Our circuitous journey has taken many turns to understanding our appreciation and knowledge of wine. This is a slight deviation from our tour de France, but I will not leave you wanting. On that note, we’ll remedy a glaring issue I’ve skirted, taste. Let’s correct that oversight.
While I can appreciate wine solely on its own, there are more pleasures to derive from the combination of food and wine. French wine merchant and writer André Simon stated: “Food without wine is a corpse; wine without food is a ghost. United and well matched, they are as body and soul: living partners.[1]” Perhaps you too have felt that phantom. That inkling that food could and should have made this wine transcendent.
Thankfully there is a lot less to learn about tasting wine than the appellations of France. In general, you can taste the five meta-flavors of sweet, salty, bitter, sour, and umami. This is where it gets complicated. Every person has a unique palate which makes scientists and chefs slightly to incandescently crazed. These meta-flavors provide a loose guideline of what we perceive, so there are enough similarities to describe what we taste.
There are areas of the tongue that are more sensitive to the five meta-flavors we perceive. In the front of the tongue sweet reigns supreme. On the sides, the salt flavors are more pronounced forward to the tip and the sour flavors are further back. In the rear, bitter and umami flavors are more prevalent. No one flavor is in each of these regions, but it gives some sense of how you experience flavor. Now you may be able to better diagnose how that wine tastes in general.
The more you taste, the more vocabulary you have to express your preferences. This is as much a sensory memory as an emotional connection. Much like learning a new language, the more expansive your vocabulary, the easier it is to communicate with others.
We bring our experiences of other foods and drinks into the talent of identifying the several components that make up the glass. These sense memories aid in identifying the characteristics that compose the wine. There are markers that we look for: fruit, flowers, soil/terroir, vegetal/herbal, animal, and compost. Therefore, it is within your vocabulary to mark a few of these characteristics. We taste in part as we learn in part.
We now have put some “flavors” on what our wine tastes like on its own. Jot down these initial perceptions. They could be as fleeting as “fruity” or more nuanced but having these serve as a springboard to a true partnership with food.
There are a few components to pairing your food and wine in harmonious accord. One is intensity. A potent, high alcohol and tannic wine like Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa would feel out of place with a delicate fish like Dover sole. Matching the intensity of wine with that of the food is tantamount.
The second thing to consider is how certain foods interact with wine. Salty foods will lessen your perception of acid but increase the tannic flavor. Animal and dairy fats will reduce the tannic feel of wine. Any dry wine will only be amplified in its “dryness” when paired with higher sugar foods. Highly spiced (Thai, Mexican, Szechuan, etc.) will amplify its spicy intensity if there is higher alcohol and low sugar. The interplay between food and wine is the whole shooting match.
These are guidelines, and some will come across a flyer that defies these precepts. One such is Champagne. That kid will play well with everyone. Popcorn? Champagne. Ribs? Champagne. Caviar? Champagne. You get the gist.
The understanding of how or what to pair with wine is undoubtedly artistic in nature, but as you experience different wines and foods, you develop your second (or perhaps, third or fourth) language. Become fluent in speaking about wine by talking it through. You do this with food all the time, and wine is no different. Bounce some ideas off your partner, or the dog. They may disagree, but verbalizing your thoughts it provides your mind with better recall about the why you liked the wine and food. Synthesizing thought and taste through language will further add to your enjoyment.
To summarize, drink more wine and eat more food. That’s it. The best way to understand the taste of wine is to taste it. The more that you put description to taste, the better you can identify why the cuisine and food are well suited. I will send you off with a charge to practice your fluency in wine.
Wines (and Food) for Consideration:
| Wine | Food | Comments |
| Sancerre/Sauvignon Blanc | Fresh Goat’s Cheese | Matching high acids |
| Bordeaux/Left Bank Cab Sav | Steak | High tannin vs. high fat |
| Beaujolais Cru/Gamay | Roast Chicken/Seared Pork Chop | White Meat and low tannin red |
| Muscadet/Melon B | Oyster | Matching salinity |
| Alsace/ Off-dry Riesling | Roquefort Bleu Cheese | Sweet wine vs. salty cheese |
À votre santé!
[1] (Harding, Julia; Robinson, Jancis 291)
