No Perfect Pairing

On Christmas day 2018, my parents gifted me a spot in a food and wine pairing class hosted by the Stonewall Kitchen in York, ME. As I picked up the paper tickets from out of the unwrapped box, I couldn’t really tell if this was borne out of good intentions or if this was a non-confrontational way of commenting on the state of my cooking ability.

My relationship with food had never been a healthy one (figuratively and literally). I didn’t have anything against eating healthy; rather, fixing conventional meals just seemed like something people with a steady paycheck did.

Since leaving my parents’ home after high school, my three-course meals followed a strict regimen: canned goods like Campell’s chicken noodle soup and a cigarette for breakfast; apples stolen from the grocery store for lunch; and going to sleep for dinner.

Wine, on the other hand, was something that I avoided altogether. My only exposure to the reds and whites came from inside a cardboard box, which was ripped open, plastic bag extracted, slapped with pornographic violence, and opened with a twistable nozzle. To this day, I’m embarrassed to admit the first time I ever tasted a red was when it was sprayed all over my mouth like a bukkake from someone desperately in need of medical attention.

As time went on, though, I started to second guess my indifference to food and wine. Thinking about both of those things intelligently seemed like the next logical step to adulthood, so when I received the gift, I thanked my parents sincerely and spent the next month studying food and wine pairings religiously.

*

Folks from all different disciplines have searched for the scientific principle behind pairing food and wine. Articles exploring the topic have been published by chefs, sommeliers, scientists, and “wine enthusiasts,” or, as they’re more addressed, alcoholics.

Terms like “matching like with like" or “what grows together, goes together" are referenced frequently. In an article for Wine Maker, Bob Peak writes that not only is this the “most predictable and reliable technique,” it’s also the foundation of historical wine and food pairings. Like most culinary philosophy, the foundational aspect was necessity; whatever wine was available locally was what was paired with the dinner item of the evening.

From the perspective of hard science, consideration must be made for the chemical changes during consumption.

“Humans can detect 10,000 or so aromas,” Peak writes. “These aromas reach the receptors not just through the nose, but also through the retronasal passage connecting the mouth with the olfactory center. Thus, as food is chewed and generates smellable vapors, the perception of taste changes.”

The same can be said with wine, although there is more of an emphasis on the ethyl alcohol content and how this changes as it is warmed in your mouth. However, for folks like me who may have barely passed molecular biology in college (and probably shouldn’t have even been enrolled in the class in the first place), it doesn’t say much about the compounding of what we actually “taste” in both food and wine.

But as one reads through more casual articles on the subject, the simplification leads to several contradictions. For example, it’s highly encouraged to pair food and wine that have similar flavor profiles, but you should also consider that it’s highly encouraged to pair food and wine that have polar opposite flavor profiles. The latter makes sense with certain dishes; as the San Francisco Wine School points out, “[v]ery few wines are literally salty. So you can’t match a salty food. But, you can balance the salt with…sparkling wine.” In other words, if you spring for a Dom Perignon Brut Champagne that’s been aged for ten years, it’s acceptable to pair it with a bag of potato chips, which is a good thing considering that’s all you could really afford for dinner after buying the wine anyway.

In some cases, it’s not even about your choice of wine selection, but rather about the environment in which you’re consuming these things. Rosé and cured meats, for example, are going to taste different when you’re day drinking while having a picnic with the kids in the park as opposed to when the exact same combination is consumed at a stuffy dinner party that you’re desperately trying to leave.

On several occasions, writers will just throw out dishes and wines without explaining why the two compound with each other. In Food & Wine Magazine, the editors claim, “Malbec, Shiraz, and Cotes-du-Rhone are bold enough to drink alongside foods brushed with heavily spiced barbecue sauces—just be careful that the sauce isn’t too sugary-sweet, which can throw off the wine’s fruit." But when 50% of sauce choices at the grocery store are sweet, and it is also a foundational flavor for cuisines like Kansas City-style barbecue, suddenly the suggested pairing seems bitter. You’re left standing in the wine aisle at the supermarket with a squeeze tube of Sweet Baby Ray’s, blindly purchasing the Artie Cabernet Sauvignon because the cork dressed like a koala on the label is kind of cute.

When I finally threw my notebook and pen on the ground after several hours of research, I thought maybe attending the demonstration would help clear some things up.

