Wine Chocolate Pairing (by matchmywine.com)

As we approach Valentine’s Day, thoughts turn to wine and chocolate. Well, ok maybe we think of other things as well, but we do think about giving chocolates. Wouldn’t it be great to give chocolates and experience it with a wonderful wine?

Chocolate and wine, oh, so devine!

Wine chocolate pairing is not easy. The general rule with all pairings is the wine should be sweeter than the food, and this applies to chocolate as well. Otherwise the taste will be sour and the finish will be unpleasant. We usually think of Champagne or a Red. But so does everyone else and it seems outdated. Plus the bubbles get in your nose and the red can really ruin the whole experience since there are more bad matches then good ones.

You can’t go wrong with a dessert wine or port with fruity flavors high with residule sugars. If you don’t like sweet wines, Cabernets are a great alternative because a lot of them have a hint of cocoa, along with blackberries and spices. Make sure you don’t grab an oakey Cabernet though as you will be disappointed. The oak doesn’t work well with the sweetness of the chocolate and makes a bad match.

Read on …

Also read:

• Free Romantic Valentine’s Wine Desktop Wallpaper wallpaper (by ytsemike)
• Women drinkers ‘have better sex lives’  (by telegraph.co.uk)

McWine Pairing Tips (by Joshua Wesson)

What should you drink with Big Macs or pizza? An expert analyzes the basic flavor components of America’s favorite fast foods and suggests the perfect wines for each one.

 

Fast food and wine?

At the end of my last trip to France, my cheap, no-brand rental car broke down on my way out of Paris, directly in front of a large—and hugely busy—McDonald’s. Fate, I felt, had finally poked its finger in my back. In the nearly 20 years I’d been traveling through Europe, I had managed never to set foot in a single fast-food restaurant. This wasn’t out of some highbrow pretense, mind you—when stateside, I visit my local White Castle so often they give me my change in shares of stock. It just seemed philosophically boneheaded to eat the same food over there that I could get back home. Yet there I was, stuck in front of that familiar yellow-and-red “billions and billions” sign. It was dinnertime and I was hungry. And I wasn’t going anywhere soon.

I walked through curtains of Gauloises smoke and up to the counter, where in my best 10th-grade French I requested: “Un Big Mac, un Royal avec fromage (a Quarter Pounder with Cheese), des frites,” and—because I couldn’t resist sampling what the corporate palates had chosen to complement their cuisine—a couple of tiny bottles of vin rouge et vin blanc.

I sat there for two hours, guiltily picking at the burgers and fries, swirling and sipping the wines from little plastic cups. I was, by the way, the only one swirling and sipping anything in that place—and for good reason. Both wines were mediocre at best and actually tasted worse with the food than alone. The burgers and fries were fine.

This experience taught me two very important lessons: It doesn’t pay to drive a low-rent voiture, and the French don’t know jack about matching wine with fast food.
Read on …

How to Choose Wine (infographic) (by winefolly.com)

Original Source: How to Choose Wine

How to serve wine (by Decanter.com)

Tips on how to open, decant and serve your wines like a professional

 

Chambrez Vos Vins
Leave everyday reds and whites until the day you need them, but bring your finer reds up from a cool cellar the day before to bring them gently upto room temperature.

Let The Wine Breathe
When you have pulled out the cork some restraint is needed. Let the wine interact with the air, it helps the aromas develop and eases out the flavours.

Delicate Or Commercial Wines
With a delicate wine, or most commercial wines, there’s little need to practice the above. It may even prove fatal for the more volatile mature wines – just uncork and enjoy.
To Set The Process Off
Either leave the bottle standing, cork off, or better still, pour into a decanter. This will not give the wine nearly as much airing as when it is left in the bowl of a glass. Younger, more closed wines need longer. More complex wines really show their class with a little time.

Separate The Wine From Its Sediment
The main basis for decanting is to separate good wine from sediment. Vintage port and mature claret are the greatest culprits. Barely filtered California Cabernets (Cabernet Sauvignon being renowned for throwing a deposit) or Rhones (Syrah another sediment fiend) may muddy your glass if undecanted.

Learn more …