BY RACHAEL ANN ROTH

The first rule of wine pairing is there are no rules.

We’ve learned by rote to serve red wine with steak and white wine with fish, for example, but that doesn’t mean pairings should always adhere to convention.

“It doesn’t have to be doctrinal,” says Nate Sullivan, a wine distributor from the Berkshires in Massachusetts, whose favorite pairings include fried chicken and champagne, and Thai food served alongside German riesling.

“If you’re having red meat, and you’re all about white wine, you should enjoy that,” he continues. “That doesn't mean it will be the best marriage of flavors, but it’s about finding a balance. You don’t want the flavors of the wine to overwhelm the food, and you don’t want the flavors of the food to bully the wine.”

This simple non-rule is just the tip of the iceberg; there are scientific and cultural reasons why certain wines taste better with certain dishes, but starting with flavors you like is a good way to anchor your journey into wine pairing.

Wine: The Food Drink

Serving wine with a meal is a cultural tradition. The country of Georgia is known for their amber and natural wines, fermented in ancient, giant underground casks. Here, dinners are endless streams of food, music, and many impromptu, lengthy toasts, which would be relatively lackluster without copious amounts of wine.

Holidays like Passover traditionally call for multiple glasses of wine throughout the meal, and you haven’t lived until you’ve paired Manischewitz with my Bubbe’s matzo ball soup. (Just kidding; avoid Manischewitz at all costs.)

Naturally, this longstanding, versatile drink is the beverage of choice for meals around the world. And while we might suffer the sweetness of Manischewitz to appease our elders, or be so drunk in Tbilisi that we can’t detect the subtle aromas of a natural wine, there are ways to enhance and reveal flavors of food and wine through pairing.

Blind Me With Science

“The more I learn, the less I know, in that clichéd sort of way,” says Sullivan about the intricacies of wine pairing. “There are biochemical reactions behind what we taste and smell. But in the end,” he reminds us, “it should be about enjoyment.”

Wine is a layered drink: each bottle balances acids (milkyness), oak (complexity), sugar (sweetness), alcohol (body), and tannins (bitterness), giving your palate a lot to sort out. Here’s why certain combinations work well:

Acidity cuts the salt, oil, or fat of a dish, which is why sauvignon blanc is often served with oysters; tannins dial down the pungency of proteins, like a cabernet with a sharp cheese; and alcohol enhances spiciness, so a lower-alcohol wine like Prosecco will ease the intensity of spicy food.

"Two people might taste different flavors
within the same wine, but both are right."

Then, there are the aromas, or “noses,” of wines, which change depending on how the wine is produced and stored—two wines made from the same grape can vary in taste if they are produced in different regions, because of the effects of the climate on flavor.

Aromas account for wine characteristics like “earthy” and “floral.” Add that to the basic flavors our tongues can detect: salty, sweet, sour, bitter, astringent (a drying sensation), umami (savory or meaty), and pungent, and you can begin to see why there are limitless combinations to explore.

Two people might taste different flavors within the same wine, but both are right. That’s why experimenting with how different wine aromas interact with different foods is subjective. “The language that people use in wine can be kind of intimidating, but it's really just a way to get everyone on the same page, because everyone tastes and smells things differently,” says Sullivan. If you follow your tastebuds, you can’t go wrong.

What grows together, goes together

It may be an overused phrase, but it has stuck for a reason. Climate and history both have an effect on wine pairing. Because wine has such early roots in history (Georgia is said to have produced wine as early as 6,000 BC), food and wine pairings were once dependent on what was locally available.

Not to mention that wine and food that share “terroir”—the soil, topography, and climate of a region—also share complementary flavors. Barolo wines made from the nebbiolo grape might be served with gorgonzola or truffles: the tannic wine mellows the strong flavors, and they can all be found in the Piedmont region.

Even when wine trade routes were established, tradition still called for dishes to be served with certain wines. Associations between food and wine, and the overall experience of your meal, can supersede any scientific reasons for pairings.

If you visited Italy today, you’d probably want to try their locally produced wine with locally grown food. Drinking organic Chianti with handmade pasta and local tomatoes in Tuscany would forever remain a good memory that you seek to recreate back home, regardless of the taste (though it would taste pretty damn good).

When to bring in the experts

If you crave a perfect pairing at a restaurant, ask the server or sommelier for their recommendations, and offer some of the flavors you like as a starting point.

Staff at your local wine shop, especially a smaller store with a curated selection, can recommend a bottle to pair with your dinner; the more you get to know and trust their recommendations, the further you can explore interesting combinations.

You don’t have to splurge for the most expensive label to land on an excellent pairing, either. “It's a somewhat American thing to mystify wine,” says Sullivan. “There's a definitive difference between quality and cost; just because something is inexpensive, doesn't mean it's of low quality.”

Finding the right wine pairings can be a lifelong endeavor, or an enjoyable pastime. You don’t have to be an oenophile or sommelier to do your own experimenting; simply go with your gut.

FINE FLAVORS: WHERE TO START WITH WINE PAIRING