Wine & Food Pairing 101

To some, pairing the right wine with a meal is daunting task, something that is to be left to sommeliers.  However, it’s much simpler and more intuitive than most people think.  As someone who loves cooking and drinking wine, food and wine pairings are always exciting to me.  I often buy a bottle of wine and plan a whole meal around it.  I’m always looking for a new and interesting pairing. 

There are several approaches to pairing wine with food, one which resonates with me is the concept of terroir and geography, or taking a regional approach to pairing.  “If it grows together, it goes together”: a common mantra of chefs and sommeliers.  Throughout the major wine producing countries of the world there is a wealth of different cuisines.  In France, for example, there are several regions, all of which produce their own specialty dishes and all of which make wines that fit in perfectly with the regional cuisine.  This is where many of the classic pairings originate. 

Highlighting a few regional pairings in France:

Burgundy is known for beef bourguignon which pairs well with a red Burgundy.  Buttery escargot go perfectly with a white Burgundy. From the Southwest, try a rich cassoulet with Malbec-based Cahors. Loire valley is famous for its chèvre (goat cheese), which pairs fantastically with a crisp Sancerre or Pouilly Fumé.

A typical cheese offering after a meal in France

Which brings me to cheese and wine pairings, which can sometimes be tricky.  Because of their buttery and nutty nature I usually find that sheep's milk cheeses are well paired with most wines.  At the other end of the spectrum blue cheeses can be more challenging.  I will always suggest a blue cheese with a dessert wine like Sauternes or an aged port. A juicy, zippy Zinfandel would also pair well with blue cheese. 

There are plenty of more challenging cuisines without the historical wine culture to refer to.  One of my favorite pairings with South and Southeast Asian food, for example, is a German kabinett or spätlese Riesling.  The refreshing, light sweetness and bracing acidity of Riesling cuts right through the spiciness and varied flavors of these regions, and balances beautifully! 

When I'm out to dinner, I rarely pass up a chef's tasting menu complete with wine pairings to experience the collaboration of sommelier and chef, and perhaps taste a different perspective on wine and food pairings. Experimenting with different foods and wines is fun and a great way to teach yourself how different flavor profiles do or don’t work well together. You may find the occasional terrible match but if you follow your palate you’ll be sure to find a great pairing. Don’t be shy, practice on your friends!  Once you taste the perfect pairing, it’s a fantastic and rewarding gastronomical experience.

In addition to our outstanding wine list we also offer cheese plates, which are served with baguette, McQuade’s chutney and almonds.  All of our cheeses are hand picked from Cowgirl Creamery to pair with our wine list. We’re always happy to suggest a great cheese and wine pairing for our guests here at the Barrel Room!

 Happy Pairing!

-Carolyn

only excellent: the story of the wines of the finger lakes

"Only Excellent. Good Wine is not good enough for humans - only excellent will do."--Dr. Konstantin Frank

Dr. Konstantin Frank

Once upon a time, the wines of the Finger Lakes region of upstate New York were little more than boozy grape juice, and those who produced them had resigned themselves to mediocrity. Believing that it was simply too cold in the region to grow quality, vitis vinifera grapes, winemakers of the region had long relied on the simple, sugary wines made from cold-hardy native American and French hybrid grapes like Concord and Catawba. It would take the persistence and dedication of a maverick mad scientist to turn the Finger Lakes into the impressive wine-producing region it is today.

In 1951, the prayers of those who desired great wine were answered with the arrival of Dr. Konstantin Frank, a 54-year-old Ukrainian immigrant, to the region. Although in the old country Dr. Frank had been a respected viticulturist, English was not one of the nine languages he spoke, so in New York he was forced to take a low-level, menial labor job at the Geneva Research Station, a grape research facility at Cornell University. Once he had found his in, Dr. Frank immediately began urging the local winemakers to experiment with planting vinifera grape varieties. He explained that his thesis at the Odessa Polytechnic Institute had been on techniques for growing vitis vinifera in a cold climate, and that if it could be done in the below-freezing winters of Ukraine, it could certainly be done in slightly milder New York. 

Winter in the Finger Lakes

As most mad scientists are at first, Dr. Frank was ridiculed by the local winemaking community. His idea that the failure of vinifera wines in the region was due not to icy temperatures but to the lack of proper rootstock was viewed as ludicrous (although admittedly, he may have hurt his case by telling women who drank labrusca wines that they would be unable to get pregnant as a result). The ornery Ukrainian viticulturist, however, refused to give up. After much perseverance, he finally was able to convince local sparkling wine producer Charles Fournier to give him a chance. Together, they planted thousands of Chardonnay and Riesling vines grafted onto hardy rootstock in Quebec, Canada, and then waited patiently until 1957, when the vines proved Dr. Frank's hypothesis to be correct. 

Shortly thereafter, Dr. Frank founded Vinifera Wine Cellars, which will celebrate its 50th anniversary next month, in Hammondsport, New York. The first vintage, a trockenbeerenauslese Riesling, was released in 1962, and upon tasting the success for themselves, other winemakers sheepishly began to follow suit. The Finger Lakes region is now home to more than 100 wineries producing wines made from vinifera grapes, the best of which are often bone dry, aromatic Rieslings, although great success has been had with Pinot Noir, Cabernet Franc, Chardonnay, and Gewürztraminer as well. More recently, experimentation with Austrian varieties such as Blaufrankisch and Grüner Veltliner has led to pleasing results. 

Keuka Lake in Autumn

In addition to Dr. Frank's Vinifera Wine Cellars, now run by Konstantin's grandson Frederick Frank and still producing some of the best wines in the state, top Finger Lakes producers include Sheldrake Point, Red Tail Ridge, Ravines, Hermann J. Wiemer, and Hearts & Hands. These wines are still sorely under-appreciated in the national marketplace, which makes them a little hard to find on the West Coast, but luckily a few of them are available at The Barrel Room. We have Sheldrake Point's fantastic 2007 Reserve Riesling by the bottle, as well as their delightfully aromatic and spicy 2010 Gewürztraminer by the glass. Also available by the bottle is Red Tail Ridge's earthy and unusual 2008 Lemberger (a synonym for Blaufrankisch). If you haven't tried the wines of the Finger Lakes, you are missing out. But if you, like us, have tried them and loved them, then you can thank Dr. Konstantin Frank. 


-Nikki