Sauvignon Blanc Wine

 

Archive for December, 2006

Dec
16

What Wine Will You Serve at Christmas Dinner?



Wine Choices for Difficult Food-wine PairingWhat wine will you serve with Christmas dinner? Perplexed? You are not alone.Even for very skilled and experienced wine connoisseurs, pairing wine with holiday meals at Thanksgiving and Christmas can be difficult. That is because there is not just one predominant course or flavor. Your Christmas meal may be poultry, ham, or roast beef based, but many different,  unique side dishes have strong opposing flavors as well. The question of choosing a wine which nicely pairs with your Christmas dinner becomes one of should you pair to match the flavor of the main course, the majority of the dishes, or the strongest, most powerful accompaniment?Unfortunately, there is no one hard and fast answer. On the other hand, this opens up a good opportunity for you to serve more than one wine or experiment with varietals at Christmas dinner.The most popular wine-drinking day in America is Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving meals, often the same or similar menu as what is served at Christmas dinner, suffer from the same wine-food pairing dilemma. Even Kevin Zraly, noted wine connoisseur and author of Windows on the World Complete Wine Course (2006, Sterling Publishing CO., NY) has no one simple answer. Zraly recommends serving what he dubs “user-friendly” wines. “User-friendly” wines are good quality, inexpensive wines that pair well with a wide range of flavors.So what “user-friendly” wines should you serve at Christmas dinner?