Pairing wines with your favorite foods can be intimidating. Professional and amateur sommeliers might know just the bottle to pair with that sizzling steak, but weekend warriors might not be so confident. The Food
Network offers the following pairing tips to people looking for the right bottle to go with some popular foods.
Steak
Cabernet Sauvignon is a red wine that’s high in tannins. Novice wine drinkers might wonder why certain wines dye their mouth after drinking, and that’s because of tannins. Steak softens the impact of tannins because of its fat content, making this an ideal pairing.
Spaghetti & meatballs
Italian food and wine go hand-in-hand, and Chianti is a great wine to pair with spaghetti and meatballs. Chianti has a bold flavor, and the Food Network notes it has enough acidity to stand up to all the tomatoes and meat in spaghetti and meatballs.
Indian cuisine
Fans of Indian cuisine no doubt like spicy foods, but that doesn’t mean they wouldn’t also enjoy some temporary relief from their fiery favorites. Rieslings, which tend to be low in alcohol content, are sweet white wines that can be just the thing to complement all that spiciness. The Food Network notes that high-alcohol wines might make spicy Indian food feel even spicier, so if Riesling isn’t your ideal wine, at least opt for another wine with a low ABV.
Salmon
Seafood fans who love salmon might like it even more if they pair it with Pinot Noir. While many types of fish are best paired with white wine and Pinot Noir is a red, this pairing actually works well because the salmon stands up to the wine’s bold flavor.
Lamb
Red meat and red wine go great together, but different types of red meat pair better with different types of wine. Lamb and Bordeaux go great together because lamb has a gamey flavor that requires a rich, bold wine. Bordeaux fits that bill, allowing the rich, fatty lamb meat to absorb its tannins.
