Wine Dinner

For this wine dinner, I made a three-course meal with my roommates and some friends and paired wine with each of the courses. The three courses were the main course of chicken parmesan, a side dish of ratatouille, and a dessert dish of homemade brownies. We also made spaghetti to go with the chicken parmesan. The three wines we drank were a g.stepp 2020 Riesling, an F. Stephen Millier 2020 Rose, and an F. Stephen Millier 2020 Pinot Grigio. Later in this blog, I will explain the various pairings we were going for and how they worked out for us. All pictures will be included at the end.

In no particular order, I will begin discussing each of the three pairings beginning with the Riesling and brownies. We decided to make this pairing for a number of reasons. The high acidity pairs well with the relatively high-fat content in the brownies, we found this to be a good pairing based on reading the Wine Folly textbook which said acidity and fat pair well together. We also knew that Rieslings are a versatile wine which made us want to pair it with the brownies as the other dishes were easier to find a wine pairing for. The brownies we made were very soft and sweet with the flavor being entirely chocolate with no real notes of anything else. I was able to pick up on some citrus notes in the Riesling which really paired well with the sweetness of the brownies. I also found that the acidity of the Riesling paired very well with the richness of the brownies and made both more enjoyable to eat than if I had consumed either separately. The brownies also did a good job extenuating the acidity of the wine. Overall I would say this was a good pairing that worked out better than I had expected. Smelling the wine really showed the strong acidity and citrus notes before I drank it. After smelling the wine I was worried it would be too strong, but the pairing made the wine more palatable. This Riesling is from the Stepp winery in Pfalz Germany and is a 2020 vintage. It costs about 15 dollars for a single bottle. From cheapwineratings.com this wine was reviewed as follows: "Honeysuckle, white peach and mineral aromas give this wine a lovely nose. On the palate, it delivers tart white peach, green apple, pineapple and salty mineral flavors. The acidity is good and vibrant, which really makes your mouth water. The mouthfeel is nice. It has a fairly long finish with tart and salty tropical flavors. This is a very refreshing and easy to drink riesling." The Wine Folly textbook points out notes of lemon-lime, apricot, lemon zest, and tarragon as being commonly found in Rieslings on page 1011.

The next pairing I will discuss is the rose with the main course of chicken parmesan. The reasoning behind this pairing was to mate a simple dish with simple wine. I used the following website to make this decision https://www.winespectrum.com/the-best-wine-to-pair-with-chicken/. We settled on a rose because we had it on hand and the writer of this article made some good points about pairing a rose with a chicken dish. For the chicken parmesan, we used a fairly basic recipe that we had used before and got good results. The chicken was very moist and the sauce and cheese on the meat gave a very good, but not too complex flavor. Aesthetically the chicken also looked very appetizing, especially in regards to the cheese on top. Included in this dish was some plain spaghetti which I sprinkled with black and red pepper along with the chicken. The pairing with the rose was quite good as the simple fruit notes played well with the basic chicken flavor as well as the parmesan. I was able to pick up on some strawberry and raspberry notes as well as some kind of citrus flavor. These fruity flavors really added a lot to the chicken which otherwise would not have been as flavorful. Adding in some spaghetti with each bite really finished off this food and wine pairing. Overall I would say this pairing was very good, which based on what I knew about the two elements did not surprise me. This Rose is from the Lodi region in California and is a 2020 vintage. It costs about 9 dollars for a single bottle. Naked wines reviewed this specific vintage as follows: "A lighter crop in 2020 gave Stephen grapes double-stuffed with intense, fruity flavor and you can taste it in every drop. This is one easy-sipping pink delight you’ll want on hand for every sunny afternoon." The Wine Folly textbook points out notes of strawberries in most of the sections on various types of rose throughout the book.

The final pairing to be discussed is the Pinot Grigio paired with the Ratatouille. The primary reasoning behind this pairing was the light nature of Pinot Grigio pairing well with things like salads. Ratatouille is similar to a salad with its heavy focus on vegetables like eggplant, tomato, and squash. The ratatouille was made using a recipe we have used a handful of times and really liked. It is a very standard ratatouille with nothing out of the ordinary included. The dish came out very well and the seasoning specifically was perfect. The texture of the vegetables and sauce paired very well with the body of the Pinot Grigio and made for a delightful eating experience. The actual flavor of the Pinot Grigio ended up being stronger than I had expected which I was worried would damage the pairing. However, I did not properly account for how intense the flavors of the sauce and herbal seasoning of the ratatouille would be. This resulted in both elements having a stronger flavor than expected which ended up balancing each other out. While the pairing did work out rather well, I did not particularly enjoy the wine itself. I was able to pick up on the apple notes as expected, but I found the wine to be very loud in regards to flavor and too acidic for my taste. In regards to the pairing, I was very happy with how the elements interacted and I enjoyed the ratatouille, but the Pinot Grigio was one of my least favorites of this variety that I have tasted. This Pinot Grigio is from the Lodi region like the rose mentioned above and is actually made by the same winemaker. It is also a 2020 vintage. It costs about 14 dollars a bottle and naked wines reviewed it as follows: "This light, refreshing Pinot Grigio is an irresistible summer sipper full of bright, ripe fruit flavors and delicate floral aromas." The Wine Folly textbook points out notes of green apple, unripe peach, and lime zest among other flavors. After considering these notes I did find it easier to identify them in the flavor of the wine.

Overall I found this entire experience very enjoyable and educational. The food was very good as me and my friends put a lot of time and effort into making a good meal. It was also very interesting to try and pair each course with a wine that would best go with the flavors and textures of the meal. I was not a huge fan of the wines we drank, but they were all improved by the food they were paired with. Below are pictures from the dinner as well as pictures of the wine bottles. I forgot to take pictures of an