Food and wine pairing

Why is food and wine such a big topic?

For some reason, we find few rules of thumb when it comes to choosing juice, water, soda or milk for our food. But when it comes to wine, countless books have been written about how to pair it with food.

Why is food and wine such a big topic? Wine to a greater extent than drinks such as juice, water, soda and milk contains so-called structural components such as alcohol, acid and tannin. These are things that in isolation do not taste that good. A wine that only tastes of alcohol, acid or tannin is rarely sought after.

To balance these structural components, wine also has a number of other properties such as sweetness, body and aroma. A good wine can have a lot of alcohol, acid and tannin, as long as this is balanced by a lot of sweetness, body or aroma. When we combine food and wine, the food can affect how different elements in the wine appear and thus the wine's balance, for better or worse: A sharp red wine suddenly becomes soft and pleasant with steak; a wine that tasted a little sweet with the appetizer suddenly becomes an acid bath after dessert.

Isn't there an all-rounder?

You can minimize the risk of something going wrong in the encounter between food and wine by choosing wines with low alcohol, acidity and tannin, but the problem is that such wines often end up being quite bland. No risk, no gain, in other words. If you want to create the really good combinations, you can follow the five simple basic rules below.

This is how you create good combinations

1. The sweetness of the wine should be at least as high as the sweetness of the food
2. Extremely salty and spicy food benefits from sweetness in the wine
3. High acidity in the wine is almost always an advantage with food
4. Flavourful and full-bodied food requires flavourful and full-bodied wine
5. Tannin-rich wines require pink roast meat

What do these five rules mean?

The starting point here is that the wine should not lose its qualities when combined with food.

1. The sweetness of the wine should be at least as high as the sweetness of the food

This is the most important rule of all. If you eat sweet food, your palate will adjust to the sweetness level of the food. This will dampen the impression of the sweetness in the wine and you will be left with a wine with acidity and alcohol that is no longer balanced by the sweetness. This is why we drink dessert wine with desserts and cola with candy. Sweet to sweet.

This rule assumes that the wine initially has a good balance between sweetness, acidity and alcohol. If the wine is initially too sweet, it can actually be an advantage if the food is all the sweeter, as this will counteract the excessive sweetness in the wine.

2. Extremely salty and spicy food benefits from sweetness in the wine

Salty and sweet is a classic combination. You may already know it from popcorn and cola. Spicy and sweet as well. Think of Asian dishes that often have elements of both a lot of spice and sweetness like a sweet chilli sauce.

3. High acidity in the wine is almost always an advantage with food

Salt, acid and fat in the food dampen the impression of acid in the wine. This can make the wine appear unhealthy, lifeless or limp, if it does not have enough acid. Acid also helps to freshen up or lighten a fatty meal.

Almost all food will either contain elements of salt, fat or acid and a certain amount of acid in the wine is therefore almost always an advantage. There is an exception to this rule: If the acid in the food is extreme, as in certain versions of ceviche, this can enhance the impression of acid in the wine. Our palate becomes tired and there is simply too much acid overall. In this case, you should actually go against the rule and choose a wine with low acidity.

4. Flavourful and full-bodied food requires flavourful and full-bodied wine

A wine will taste bland and watery if the flavour of the food overpowers the flavour of the wine. Similarly, the wine will seem flimsy if the food is much fuller than the wine.

5. Tannin-rich wines require pink roast meat

Tannins are substances that dry out our mouths. They dry out our mouths because they bind proteins in our saliva that otherwise help lubricate the oral cavity.

When we drink wine with food, we want it to be refreshing. Many people therefore choose to avoid tannin-rich wines. But this is a shame, because there are so many tannin-rich wines that go well with food. And if you choose the right food, you can reduce the tannins.

The rule above is a simplification, but still a practical rule to remember. More specifically, there are two requirements for the food to attenuate the tannins:

• The food must be rich in proteins
• The proteins must not be denatured

Without the right food, tannin will bind to proteins in our saliva, and our mouths will become dry. If we add proteins through food, these can take some of the work away from the saliva, and we will not get dry mouths even if we drink tannin-rich wine.

However, if the proteins are coagulated (clumped together) due to, for example, heavy heat treatment (think hard-boiled eggs), they lose the ability to be bound by tannin. The rule is therefore strictly speaking that tannin requires proteins that are not denatured. In other words, a piece of rare-roasted meat that is rich in protein that has not been 'destroyed' by heat treatment will be able to dampen the tannins in the wine.