deVine Table

Sure, we’ve all heard by now we don’t have to abide by the old rule of drinking only white wine with chicken or fish. Yet, how many people know how to go about pairing red wine with these dishes? One method is to pay close attention to what you prepare to accompany the dish. Put a sauce on it.

In our house, we typically put these sauces over simply roasted chicken or a hearty fish such as salmon or halibut. Sometimes, we improvise and put them on pizza or pasta. It’s that simple.

Here are some of our favorite sauces to pair with red wine.

1. Romesco Sauce, such as the version from the reliable food blog, Simply Recipes,  stands up to Merlot or Cabernet Sauvignon.  Try the Romesco over prawns sauteed in garlic.
2. Savory Blueberry Sauce pairs wonderfully with Merlot and Cabernet Franc.
3. Mole Sauce can top everything from traditional roasted turkey breast to anunexpected pasta dish and has a complex flavor profile that plays nicely with Malbec.
4. Sun Dried Tomato and Red Pepper Pesto make a delightful accompaniment for Sangiovese.
5. A deVine Twist on Pesto pairs nicely with Barbera.

Do you have a favorite sauce to serve up when you’re pouring a big red?

Basil Pesto and Ingredients

Some people might not consider this a true pesto due to the omission of Parmigiano and pine nuts. Since I like to use this sauce on dishes such as pizza or pasta where cheese is added anyway, I find that I don’t miss the Parmigiano in this recipe. The end result is a more balanced dish.

There are two reasons that I no longer use pine nuts in pesto. The first is that I have experienced a reaction to pine nuts resulting in  everything I ate and drank tasting chalky like Tums. There’s a great post about this phenomenon on Pinch My Salt.

The second reason I don’t use pine nuts in my pesto is that walnuts are great for cutting through tannin in wine.

This recipe makes just enough for a batch of pizza or pasta. (more…)

There are many advantages to eating in. For one thing, we can substitute anything we like! For another, we can open any bottle in the house without paying a 50% or greater markup. It’s also a heck of a lot cheaper overall than I imagined.

When the hubby and I eat out, he always makes comments about how inexpensive the raw cost of ingredients must be for foods like pizza or pasta. He is an accountant after all! So, I did a little experiment and broke down the cost of homemade pizza for the two of us and compared it to what we paid the last time we went out for pizza in Seattle. (more…)

Jeffrey Saad and Exhausted Me

“Trust your mouth. You know what you like; enjoy it.”

So says Jeffrey Saad, The Next Food Network Star runner up, 25-year food industry veteran and restaurateur. I recently returned from the 2010 Wine Bloggers Conference where I had the great pleasure of seeing this dynamic personality give a presentation on food and wine pairing.

Jeffrey asked us who in the audience would pair a Coke with pizza so that he could make a point about why the combination works together. A big laugh came from the crowd when not even one hand went up and he mused, “Wow, you guys really are a bunch of winos!”

Key pointers:

• Pair acid with acid, such as salad with vinaigrette paired with Grüner Veltliner.
• Pair fat in food with acid in wine, such as goat cheese in buttery phyllo cups with Argentine Torrontes.
• Pair protein or animal fat with tannin such as Kobe beef with Cabernet Sauvignon.
• Pair sweet with sweet. Sweet food spanks the fruit right out of the wine if the wine isn’t as sweet.
• Pair spice with sweetness. Spice does not like tannin; it accentuates it.
• Make funky ingredients a part of a dish, not the main flavor.

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