is there a philospohy of food pairing?

Howard Schwartz snipped-for-privacy@spam.com wrote in news:10uvm29ih8kfra0 @news.supernews.com:

It is a matter of what your palate likes in terms of tastes and textures. the general red with meat white with fish is an example. Dover sole is fairly light and would not usually be prepared like beeef with a brown sauce, similarly one would keep the wine lighter.

Salmon as is often noted is a heavier fish and like Tuna lends itself to fine mates with red wines. Tuna steak is one fish that I have trouble matching with a white at all.

As jcoulter pointed out, there are some guidelines but it is really a very personal thing. You will hear a lot of dos and donts about asparagus, olives, peanuts, spinach, soups, cheeses, but almost all can be proven wrong. There are some guidelines such as those provided by jcoulter, they are a good start.

Look up the archives of this NG and you will find some good threads about food and wine matching. Ian has theorized at length about this, and he is a very good food-wine matchmaker.

Mike Tommasi, Six Fours, France email link

A typical Italian dinner structure should be studied, in any Italian cookbook.

Start here:

I grabbed these from the internet too:

--------------------- The meal starts with an antipasto, which simple means before the meal and can be almost anything. The meal then follows with pasta or soup, then the entrée. The vegetable and salad may be served with the entrée or as the next course. Followed by cheese and fruit and desserts on a special occasion (like a dinner party). Finally the meal ends with a nice cup of coffee. The meal itself is served with a nice bottle of wine thought out the meal, rather than a different wine with each course.

------------------------------------------ The first course was usually an antipasto of meats (Prosciutto, salami and ham), marinated vegetables, cheese such as provolone and mozzarella, and roasted red peppers. You'd better take a little walk after that course to get ready for the following items. There might be a soup course; a stuffed pasta dish such as homemade ravioli, lasagna or manicotti; meat that was cooked with the gravy including meatballs, sausage and braciole; roasted chicken and/or roast beef. Sweet potatoes, stuffed artichokes, salad and string beans could all serve as accompaniments.

The dessert course completed the final couple of hours since it included fresh figs or other seasonal fruit, cakes, pignoli cookies and Italian pastries. Nuts in the shell sat in bowls, waiting to be cracked and picked over as the grownups engaged in heated discussions.

------------------------------------------------------------- If you don't want to cook Italian, I have nothing to say...

That was plenty, thank you.

I even have a Roman cookbook.

With 2000+ years of cooking and wine-making experience, it is to Italy one should look. The only reason that F____ has grapes is because the Romans brought them there, so the generals would have something to do. The Gauls had no wine-making cuilture.

All roads lead to Rome.

Hi Howard just read the thread and the answers all refer to food & wine pairing. Is this what you were asking? I read that you were asking about pairing just FOODS e.g. Tomatoes & Basil (Yes for you Mr Scarpitti :) ) Could you clarify please. Cheers Andrew

My intention was broader than wine and fine, but that's good too. In your example, why are tomatoes and basil a good pairing? And can that information be used to suggest other pairings that one might not have thought of otherwise.