Date: Fri 01-Sep-1995

Publication: Bee

Author: SHANNO

Illustration: C

Location: A-12

Quick Words:

wine-tastings-chardonnay-Small

Full Text:

Wine Wisdom-

Wine & Food: A Marriage Made In Heaven

By Steve Small

I have recently had the pleasure of attending some excellent wine tastings.

The wines were absolutely first rate; however, the wines alone do not tell the

whole story. What made these tastings special was the experience of combining

good food and good wine.

Much has been written about the proper matching of certain foods with specific

wines. Although it is fun to discuss how the flavor of a certain wine marries

well with a particular dish, fun is all it is. As a general rule, wine and

food go together like peanut butter and jelly, or spaghetti and meatballs.

They are such a good match it really is hard to screw it up.

One of the first things I learned about wine was an old expression that you

should buy wine with bread and sell it with cheese, the reason being that

cheese will make almost any wine taste good, while tasting with bread will

reveal the "true" taste of the wine. This expression made perfect sense to me,

until I realized that 99 percent of the time, I am drinking wine while also

eating.

One of the wines I found to be particularly nice with a light meal of chicken

or fish is the 1992 Sterling Diamond Mt. Ranch Chardonnay. This wine has some

mineral and acid flavors that can be fairly strong when sipped by itself. When

I had the wine with dinner, however, the mineral flavors and acidity were

softened by the food, and the wine was delicious.

At another tasting, we were served the new releases of the wines of

Zind-Humbrecht from Alsace in France. Although these wines are some of the

finest in the world, pairing them with some Alsatian cuisine made the tasting

truly memorable. The Zind-Humbrecht Pinot D'Alsace is a blend of Pinot Blanc,

Chardonnay and other white grapes. It is a complex, flavorful wine I enjoyed

by itself and with food.

The tasting then moved on to Rieslings, then Gewurtztraminer. Personally, I

had rarely tasted a "Gewurtz" I liked. The combination of Zind-Humbrecht's

Gewurtztraminers with a delicious Coq-Au Vin made with white wine changed my

mind. I find the taste of Gewurtztraminer to be dry, yet with definite fruit

character and acidity. If you are up for trying it, it is an excellent match

for spicy Oriental or Southwestern dishes. The wines of Zind-Humbrecht are

limited; prices start at $15 and go up from there. They are also singularly

top-quality wines.

I do not often get a chance to drink a number of different wines with each

course of a meal. My recent experience served to remind me that wine and food

is a marriage made in heaven, enjoyed at countless tables every day of the

week.

(Steve Small is the proprietor of Steve's Liquor Store, in Ricky's Shopping

Center at 71 South Main Street/Route 25 in Newtown.)