Top wine food pairings for the holidays!
Food, glorious food! It is all well and good channelling your inner Mary Berry to create a Christmas dinner to die for, but without the right wine food pairings, even Rudolph might turn his nose up at your perfectly cooked carrots. These combinations should please all guests, reindeer or otherwise…
The cream of the crop for some tasty starters!
Start your Christmas dinner with a bang with some Champagne! For nibbles, it can be hard to find wine food pairings to suit all flavours! Fortunately, bubbly is up to the task and makes your dinner a really special occasion. If you have decided on one specific starter, tailor your wine to suit that. For example, Chablis is great with smoked salmon, as it is acidic enough to cleanse the palate and cut through the smoky flavour.
Don’t cook your goose - go for these wine food pairings!
Now the main event: the turkey. Wine with few or no tannins, such as a Cabernet, Shiraz or a Rioja, will complement this relatively lean meat. Tannins react with fatty protein molecules and taste sharp without fat. Salt clashes with tannins and what do we usually put on turkey? Yes, salty bacon! So avoid wine with tannins and you are onto a winner. As for goose, bring on the tannins - a Red Bordeaux works well. Nuts about nut roast? Fruity reds balance out the dish’s weight and flavour.
Proof is in the pudding!
Australian Muscat is great coupled with Christmas pudding, as the sweet toffee nut flavours complement it. If you cannot resist brandy butter, try Tawny port which is not so sweet. Chocolate puddings work well with port or Madeira and sherry trifle unsurprisingly goes with sweet sherry. Proof really is in the pudding…or perhaps whatever you pair it with!