Wine And Cheese Pairing By Harmony
Pairing wine and cheese by harmony consists in matching the hardness of the dough and the maturation of the cheese with the structure of the wine.
The principle is based on the idea that the alcoholic component of the wine is matched with the water content and the fatness of the cheese, creating balance. In fact, the alcohols break down the fats of the cheese, reducing them into compounds that are more pleasant to the palate and making interesting aromatic nuances perceptible.
The wine and cheese pairing by harmony is very common in Italy. In fact, the Italian dairy culture offers a very wide range of types of cheeses which allow countless combinations and pairings with wine. Lets find out some examples with this approach of pairing wine and cheese.
Examples of pairing Wine and Cheese by Harmony
Fresh and lean soft cheeses such as Robiola and Crescenza and Squacquerone can be ideal with light, aromatic and low alcohol white wines.
Semi-hard cheeses of medium maturation, such as semi-matured Pecorino cheese, can be paired with slightly tannic red wines or white and rosé wines with good structure. Try it also with macerated white wines.
In the case of hard aged cheeses such as Parmigiano Reggiano, Grana Padano, Provolone or Castelmagno, to support the organoleptic richness of the cheeses, you can opt for a full-bodied red wine, embellished with tertiary notes of aging in wood.
Classic & Unconventional Pairings
Though there may be some classic pairings, there are no boundaries when it comes to pairing cheese with bubbles, white, red, rosé, or orange wine. If you’ve got a specific bottle in your wine cellar you are looking to crack open for a little apéro and want a little more direction, these classic and unconventional pairings are here to help.
The Ultimate Guide To Pairing Cheese And Wine
Everybody knows that wine and cheese go together like, well, wine and cheese. But through human history, this timeless food and beverage pairing has gone from an everyday pleasure to a culinary conundrum. These days, we even teach classes on how to pair wine and cheese.
Luckily, a few simple tips will set you on the path to deliciousness. Read on for our guide to pairing cheese with wine .
Also Check: Does Red Wine Cause High Blood Pressure
Pairing Wine With Your Cheese Platter
Pairing wine and cheese is less of an art and more of a science. There isn’t just one style of wine and one variety of cheese. Wines vary in acidity, sweetness, body, flavour, and structure. While cheeses vary in age, flavour, texture, moisture content, and fat content.
Age: Younger cheeses, like Brie and Gruyere, contain a higher water and milk content. As cheese ages, the moisture begins to evaporate to produce a higher fat and protein content. This is important to consider when pairing cheese and wine. Generally, a young vibrant wine pairs well with a young cheese. And an older, bold and tannic wine pairs best with a fattier, richer cheese.
Sweetness: A sweet wine is best paired with a salty cheese. The perfect wine and cheese pairing for dessert would include a sweet dessert wine and a blue cheese with a salty, spicy tang. If youre serving a dry wine, then a fruit plate and a sweeter cheese will help balance the palate.
Texture: You can choose to either create a harmonious matching of textures, or offer a contrast. Some wine lovers will prefer a smooth, creamy cheese to blend cleanly with their buttery, oaky white wine. Others will enjoy the contrast between a creamy cheese and a bubbly Champagne.
How To Pair Cheese With Whiskey
Rich and complex, whiskey is something of a next-level cheese accompaniment, but its rewards are great. With flavors ranging from smoky and woodsy to toasty and nutty to fruity and floral, this spirit can pair with a range of robustly flavored wheels. Sip it on its own or pair cheese with a cocktail like an Old Fashioned or a Manhattan.
Round, caramel-y bourbon, for example, can complement an earthy English-style clothbound cheddar, while spicy, full-bodied rye goes well with both soft, buttery bloomy rinds and dense, crystalline aged cheeses like Gouda or Parmigiano. Smoky Scotch has the spine to stand up to a brash, flinty hunk of blue.
Don’t Miss: Where Can You Buy Empty Wine Bottles
Age With Age Body With Body
Another good rule of thumb is to serve full-bodied cheeses with full-bodied wines and old cheeses with old wines.
Very light cheeses, such as cream cheese, go best with a young, crisp white wine, while more flavourful aged cheeses require a more robust wine companion.
