Food and Wine Pairing Class

Friday morning of the Napa Experience, I found myself sipping a Sparkling Brut at 9 AM. This was to be our longest day of tasting and swilling wines, and we began at Beringer. Beringer is a large production winery with numerous labels and quality levels. We all know about the Beringer White Zinfandel, the wine made from "no such grape". But they have a number of high end wines, some of which are on the Fleming's Wine List. Their Knight's Valley Cabernet is a wonderful effort if you get a chance. Today our effort was all about pairing wines with food and our lecturer was Jerry Comfort, a former chef and current partner in a Wine Education company that Beringer started.
Jerry's lesson revolved around the theory that food changes wine, wine does not change food. Our simplest lesson tested the effect of sweet and sour on 4 different wines. Armed with an apple slice and a wedge of lemon, we tasted four styles of wine: off dry (the White Zin), crisp white with no oak (sauvignon blanc), light intensity red with little tannin (Pinot Noir) and a strong intensity red with tannin (Cabernet Knights Valley). Each was affected in similar ways by the various outside tastes. After the sweet apple, each wine became more acidic or tart, and the Cabs tannins became more bitter and astringent. Even the White Zin lost all elements of sweetness. The lemon had the opposite affect, neutralizing the acid in the wines. The sweetness became cloying, and the reds became flabby, with no element of structure or mouth feel. We did a similar test with a piece of pepper coated Brie, simulating spicy foods. Typically we recommend wines with some residual sugar to pair with spicy foods (think Gewurtztraminer). The White Zin performed that role in this tasting, and the structure of the spice remained. When we tried the tannic Cabernet however, the oak accentuated the spice, and the taste of the fruit is diminished in the wine. The result is a very hot mouth feel and increased spice. Not a pleasant pairing. However when we seasoned the spicy food with lemon and salt, two typical additions, the resulting reaction helps reduce the spice, and works with the oak to "fix" the wine, and the flavor of the wine returns, and spice is modified. The subsequent pairings involved this theory. Various foods were "seasoned" with moderate levels of acid and salt, and the resulting pairing typically was a winner. The conclusion was that most wines pair with most foods, if the competing elements are neutralized with proper seasoning. This is most effectively shown when we add salt and lime to tequila! The Margarita demonstrates how the acid and salt neutralize the bitterness of the tequila and maximize the sweetness of the Lime and Agave. For homework, let me recommend you try a light white and a heavy red with a piece of Salmon, unseasoned. Watch the food affect the wines, the red especially becoming more oily tasting and overpowering the fish. Then add a bit of lemon and salt to the salmon. The result is a balance of flavors in the wine, and regardless of how big a red or light a white you use, they tend to work.