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The magic of local wines

It's never easy to find the right wine to serve with the dish you've just cooked for your guests, because we're not all amateur sommeliers, and then there are so many possible choices in wines that "the perfect match" seems like a distant utopia, almost impossible to obtain. Add to that a lot of preconceived ideas that we have unconsciously in mind, like fish = white wine, and meat or cheese = red wine, which make it very easy to get lost.

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Last modified on: April 7^th 2020

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The magic of local wines

Fortunately, you can ask your wine merchant for advice, which is always a good idea, or you can browse the web, but there you may also find almost everything and its opposite.

It is important to recognize that giving advice on wine is quite arbitrary, of course, matches that please everyone are possible, but there is also a good part of the taste, preferences and personal choices of the person who gives the advice that is found in the suggested wine, which is quite normal.

In short, all this to tell you that there are no established rules, and that the tastes of each person can give very different food-wine associations, and yet very successful.

So there are no rules? So it's true, globally, but there are some "tricks" that work all the time, and it's about one of them that I would like to say a few words.

There is a kind of constant in wine and food pairing, it is the wonderful association that happens almost every time with a regional dish, and the wine of the same region. Let's call it "The magic of local wines"...

I don't know which one influenced the other, but I have to admit that if you taste a regional dish, let's say typical of the area, you can safely opt for a wine from the same area, and be almost 100% sure that the match will be perfect.

I'll take two examples to illustrate my point:

cassoulet appellation cahors

1) Cassoulet and Cahors wine: If you serve a cassoulet to your guests, accompany it with a Cahors wine, a good one, which preserves its typicity, and not something neutral and smooth to flatter the globalized gullets, and you will be amazed by the result.

saucisse de Morteau vins du jura

2) Morteau sausage (a dish based on) and a wine from the Jura, in particular a white wine from the Savagnin grape variety, and there you touch on the marvelous... (Yes, yes, well, I'm probably overdoing it here, but what do you expect, this is one of my favourite dishes, and I should never get into it). Same thing if you taste an old Comté, with a lightly toasted sourdough bread.

This natural pairing is therefore an interesting option if you are hesitating about your choice of wine, and if your recipe is a little regional, look at the regional wines, you might just find what you are looking for.

Note of course that this agreement is not an obligation, besides there is never an obligation in gastronomy if you like, but just a very interesting option. And anyway, the possibilities are so numerous, and the tastes so different, that each one of us will have his way of seeing things, and thus of realizing his agreement. The ideal of course is that you, or one of your guests, say, after the first glass "Hey, it's not bad at all!

To sum up: Are you going to serve a (slightly) regional recipe? Always think of local wines to serve with it.

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