If you have an old, creamy, amber, aged white wine, whether it is a Riesling, Chardonnay or Gewurztraminer, serve it with flavourful aged cheeses. For instance, an aged Gouda, Emmenthal or even Havarti.
Pairing Tip #: Match Intensities
We often think about cheese on a spectrum of intensity, with soft, mild fresh cheeses and robust, pungent aged wheels on the other. We can think about wines in the same wayand seek out pairings that complement each other well on that scale.
For example, serving big, bold red wines with robust, long-aged wheels like cheddar or Gouda is a classic move, as is serving a young, soft-ripened cheese with a crisp white wine or wheat ale.
You May Like: How To Store Red Wine
How To Pair Your Cheese And Wine: Pairing Guide
Right, so you have planned the perfect evening.
A delicious meal is preparing in the kitchen, and the smells are wafting in. Beautiful flowers and decorations are arranged around the room. You have dimmed the lights, maybe even set a log fire burning in the grate to establish just the right mood but we are not there yet. Every magical night needs to start or end with the right cheese and wine. Now what?
No problem this is where we can help! Here you have the ultimate guide to wine and cheese pairings, so bookmark this page and read away
Pro tip #1: For a blissful relationship between your cheese and wine, always think about geography: products from the same area match perfectly. So when you grab your Ile de France cheese, think French wine!
Pro tip #2: Sweet white wines and reds go best with strong cheeses, while dry whites are best paired with soft cheeses. Remember, white wine generally goes better with cheese.
Now that we have sorted out some basics let us dive a little deeper.
Type of cheese: Ile de France Camembert and Brie
Wine pairing: Well, you have a few options here. You could go with a nice fruity red or even Champagne! Really this just depends on what you prefer. So when you shop for your Ile de France Brie or Camembert, look out for a rich red Burgundy from the Côte Chalonnaise, the Côte de Beaune, Pomerol, or Saint-Emilion, or perhaps a fun bottle of white bubbly .
Type of cheese: Ile de France Roquefort
Type of cheese: Ile de France Slices
Cheese And Wine Pairings
1. Merlot and Garlic and Herb Cheese
The garlic and herb cheese has sharp and tangy flavours. When paired with the Merlot, which is a dry red wine that is medium to full-bodied, the cheese brings out notes of black cherry, plum, and black tea. The garlic and herb cheese flavours are more heavily emphasized because of the Merlots dry fruitiness.
2. Cabernet Sauvignon and Extra Sharp Cheddar
A full-bodied and dry red Cabernet Sauvignon has hints of herbs and dark fruits. When paired with the extra sharp cheddar, the red wine draws out the bold cheddar flavours of this strong cheese. Cabernet Sauvignon also works well with other intense cheeses, particularly ones that are firm and salty.
3. Malbec and Vintage or Reserve Cheese
Reserve or vintage cheese has robust flavours, which need a red wine that can hold up against it. Malbecs are medium to full-bodied red wines that have black fruit, anise, and herb notes. The strong flavour of the Malbec complements the vintage or reserve cheese.
4. Zinfandel and Jalapeno or Hot Buffalo
Zinfandel is a dry red wine that is medium to full-bodied and has dark jam and black pepper hints. Because Zinfandel is fruity and spicy, it pairs well with these spicy cheeses for a bold combination.
5. Chianti and Tomato Basil or Tuscan
With smoky undertones of plum and cherry, Chianti is a dry red Italian wine that is medium-bodied and pairs well with Mediterranean flavours such as tomato and the basil.
8. Dry Rosé and Tomato and Basil or Mild Cheese
Read Also: What Kind Of Wine Can You Have On Keto
Wine And Cheese Pairings
Cheese is one of the most misunderstood foods when it comes to matching with wine. Cheese connoisseur Terry Kirby gives advice on how to do it properly.
Terry Kirby
Cheese and wine are alike in so many ways it’s no wonder we often consume them together. Both have vast ranges of styles, where national and regional traditions interweave with climate, soil and other changing natural influences, meaning one year’s batch can be very different from the last. Pests and moulds play their own parts, as does the temperature at which they are consumed.
Production methods, how they are kept and aged or not and the love and care, as well as the whims, of the people that make them all shape individual character.
