Pairing Wine with Foods

Hi, I am Brendan Walsh. Today, we are discovering the wonderful world of wine. In this clip, I will be discussing food and wine pairing techniques.

Now, most of you may have heard the concept of white wine with fish, red wine with meat and that is not a bad concept to start from. It actually serves as a very good base line. One primary technique that has been used to pair food with wine is the concept of matching weights. Your lighter bodied white wines would be a Riesling or a Pinot Grigio, your medium bodied typically, will tend to be a Sauvignon Blanc and your more fuller or heavier bodied wines will be a Chardonnay. Now, when you are pairing a lighter bodied Pinot Grigio or Riesling, that will go very well with a salad, maybe with a raspberry vinaigrette dressing and also some very, very light fish, maybe some sushi. With your medium-bodied Sauvignon Blanc, you can actually pair that also with some light flaky fish, maybe even some poultry. Then, with your heavier bodied Chardonnay, that pairs very well with a salmon or swordfish.

What we can see here today is that that I have prepared a crab stuffed salmon and I have paired it with a light oaked Chardonnay. With red wines, they also range from light to heavy or fuller bodied wines. A lighter bodied red wine would include a Pinot Noir or a Beaujolais. A medium-bodied red may include a Merlot or a Syrah- Shiraz. Finally, your heavier bodied or fuller bodied red wines may include a Sauvignon Blanc. With a Pinot Noir that will typically pair well with salmon as well as some poultry, your medium-bodied Merlot or Shiraz will also pair well with some beef or pork. Finally, a Cabernet Sauvignon will pair extremely well with some beef or lamb or some other game. You can see here that I have prepared a lamb loin that I have seared then broiled and I have paired it with a Cabernet Sauvignon.

Today, I discussed different techniques for opening a bottle of wine, proper etiquette for ordering wine in a restaurant, differences between red and white wines, the four steps in tasting wine and finally, pairing wine and food. Thank you so much for joining me.