I always used to just drink the same kind of wine with everything. There were a few brands of Pinot Grigio that I liked, they never let me down. In restaurants I would order whatever Pinot Grigio was on the menu. It was simple, I knew I liked it, and I though it went with everything.
I never messed with red wines much, I don’t know why, I just didn’t. One day while at a friend’s party, he convinced me that I was missing out on a whole big world of wine drinking with this thinking.
He gave me some olives and red wine. He told me to drink the wine with the olives and without. The difference was amazing. The flavor of both the wine and the olives seemed to pop. I don’t even remember what the wine was (I should have asked, I know), but I since that day I have become much more adventurous with wine pairings, and have discovered many wines and even foods I thought I didn’t like.
Pairing wine is hard if you’re trying to impress a sommelier; when I was in culinary school, the hardest test I remember taking was the wine pairing test. It didn’t help that the chef that taught it was a sommelier herself, but it was a nerve wracking exam. So many grapes from so many countries.
Pairing wines doesn’t have to be a complicated affair, and it doesn’t have to be as basic as red with meat, white with fish.
Here are some things you’ve probably heard and why they just don’t have to be true:
“Your food and wine should come from the same place.”
Umm…Not. True. There are so many types of wine out there that it’s more important to complement the fruitiness in the wine with your dish than it is to match the region of the wine with the region of the food.
“Your wine should be the same color as your food.”
A good oaky Chardonnay can be as good with a steak as a Cabernet. It’s all about finding something that compliments as far as flavor, not color.
“Some things just don’t go with wine”
Again, false. You can pair anything with wine, and taste is subjective anyway. Asparagus is something lots of people think can’t go with wine, but if you prepare it correctly and eat it with something else, such as a filet mignon, it can go beautifully with wine.
Bottom line: Wine is what you make it. While I have branched out considerably since that party where I got a good glimpse of wine, I used to drink my Pinot Grigio like it was going out of style. I never had any problems with it matching, and I even drank quite a bit of it by itself, and it was delicious.
Life’s too short to worry if your wine matches your food. If you like it drink it, if you don’t, find something else.