*

When the night of the class arrived, my cousin Frank and I drove up to York, blooming with anxious energy. Stonewall Kitchen’s headquarters looks less like a culinary school and more like a state welcome center. We walked against the brittle January wind along a short path glittering with decorative tree lights. I opened the door and was welcomed with the warm, salty scent of seafood.

The classroom looked like a high school chemistry lab at a prestigious charter school, with tall stills and high-top tables. Around the room, the walls were lined in Stonewall Kitchen products sitting on steel shelves, like a chic, gourmet fallout shelter.

Which artisanal chutney compliments the inevitable apocalypse?

In the front of the room was a massive kitchen counter with two gas-fueled ovens, grills, refrigerators, and an expanse of counter space. Five women in black aprons prepped militantly, straining pasta, scooping mussels, and adding garnish to scallops.

On the left side of the room, the sommelier, a tall, well-dressed woman with electric blue eyes, studied four bottles of wine.

I felt a tap on my shoulder. My cousin Frank pointed at one of two televisions suspended above the chef’s counter. The Food Network was airing an episode of “Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives." The host, Guy Fieri, was marveling at a sandwich that looked at least six inches tall.

“When we get back to the house, we have to play a drinking game,” Frank said. “Every time Guy takes a bite, you drink. Sometimes he takes two, sometimes he takes 12.”

“You take two drinks if he does it while he’s sweating,” I added, grinning.

The sommelier came over to each table to introduce herself. We chatted briefly about ourselves and asked about her. In her early career, she said she had gotten her education working with a wine and liquor distributor, but when the money wasn’t exactly coming in, she chose to use her talents of selection recommendations to the always-reliable, honest world of pharmaceutical sales.

The first thing that came to my mind was to ask her what kind of wine pairs best with Vicodin, but I reminded myself that I was in this environment to become a better cook, not a worse human being.

Before I could ask more questions, an older man behind us cleared his throat. I turned around to find him staring at Frank and me.

“I couldn’t help but overhear you guys are from New Hampshire,” he said. I only had a moment to purse my lips before he cocked his head back to his wife and said, “We’re from Wolfeboro. We come over here all the time.”

He turned to his wife, who smiled politely back at him.

“It’s a bit of a drive, but, you know,” he paused to take a deep whiff and exhaled loudly. “It’s worth it to get some pointers on cooking.”

The man from Wolfeboro wasn’t dressed like any cook I had ever met, with his tweed jacket, khaki pants, and greasy comb-over. Rather, he looked like someone who would stop the Japanese-speaking busboy at a mixed-cultural restaurant, holding a leaking bag of trash, to have him tell the chef that the Yakitori lacked a certain je ne sais quoi.

The sommelier called the class to attention. She kicked things off by introducing her first wine.

“The Bertani Due Uve is a hybrid of the Pinot Grigio and the Sauvignon Blanc,” she said, watching the wine swirl between her fingers. “It combines flavors of pear and peach at the top of the tongue, with elderflower and sage rounding off the palate.

“There are three different types of aeration methods that will help you taste wine like professionals,” she said. “The first method is called ‘trilling’. You take a sip and suck the air through your mouth as you hold the wine on the top of your tongue.”

The sommelier tipped the wine glass to her mouth and warped her lips into a massive O-shape. She sucked in, making a bubbling sound like she was trying to cool off a mouthful of boiling hot soup, but in reverse.

The second method, “chewing", was exactly how it sounded. Chewing the wine like a tough piece of steak would create a traffic of air that would excite the wine into encompassing your senses. If you’ve ever tried to chew liquid before, you should know that you are certifiably insane. But like with everything else, the only real difference between certified insanity and high culture ultimately comes down to how much money you have.

The third method required us to hold the wine in our mouths and inhale through our noses. As the diners filled the room with a chorus of sniffing, it became harder to discern these three aeration methods from the behavior of a bored toddler at a restaurant.

The Bertani Due Vue was paired with steamed saffron mussels and toasted brioche. As the service staff delivered our food, Guy Fieri disappeared from the television screen and an aerial shot of the head chef came into view, demonstrating the cooking technique of the first course.

Everything felt so calculated; the service, the plating, the set-up of the utensils. The professionalism of it all inclined me to really take this seriously. As everyone started eating, I pulled out my journal to take notes.

“Does anybody have any questions before we move on the second wine?” the sommelier said.

