What makes a wine suitable for food?
Thu, 06/21/2012 - 16:08 — What Food What Wine team
Matching Californian wine and food
Wines are often a mealtime treat introduced between Thursdays and Sundays to complement the break from the run-of-the-mill week.
We often begin with a wine on a Thursday evening in celebration of the oncoming weekend and commiserate its end with another bottle matched to that Sunday roast.
That's not to say that we can't uncork a bottle of our favourite Chablis between Monday and Wednesday, just that human nature would have us stock up our treats to enjoy in one fell swoop.
So when we're preparing a meal and we want to match our food and wine, what kind of things do we take into account to ensure we create the right blend?
Most people begin with the food, deciding on what dish to serve before selecting a fine wine from the cellar, or taking a recommendation from a friend.
Michael Newsome is a certified Italian wine specialist and he writes for one of the US's largest independent public television stations, KCET.
He believes there is really no such thing as a 'food wine' but merely wines that can be great.
Writing for KCET, he said: "All wine should be food wine. Wine is food in liquid form and should be a harmonious part of any table full of 'solid' food."
The expert questioned what people meant by 'food wine', arguing that it generally referred to wines with tannins, acid and moderate alcohol.
As such, those are the kinds of wines you might be looking to, like a French Bordeaux or Burgundy, or a slick Italian wine.
However, Mr Newsome believes Californian wines have been unfairly overlooked as a good food wine, despite being harvested by the ocean.
He continued: "[Producers] plant their vines in cool regions where the ocean influence tucks them in at night under a blanket of fog.
"They harvest earlier while the grapes still have proper pH levels, and with them they make great wine."
So what Mr Newsome is suggesting is that Californian wines can be the perfect accompaniment to food.
You can apply the same logic of acidity and alcohol content to a Californian wine when matching it with meals, but avoid the stereotype that perhaps these harvests are too sweet to serve with food.
Whether hosting a dinner party, or simply unwinding from a long week at the office, you might be best advised to try something a little different, a little Californian, this weekend.
Photo courtesy of *~Dawn~*
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