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Wine Food Pairing

Most Conversations About Wine Begin With
Wine Food Pairing!

Most conversations about wine facts begin with Wine Food Pairing! Wine and food pairing is the process of pairing food dishes with wine to enhance the dining experience. Traditionally, wine food pairing has often been either too simplistic or too complicated. Everyone has heard that red wine goes with meat and white wine goes with fish and poultry, but what about everything else in between?

The most basic of wine facts is that food and wine are meant to be enjoyed since they both enhance each other. The purpose of this section is to make the matching of wine and food easy and enjoyable so that even those with basic wine knowledge can become quickly comfortable about which foods to pair with wines.

Champagne and Food | Wine and Cheese Pairings
Wine and Cheese Parties

From an elegant dinner or wine tasting to a casual backyard get together, our wine food pairing guide is intended to provide basic wine information and simple guidelines to use when searching for the best wine to accompany a meal.

Wine Food Pairing

Weight, Body and Texture: The most primary consideration to wine food pairing is matching the weight, body and texture of the flavor and intensity of the food to the flavor and intensity of the wine.

Weight, body and texture are present in both wine and in food. The more powerful and flavorful the food, the greater the flavor of the wine accompanying the dish will need to be in order for everything to remain in balance.

For example, the texture, weight and body of an English muffin are more delicate and lighter than a toasted bagel would be. The body and weight of a fish such as Dover sole would be lighter, tender and flakier than the body and weight of a fish such as Swordfish, which would be meatier and more likely to be cut with a knife.

Therefore, the lighter dishes would match well with wines that are light-bodied such as Pinot Blanc, Chablis or Pinot Grigio. The heavier, meatier dishes would work well with more full-bodied wines such as Sauvignon Blanc, White Burgundy or Chardonnay. Heavier wines will overwhelm a lighter dish. Lighter wines served with heartier meals will cause the food to be underappreciated.

Wine pairing is just one aspect of matching the right things together in a meal. Check out Creative Salad Recipes to choose the best salad for today's dinner menu.

This Wine and Food Pairing Chart
provides basic wine information on how to pair wine and food.

Food Weight	Food Example	White Wines	Red Wines
Very Light Foods	Sole Flounder Clams Oysters	Pinot Blanc Chablis Vinho Verde Muscadet Orvieto,Soave Champagne
Beaujolais
Light Foods	Snapper Bass Shrimp, Scallops Trout Pasta with Marinara	Pinot Grigio Bardolino Sancerre Gewurztraminer Champagne	Chianti Pinot Noir Rioja Beaujolais Valpolicella
Medium Foods	Veal Salmon Tuna Swordfish Duck Roasted Chicken Game Birds such as Pheasant or Quail	Albarino Sauvignon Blanc White Burgundy Chardonnay Champagne Rhone Whites
Bardolino Pinot Noir Chianti Syrah/Shiraz
Medium to Heavy Foods	Poultry Lobster Veal or Pork Chops Ravioli,Stews Most Cheese	Chardonnay Viognier
Merlot Zinfandel Cabernet Sauvignon Bordeaux Malbec
Heavy Foods	Lamb Chops Game Meats such as Venison Steaks Leg of Lamb	White Bordeaux (Semillion) Oaked Sauvignon Blanc	Bordeaux Cabernet Sauvignon Barolo

Note: This chart is intended to be only a guide to wine and food pairing. It is not inclusive of every food and wine available for pairing. Many wines are listed more than once because many wines have the flexibility to be paired with different weights of food.

Sauces and Spices: Food would be boring if there were no sauces and spices. For many dishes, it is the sauce that provides the primary flavors for the food. When preparing a dish with sauce, be mindful of how the sauce will interact with the entrée. Is the sauce intended to be a subtle addition or a powerful, integral part of the overall flavor of the dish? Whatever the primary flavoring of the dish is, it becomes the key component to choosing which wine matches the food.

The following Sauce Chart
shows which types of wines pair well with certain kinds of sauces:

Sauce	White Wines	Red Wines
Mornay, Herb and Butter, Carbonara, Alfredo	Chardonnay White Burgundy
Puttanesca, Tomato Vodka, Cacciatore		Pinot Noir Chianti Zinfandel Syrah Beaujolais
Pesto Sauce, Mustard Sauce, Lemon Sauce	Sauvignon Blanc Riesling Chardonnay
Peppercorn Sauce Florentine, Chimichurri	Chardonnay	Pinot Noir Burgundy Merlot Syrah Zinfandel Bordeaux

Note: This chart is intended to be only a guide to pairing wine with sauces. It is not inclusive of every sauce and wine available for pairing. Some wines are listed more than once because many wines have the flexibility to be paired with different types of sauces.

Similar to which sauce is used, it helps to also consider how a certain spice or a combination of spices will affect the overall flavor of the dish. Wine can either complement spicy dishes or clash with others. Keep in mind that spices are often present in sauces. The main wine matching should take into account the overall flavor of the dish.

The following wines pair well with dishes that are seasoned with spices:

Types of White Wine:

Pinot Gris, Pinot Grigio, Riesling

Match best with: Clove, sage, black pepper, nutmeg, dill, chives, fennel, thyme, white pepper, orange peel

Chenin Blanc, Vouvray, Gewürztraminer, Sauvignon Blanc Match best with: Chives, black pepper, tarragon, rosemary

Chardonnay, White Burgundy, Sémillon Match best with: Mustard, clove, mint, tarragon, sage, cumin, lemon, thyme, dill, mint, ginger

Types of Red Wine:

Chianti, Nebbiolo, Beaujolais

Match best with: Oregano, basil, ginger, mint, chives, thyme, tarragon, fennel, juniper

Zinfandel, Syrah, Shiraz, Rioja

Match best with: Rosemary, black pepper, chives, tarragon

Pinot Noir, Burgundy, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, Bordeaux

Match best with: Bay leaf, parsley, dill, fennel, mint

Of course, wine food pairing would not be complete without basic wine information about Champagne and Food, Wine and Cheese Pairings, Wines for the Barbeque.

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