What wine to choose

Can you advise me on what wine to choose for a meal we are having this weekend with friends? Please bear this in mind first. Male 1 prefers white wine Female 1 prefers red wine Male 2 prefers lager Female 2 prefers white wine All of above will drink any of above.

The proposed menu is a starter of tomato/basil pasta. Meant to be an Italian style dish. The main is a full bodied curry. What I am looking for is suggestions of a style of wine that may suit the two very different courses. Grapes etc rather than specific brands please. Thanks Jonny

Reply to
Jonny
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Try this link, it goes to the TESCO site which matches styles of wine with various types of food. Good luck!

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Reply to
Terence

"Jonny" skrev i melding news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...

Hi The curry calls for a sweetish white. Common wisdom is that tomatoes don't enhance wines, unless the preparation deacidifies them (I don't find that a problem myself, however). A creamy sauce with the pasta sounds fine to me with a white wine. A Semillon could be nice, well chilled. Or a German Riesling of Kabinett type from a Rhine area, if you can find one. Anders

Reply to
Anders Tørneskog

I'd go with a fruity Pinot Grigio. The light dry style will stay out of the way of the cream sauce and the fruitiness will work with the curry.

Reply to
Jeff Russell

I'd agree, I've found Gewurztraminer to be the best wine accompaniment to most Asian food - although it's not a type of wine I like much otherwise!

I usually prefer beer to wine with Asian food though, a good well-chilled pilsener, a well-hopped pale ale or even a wheatbeer all work well with curries.

pete

Reply to
Pete Fenelon

and

If it were me, especially with four people, I wouldn't try to match a single wine to both dishes, but have at least two.

Reply to
Ken Blake

I'd agree. The Pinot Grigio sounds fine for the starter, and would also do for those who want to stay with white wine for the curry. If you'd like a second choice for the main course, I'd suggest a hearty Australian Shiraz or Washington State (US) Syrah. But I'd probably opt for a good lager - Pilsner Urquell if available.

Cheers, Rowan

Reply to
Rowan Malin

Madhur Jaffrey suggests Chablis and Pinot Grigio, an Australian Merlot or mid priced Bordeaux. If you can be more specific about 'the curry' we could be more specific about the wine, but it sounds as though your 'curry' is non-specific. What are you going to bung in it? I would start with a dryish sparkling white and for the full bodied curry an American Cabernet or Shiraz. A cold ruby port would also go. If the curry has coconut and tomatoes, maybe a red Bordeaux or spicy Gewurztraminer, even a cold Madeira or Oloroso sherry. cheers Wazza

Reply to
Bryan Wallwork

Hi there,

J> The proposed menu is a starter of tomato/basil pasta. Meant to be an

I'd go for something light, fruity crisp and dry. I found that no wine can compete with the flavours of a "full bodied" curry, so I usually keep things on the cool and refreshing side. Pinot Grigio, or Chardonnay should be perfect, and they go well with any kind of pasta, too.

With my curries, I personally prefer cider. Nothing beats a fresh pint (or two) of Scrumpy Jack.

Have an nice one, Peter

Reply to
Peter Zinckgraf

Good points Bryan. If the curry is a heavy one such as lamb, I would like to suggest an California Zinfandel perhaps Ridge or Ravenswood. American Zins can be soft in the mouth like a Merlot with a spicy or peppery finish.

Jeff

Reply to
Jeff Russell

interesting how you interpreted 'heavy', I thought heavy on the spices and/or chilli! I had not thought of lamb as heavy, they bounce off things rather well round here ;?) nearly got two of the woolly maggots today, spring lamb anyone......! cheers Wazza

Reply to
Bryan Wallwork

I was focused on the type of meat when defining it as heavy.

Gewurztraminer,

Reply to
Jeff Russell

Quoting from message posted on 1 Jul 2004 by Peter Zinckgraf I would like to add:

or Thatcher's cider made from single variety apples - Katy or Spartan go well with curries.

Reply to
Elaine Jones

Quoting from message posted on 30 Jun 2004 by Jonny I would like to add:

This query has come up a couple of times and if you check google groups you'll find that it initiated long discussions both times and there was no conclusive agreement.

Personally for wine with Indian curry I go for a gutsy Aussie Shiraz.

Reply to
Elaine Jones

Salut/Hi Ken Blake,

le/on Mon, 5 Jul 2004 16:57:00 -0700, tu disais/you said:-

Can't agree, sorry.

Again, can't agree.

I quite agree with you, Ken. As I've said on the many occasions that the subject has come up on afw, at best the choice of wines with dishes containing significant levels of chiles and other spices, is damage limitation. I know TomS doesn't agree, but I think he's in a small minority on this.

So from the point of view of damage limitation, I find that spicy wines with some sweetness, served cold, resist better than almost anything else. I've not tried a powerful Gruner Veltliner, and it's possible that such a wine may well be a good example of the type of wine I'm thinking of. My shortlist would be for a reasonably priced Gewurztraminer.

A much better choice would be beer, and better yet fruit juice (real fruit juice). In India, water or lassi seem to be the beverages of choice, if anything, though as I understand it, most people there don't drink much with Indian food.

One problem of course, is that the range of dishes under the umbrella of "indian food" varies hugely, from the meat phall so beloved of "after the pub" machismo types in the UK, where nothing whatsoever can survive (except TomS' mouth), to the most delicate roast chicken, with just a touch of lemon and garlic water, where the spicing won't stop any wine showing well. However, if you consider the _sort_ of food normally found in Indian restaurants up and down the UK (especially), with rich sauces containing liberal amounts of a variety of spices like chillies (UK spelling) coriander powder, cumin powder, turmeric, cardamom and so on, then my previous generalisations are valid.

I know that many food writers (including Jaffrey and Chapman etc) are happy to recommend wines for curry, but I don't think they are using sufficiently exacting criteria to judge the matches. I think their suggestions are more driven by the public _demand_ for a match, than by its success.

One question I'd ask of anyone proposing a match is "is the wine going to taste better for being drunk with this dish?" If the answer is "no" as it will be in 99% of cases then the match is never better than moderate. The other question is the mirror image. "Will the dish taste better for being matched with this wine?". Again if the answer is "no" then it's NOT a good match.

I should say that I am a long term (>40 years) fan of indian food and a slightly less long term fan (>30) years of wine. In the twenty years I've practiced my favourite hobby of matching food and wine, I've never ever found a _good_ match (using the criteria above) of any typical "curry", though I've tried often enough as you can imagine.

(as a personal note to you, I've not forgotten to contact the SNCF on your behalf soon).

Reply to
Ian Hoare

I tend to agree with Ken, althuogh I'd prefer to avoid terms like 'rough' when referring to any wine I'd choose to drink. As I said earlier in this discussion, a robust hearty red would always be my wine of choice with heavily spiced foods.

Not a bad chocie, perhaps, as it's got enough character to cut through the spices, but I'm puzzled by this talk of 'damage limitation'. If I'm eating spicy food I want a wine to enhance it, not kill it.

Well they don't go in much for alcohol in general, so it's a bit of a moot point IMO.

Hmmm, maybe, but you're overlooking the fact that wine is 'supposed' to be drunk with food, so it's more the second question below which is of importance.

Exactly, but I find that there are a great many wines where the answer here is in fact 'yes'.

Basically, it's all simply a matter of taste, and I'd be just as reluctant to say that people 'should' drink this or that wine as I would be scornful of anyone saying I 'should not' drink wine with curries at all.

Reply to
Ace

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