I felt the man from Wolfeboro raise his hand with simultaneous earnestness.

“These mussels,” he said, smirking, “are they from Bang’s Island?”

Everyone, the staff and the audience, looked around confused. The head chef leaned towards the sommelier. They shared a few whispers. Then she turned back to the audience. “I believe these mussels are actually from PEI,” she said. “Prince Edward Island.”

The man from Wolfeboro clicked his tongue and nodded. He took another bite of his food. We stared at him for a while, waiting to hear his follow up about Bang’s Island. He just sat back, chewed, and smiled with misunderstood pride.

The sommelier moved on to her next wine. The Carpenè Malvolti Cuvée Brut Rosé was another blend, this time combining predominantly Pinot Noir with a Raboso. (“A designer wine,” the man from Wolfeboro said under his breath. He rolled his eyes, “from Northern Italy.”)

The wine was extremely dry, with intense carbonation like a soda. Enjoyable, but I wished I had something to wash it down with.

The pairing was another tapas plate; scallops with crispy pancetta, shallots, and garlic. To the uninformed audience, she explained that pancetta was essentially fancy bacon, and shallots were the less smelly cousin of the onion. I marveled at the information, the tastes, the textures. For the first time, I thought critically about food; making connections using only your taste buds, sending messages to each other like neurotransmitters in the brain.

The sommelier, after watching the chef prepare the dish from her station, looked to the audience for questions. Everyone remained silent, enjoying the food.

Everyone except for one person.

“I have a question,” the man from Wolfeboro said. Again, we all turned to look at him. “This one is for the chef.” Relieved, the sommelier poured herself a little taste of rose and sipped elegantly. The head chef let beads of sweat roll down her face.

“I’m getting a sensation,” the man said, before stopping to reflect. I hoped that the sensation he felt was an allergy attack from the shellfish.

“I’m getting a sensation of...black pepper,” he said, finally. “I know you probably put something in the scallops, but I was wondering…" Suddenly, the man seemed to have lost his train of thought. The class was held in silent suspense while he bathed in the spotlight.

“See, you know, I like burnt cookies. I like when my cookies are burnt, you know? And I’m getting the same sensation. It’s just reminding me of burnt cookies, these scallops.”

The head chef smiled politely. “I definitely used black pepper in this dish, for sure.” She turned to the crowd with a reassuring look that implied it was ok, even encouraged, for them not to pick up on the taste of burnt cookies in their scallops.

The man from Wolfeboro smiled contentedly, then turned to his wife. He flashed her a look that said, “You’re sleeping with a transgressive food critic tonight, babe.”

Our third course started with a pour of Fasoli Gino Bardolino “La Corte del Pozzo.” The wine was much fruitier. It had a floral smell and taste to it, wild roses and fresh flowers. The sommelier explained that this is one to drink while it’s young.

The wine was paired with a Shrimp Fra Diavolo. It combined a lean protein, some delicious handmade pasta, and a level of spice that could give you a stomach ulcer in a single bite.

The sommelier explained that one of the most common errors diners can make when cooking with spicy food is to pair it with a dry red like a cabernet sauvignon, which doesn’t cut the spice, but rather accents the wine’s bitterness.

My ears perked up. As the head chef continued with her cooking demonstration, I regressed into my head. My foot tapped furiously, holding tightly to the profound question I had come up with: What then, pray tell, pairs well with spicy food?

By the time the sommelier asked for questions, I hadn’t even noticed that the service staff had placed the Shrimp Fra Diavolo in front of us. In the split second I looked down at my plate, a voice shot across the room.

“Yes, well, what, then, pairs with spicy food?” said the man from goddamn Wolfeboro. She hadn’t even begun to answer before he slouched back, crossed his arms, and smirked, satisfied. Everyone around the room ignored his comment, while I sat there in the funk of his words which smelled like sun-dried shit.

A moment arrived of exact hopelessness. The sommelier went into her fourth wine, but her words devolved to static before they reached my ears.

The man from Wolfeboro absorbed the attention in the room. In between bites, the diners glanced over at him to gauge his reaction. I huffed and shook my head. Suddenly, my hunger for education didn’t seem so urgent. Was this what being an expert looked like? What was the benefit of having knowledge when you come across like a snoot. I stared at the grease in his hair and shuttered violently.