What Is The Cheese Made Of
Cheeses are an excellent source of protein, calcium, B vitamins and many other nutrients, but they are also high in cholesterol and fat. The content of the various nutrients, proteins and fats reflect the quality of the milk of origin, in order of fatness: .
Fats can exceed 42% in full-fat cheeses, be between 20 and 42% in semi-fat cheeses and between 16% and 20% in those defined as lean.
You May Like: Where To Buy Personalized Wine Glasses
Wine For Aged Cheddar: Cannonau Di Sardegna
If youve got a really special vintage cheddar to eat, it deserves a truly great wine such as our limited edition Siddùra Fòla Riserva. This wine made from pure Cannonau is very full-bodied, with flavours of ripe black plum, and aromatic herbs that will work well with the salty and creamy notes of your cheese.
Pair Wine With Cheeses Of Equal Intensity
The secret to creating perfectly balanced pairings is to always pair wine with cheeses that are of equal intensity.
This means light cheeses should go with wines that are crisp and dry.
Bold cheeses should go with wines that are strong and robust.
For example, fresh, clean-tasting cheese like Mozzarella tends to be enhanced by elegant white wines with delicate flavours, while intense, full-bodied red wines are better suited to handle cheeses with bigger, more intense flavours like a Balderson 5-year-old Cheddar.
Don’t Miss: How Do I Sell Wine Online
Cheese And Wine Pairing Guide
Welcome to our exclusive cheese and wine pairing guide! This cheat sheet features all our truly unique wines and their finest cheese match.
The intense flavours and different textures of hard cheese need an ad hoc pairing as there is just so many variables to consider. Here we have selected three wines for the four most popular hard cheeses.
Manchego: deliciously salty with a drier texture.
- Aldwick Jubilate Blanc de Noirs 2015 – a superb English fizz with strawberries, stone fruit and hints of toasty brioche.
- Broadbent Vinho Verde NV – spritz white with bright colour and a lemon-lime zing on the palate.
- Anton Finkenauer Kreuznacher Riesling – young, dry and fruity Riesling with a gentle spritz.
Mature Cheddar: Intense flavour with a creamy texture.
- Fratelli Sangiovese 2016 – smoky, cherry aromas lead into a juicy palate with a fusion of baked cherries, elegant tannins and hints of tobacco.
- Terra Tangra Black label Mavrud – tannic, spicy and rich varietal red from one of Bulgaria’s finest producers.
- Pegoes Colheita Seleccionada White 2016 – full bodied selected harvest white wine with waxy aromas of orange blossom, peach and pineapple.
Swiss Gruyere: strong, salty flavour and drier texture.
Comte: a strong and flavourful cheese with a creamy texture.
Soft cheese is delicious and spreadable can be really enhanced by choosing the right type of cracker or bread and, of course, a glass of the right wine!
White Nancy Goat’s: crumbly, fresh and tangy.
Capricorn: crumbly and goaty.
White Wine & Cheese Pairing Ideas
Which cheeses go better with white wine?
White wines are the most flexible for pairing with the greatest number of cheeses young and aged selections alike. A recent magical experience of my own came with a Central Coast Chenin Blanc and Trader Joes Unexpected Cheddar. That said, Sauvignon Blanc goes great with fresh cheeses like Goat cheese and Brie, and Chardonnay goes great with medium-intensity cheeses like Provolone and some cheddars. Here are curated cheese and white wine adventures for you to try at home.
Sauvignon Blanc & Cheese Pairing Idea
The Sauvignon Blanc Cheese Assortment from iGourmet includes: Bûche de Chévre, Pecorino Toscano, and Montasio. The California Wine Club has selected two excellent Sauvignon Blancs to pair with this cheese assortment: Willowbrook Dry Creek Valley Sauvignon Blanc and Palencia Wine Company Columbia Valley Sauvignon Blanc .
Each of these wines will bring out unique characteristics in each of the cheeses. The additional grassy and herbal notes in the Willowbrook will bring a different pairing experience than the richer palate in the Palencia Wine Company selection. Learn more about this Sauvignon Blanc & Cheese pairing.
