; different varieties – maybe something you’ve never had before. Tell me what you liked about it. Tell me what you ate with it. Tell me how it smelled. Did it evoke any particular memories for you? Tell me what senses were engaged. Tell me about the flavors of the wine. Tell me how it connected you with the people who shared it with you.
If you have any questions or are in need of sharing your wine-gasm immediately, you can leave a comment or email .
First, get yourself some wine. Go ahead…I’ll wait. There. Now, pull out the cork, unscrew the cap, or unplug the tap – and pour it into your glass. I have no issue with the vessel in which the wine is stored and poured, but I do think it is important to drink out of a real glass. You don’t want to taste plastic, do you?
So- now you’ve poured the glass of wine. Be it white, red or pink, bubbly or still – it’s in your glass. Now, give it a SWIRL. Why - you ask? We SWIRL to release aroma. That wine has been sitting in a bottle for some time. It has travelled many countless miles for many countless days. It needs to stretch; to catch some air and awaken from it’s slumber. Re-introducing air into the wine by banging it around the sides of your glass will help re-oxygenate and release the grapey goodness or aroma . Aroma refers to the wines natural grape scent.
Second, put your nose to the edge of the glass and take in a sniff. This is your first real taste of that wine. That’s right folks, our primary sense of taste is in our noses. Your taste buds can only discern 5 basic ‘tastes’(sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and savory) but your nose can detect virtually thousands of ‘flavors’. Flavor is the combination of taste and smell. Your sense of smell also is a the most powerful trigger to your memory and emotions.
Just think, when you have a cold and are all stuffed up – nothing really tastes that good, does it? A bowl of hot steamy bowl of chicken soup with rich savory broth is just about the only thing that works, right? You probably can’t remember what Grandma’s Chicken Soup tastes like, but you can remember the feeling of warmth and goodness that came from it. Right? I thought so. One of my favorite aromas is Thanksgiving. If you are like me, all I have to do is say the word Thanksgiving and you smell roasted turkey, pecan pie and sweet yams right now, don’t you?
Okay, we have SWIRL’d . We will now try to identify bouquet. Bouquet differs from aroma in that aroma is the scent of the grape and bouquet is the scent of the matured wine itself. Can you identify any aromas? Do you smell apples, lemon, strawberries, yeast, florals, spices? Aroma isn’t just classified as one element, but rather a combination of elements.
For example:
Floral (jasmine, rose, violet..)
Fruit ( cherry, raspberry, peach, apple, lemon, fig…)
Spice (clove, cinnamon, pepper, licorice, mint…)
Vegetable (mushroom, tea, straw, bell pepper…)
Earthy ( smokey, dried , coffee, hay, leather…)
Wines that are considered complex, have one or more of these aromas combined to define it’s bouquet. Do you recognize any particular aromas in your glass of wine? ( And yes, yummy can be considered an aroma in my book! ) More importantly do these aromas remind you of anything in particular? Do the aromas trigger any emotional response?
Now look at appearance of the wine itself. There is a wide range of colors of for red, whites and rose wines. The important thing here is that the color of the wine and its clarity should be appropriate to the type of wine it is and the age of it the wine. If you have a red wine that is tinged with brown and is murky or cloudy - you may have a suspiciously old wine that may have past its prime.
Now on to the tasting part; Although you’ve already had your first taste with your nose. If you can, try to inhale just a little before you bring the wine to your mouth to further aerate it. Let the wine wash over your tongue and linger a bit. Swallow.
Take a mental note of a few key things about your taste:
• Body: the weight of the wine on the palate. Wines are typically described as ranging from light- bodied to full-bodied. Like as in a ‘2% is different than skim is different than whole milk’ kind of way.
• Acidity: The amount of crispness or tartness in the wine. Think lemon. Think citrus.
• Fruitiness: Yes, grapes are fruit. But the amount of fruitiness in a wine is an indication that the flavors are derived from the grapes themselves as opposed to the winemaking process or the barrels in which the wine was aged. And what kind of fruit do you taste? And to what level of sweetness is its intensity?
• Tannin: Found in red wines. That gritty, pucker at the back of the cheeks thing that happens when you drink red wines. Tannins are present in grapes. Next time you’re peeling a few grapes for the kids, take the skins and rub them against your teeth. What you feel is tannin. Red wines are made by leaving the skins of the grape in contact with the white juice that flows from the crushed grapes. If you drink a lot of iced tea or cola, you might be familiar with the sensation of tannins.
• Balance: The ratio of wine’s key components: body, acidity, fruitiness, and tannin and alcoholic strength. A wine is said to be balanced when no one single component stands out against the rest.
So you have SWIRLED, sniffed and tasted. Now what? The best way to know what you like is to experiment. I am an equal opportunity imbiber! I want to know! Here is a little homework for you until next time…
Try a few wines; different varieties – maybe something you’ve never had before. Tell me what you liked about it. Tell me what you ate with it. Tell me how it smelled. Did it evoke any particular memories for you? Tell me what senses were engaged. Tell me about the flavors of the wine. Tell me how it connected you with the people who shared it with you.
If you have any questions or are in need of sharing your wine-gasm immediately, you can leave a comment or email .
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