I snapped out of my thoughts as the kitchen staff were sharing applause and the audience started packing up to leave.

As I zipped up my coat and grabbed my car keys, I made eye contact with the sommelier. I do enjoy spicy food and cabernets, so I approached her again for her advice.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I got distracted by something. What did you say pairs well with spicy food?”

She looked me up and down and smiled. “There is no kind of spicy dish that doesn’t go well with a nice, cold beer.”

I stepped back. “Really?” I said. “Well, what kind of beers? Something dark, right?”

She shrugged. “Whatever you enjoy drinking,” she said. “There is no perfect pairing. Eat whatever you want. Drink whatever you want.”

With that, she walked towards the door and was swallowed by the night.

I stood, baffled. I felt two things simultaneously. The first was validation. Food and wine pairing felt impossible to learn because it is impossible. The experience will always be subjective, no matter how deep the science or art goes.

The second was this feeling of having been royally screwed out of $75.

*

Most literature discussing food and wine pairings will come with a disclaimer, typically found at the top, bottom, or bookending the essay. As I embarked on my research, I saw this disclaimer several times, my eyes rolling harder each time I read it. At the time, it seemed like a disclaimer that feels like it has to be said as a precaution but that you ultimately ignore, like “you have to be this tall to ride the roller coaster,” or “don’t drink while on this medication.”

But after experiencing the process personally, thoughts occur that maybe, instead of an empty precursor, this may be the truest part about the entire experience.

The editors at Food & Wine Magazine published an article in 2023 called, “15 Rules for Great Food and Wine Pairing.” Before you get a second to take the first sip of your reading wine, the editors note at the top of the article that, “...you can eat pretty much whatever you want while drinking whichever wine you choose. Are you pairing a green chile cheeseburger with a glass of crisp Chablis? Sounds great. Would it be recommended in most food-pairing guides? Not really, but go for it.”

After the breakdown of each individual taste profile, Peak often ends his brief paragraph by saying, more or less, “let your tasting profile be your guidance.” Good advice, but that puts a lot of pressure on palates of people who feel strongly that original Mountain Dew is far superior to Code Red or Baja Blast.

Le Cordon Bleu in London didn’t even allow the article to breathe after the reader uncorks the first lines of the introductory paragraph. Their first point on food and wine pairings says, “[b]efore even reading about the best food and wine pairings, you should consider YOUR personal taste. If a combination pleases you [sic] then it is a good choice for you.”

Some folks even went so far as to dismiss the idea of pairing food and wine altogether. Speaking at the International Sauvignon Blanc Celebration in Marlborough, New Zealand, Master of Wine Tim Hanni drew controversial attention by dismissing the idea of food and wine matching as “bullshit.”

He pointed out the evolution of French wines over the course of decades, arguing that wines like “Montrachet used to be sweet and Cheval Blanc 1947 has 30g/l of sugar in it.” The food and wine pairing consumers are militantly faithful about the historical pairings, but why should they be when the modern day winemakers don’t even do that anymore?

“A lot of people enjoy being arrogant about wine and consider entry-level wines as being unsophisticated,” he was quoted as saying in Lucy Shaw’s article in The Drinks Business. “We need to educate the trade to better serve the personal interests of wine lovers.

“We need to celebrate the diversity of consumers, not make them feel stupid. You can serve Sauvignon Blanc with steak – why not?”

Why the fuck not, indeed.

*

Frank and I pulled up to his apartment. My head was still spinning as I walked from the car to his apartment door.

Inside, his wife was sitting on the couch in the living room. We made eye contact with her from the kitchen. A small tin foil to-go container sat on the coffee table, next to a canned vodka drink.

“I had chips and guac for dinner,” she said, half-ashamedly.

I cracked up. Tears rolled down my cheeks.

“That’s just as good a meal as we just had,” I said. She smiled.

I turned and noticed that the television was tuned to the Food Network, and Guy Fieri had just arrived at a diner in Baltimore.

Back in the kitchen, Frank opened the fridge door. “Want a beer?” he said.

I looked at Fieri’s sweaty face and said, “Yes.” I couldn’t think of anything that could go so well together.

A.G. Sorette is a writer, storyteller, and teacher living and working in Maine. He splits his time between writing mind-bending science fiction and humorous non-fiction, and he's published stories in national magazines like After Dinner Conversation and Merrimack Valley Magazine.

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