Here are a few quick and easy tips about matching food and champagne and they apply equally well to other wines. All rules are meant to be broken of course and that’s just as true about food and wine as about anything else, but if you’re new to this subject, or if you’re entertaining friends of business contacts and want to look and feel in countrol, then these suggestions may help.
1 ) Start by deciding on the wine/champagne to serve and then think about the food, not the other way round.
Why ? Because what’s in the bottle cannot be changed but the food can be altered in any number of ways : the style of cooking ( poached versus grilled, for example ) the sauce, the seasoning, the accompanying vegetables etc etc.
2 ) Start with dry and move to sweeter with each new course finsihing with a sweet wine or demi-sec champagne with dessert.
Yes, I am one of those people who always serve cheese befoe the dessert. It not very common in England, but I learned to do this during the 10 years I spent living and working in France and I still think cheese before dessert works best.
3 ) Start with white and move to red.
If you’re drinking champagne throughout the meal you can serve a rosé champagne instead of red wine.Mind you, and I’m already braking one of my rules, you may wish to return to white wine/champagne with the cheese and with dessert.
If you haven’t yet enjoyed champagne throughout a meal, please do give it a try. There are many styles of champagne and you’ll find one to match just about any dish you care to mention and besides, it’s delightfully indulgent.
By the way, I believe that there are more white wines than red wines that go well with cheese. So before automatically ordering red with cheese, do pause and consider a white wine.
4 ) Start with young and move to older wines/champagnes.
As a general rule the flavour of the dishes will become fuller and more intense with each course, so the same should apply to each wine you serve.
That’s it. I hope this has been useful. If you’d like to know more or if you like information about champagne dinners and champagne events, please contact me at
sparkle@champagne-discovery.co.uk
Jiles Halling
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