Chardonnay & Cheese Pairing Idea
Read Also: How To Open Wine Bottle Without Corkscrew
Wine And Cheese Pairing Guide
Wine and cheese pairing possibilities are endless. To simplify the strategy, cheeses can be divided into six categories.
Soft and rindless, these can be made with cow, goat or sheep milk. Theyre not aged and have a mild, slightly tangy flavor. While a log of bright white goat cheese is iconic, the category also includes farmers cheese, ricotta and others that come in tubs.
These are named for the bloom of white mold on the outside. They tend to be the richest and creamiest type of cheese, with a soft, spreadable texture. The rind is edible, and it has a stronger, funkier flavor than the interior.
A bath in brine, beer or wine produces a distinct orange rind. Theyre rich and creamy, and they can be soft or semi-soft in texture. Theyre funkier than bloomy cheeses, with gamy, often pleasantly pungent notes.
Theyre not spreadable, nor do they break in shards like a hard cheese. They tend to be creamy and fairly mild in flavor. Many are excellent to melt and perfect to slice. Some cheeses like Gouda are semi-soft in younger styles, while when aged, their texture turns hard.
Thank You! We’ve received your email address, and soon you will start getting exclusive offers and news from Wine Enthusiast.
The product of aging, these are quite firm and break into crumbles or shards. They tend to have nutty and complex savory notes. Some are fairly pungent and salty.
How To Pair Cheese With Amaro
Amaro, the name for a wide variety of herb-infused Italian liqueurs, is typically served at the end of a meal as a digestif. Since a multicourse feast is often finished with a cheese courseand because amaros complex profiles include a wide range of flavors like sweet, fruity, herbaceous, earthy, and medicinalthese two make a natural end-of-meal combination.
Cheery, orange-hued Aperolthe star of the trendy Aperol Spritz cocktailpairs beautifully with soft-ripened cheeses, especially sheeps milk styles. Pro tip: many amari include cardoon thistle as a bittering agent, so Portuguese cheeses coagulated with thistle rennet are a natural combo.
Sweet, herbaceous amari like Strega can play well with young, soft-ripened goats milk cheeses, while the caramel-plus-espresso punch of Cynar is a natural fit with crystalline, caramelized aged Goudas. With dozens of varieties of amaro to choose from, youre bound to find one that makes your favorite cheese sing.
Also Check: How Can I Buy Wine Online
Wine For Mozzarella: Pinot Grigio Or Pinot Bianco
Mozzarella, and its fancier cousin burrata, have a soft flavour that can easily be overpowered by big wines. Thats why its best to stick to a lighter option white wines are a fantastic choice here. Go for cool climate whites such as Alto Adige Pinot Grigio or Pinot Bianco.
These grapes have delicate flavours of passion fruit, guava, pear and elderflower that gently work with the subtleties of the mozzarella. The medium level of acidity helps to cut through the creaminess, without completely destroying it. Pour a glass on a warm evening and sip alongside a simple burrata and heritage tomato salad. Its the perfect way to to enjoy wine and cheese on a summer evening.
Wine Pairing With Territorial Cheese
Which wine to pair with? Certainly choosing cheese and wine pairings that are territorial is an excellent solution.
Examples of sensational cheese and wine pairings in this case can be Vernaccia di San Gimignano Riserva with Pecorino Toscano, Sauternes with Roquefort, white wines from Sancerre with Pouligny-Saint-Pierre goat cheese, Buffalo Mozzarella with Greco di Tufo.
Also worth trying is the pairing of cheese and territorial wine between the Mont Dor with the Chablis, the Fiore Sardo with the Vermentino di Gallura. Sensational also the Époisses with Pinot Noir from Burgundy, Canestrato Pugliese with rosé wines from Salento.
Also Check: Who Makes Chateau La Salle Wine
Red Wine For Brie And Camembert
Light and fruity red wines, like Pinot Noir, make the best partner for these soft cheeses. Try them with Kurtatsch Glen single vineyard Pinot Noir Riserva, Alto Adige DOC, a high-altitude wine from Alto Adige the top Italian region for Pinot Noir. Its crisp red flavours of hibiscus, cranberry and dried strawberry cut straight through the buttery and creamy texture of the cheese.
