Itchy York article
How to order wine like a pro
All about wine and how to impress
Order wine like a pro
‘Would you like to see the wine list sir?’ It’s that wine selecting moment. That nightmare ten seconds where the concept of attempting to choose something other than the house white flashes through your mind, causing you to break out in a cold sweat with the stress.
Indeed the time comes for all of us when the idea of knowing a bit more than nothing about what to order over dinner appeals. Revise our handy notes and tips and never fear those fateful words again.
What goes with what?
Wine by region
Bordeaux - red meats, especially rare steaks, hard cheese, duck or foie gras.
Burgundy – (the region produces reds and whites) the reds go well with meats, especially lamb, rustic French cooking, onion sauces. Beaujolais, which comes from the South Burgundy region goes particularly well with tuna.
Champagne - light foods, oysters and caviar.
Rioja - steak, tapas and also happens to be the only wine that goes really well with mushrooms. Invaluable information when faced with a vegetarian Stroganoff. Honest.
Chianti – pasta, pizza or other tomato based foods.
Wine by grape variety
Chardonnay – a good all rounder that goes well with nearly everything (although not ideal with red meats). New World Chardonnays (those from New Zealand/South Africa) are more oaky and would go well with a mild korma. Old World (French) are made from Chablis and go better with seafood, and creamy sauces. But all in all you can’t go wrong.
Shiraz – an Australian grape variety. A spicy, peppery wine which goes well with meats and barbecues.
Sauvignon Blanc – goes well with goats cheese, salads, seafood, A New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc goes well with Asian cooking.
Pinot Grigo – goes well with all light foods.
Was it a good year?
We don’t think your ready to go learning loads of dates just yet. But if you want to blag a bit of random knowledge, we have it on good authority that 1992 was a bad year for Bordeaux reds. Slip that one into conversation and wait for the admiring glances.
Wine Tips
1. Choosing your wine with care is all well and good in a decent restaurant. Insisting on tasting the house white in a Harvester is kind of embarrassing.
2. Lambrusco and Concorde do not count as wine. They are just designed for sixteen year olds who are bored of cider. This is why they have screw tops.
3. Choosing between red and white on account of how badly you reckon the spillages will show up on your outfit is not standard practice. Just remember whites generally go better with lighter foods and for reds, put something deeper with meats and a lighter, fruiter one with anything else.
4. When offered wine to taste, you’ll look all professional if you swirl it around a bit, smell it and then taste it. Only amateurs go straight in for a taste.
5. Corked wine is not wine with bits of cork in it (although this itself isn’t ideal) it is wine that has gone off and will smell of rotting cork. Send it straight back.
6. Sounds obvious, but it is important that white wine is served cold and reds at a warmer temperature.
7. A vintage wine is a wine made using grapes from a certain year’s harvest.
8. As a general guide if you opt for a wine from the region your food is from, e.g. a Rioja with tapas, you won’t go far wrong. They’ll naturally go together.
9. If you’re ordering the house wine simply because it’s the cheapest, just do so with pride. Don’t waste your time tasting it. Drink it.
10. Alternatively, totally ignore all of the above. Once you start on the road to wine enlightenment it’s hard to go back to cheap, white, paint stripper type vintages with the same pleasure. What you don’t know your missing won’t hurt you.
Emma Howarth
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