Last post I talked about those cool new wine closures made of glass now being used by some wineries. I asked myself what other closures are wineries using to seal their wine into bottles.  I’m familiar with natural cork, synthetic cork and twist tops but I wanted to see what else was out there so I did a little research and posted an article on the Reluctant Gourmet web site. See Wine Closures to learn more about these more traditional wine closures and a couple I wasn’t aware of.

What You’ll Learn About Wine Corks and Closures

In the article you will learn more about natural cork, where they come from and how they are produced.

Besides the corks mentioned above, you’ll learn what a Stelvin and Zork wine closure is and the pros and cons of each type of closure described as well as the cost for each. So check out Wine Closures and if you know of some others I missed and need to include, please let me know.

We had to evacuate our beach vacation on Friday and made it through Hurricane Irene last night safely although our power went out this morning. I wanted to follow up from my last post about dinner at Quahog’s Seafood Shack in Stone Harbor, NJ.

With everything from octopus ceviche to barbecued Pacu Pacu fish ribs to a Brazilian version of cioppino called Moqueca on the menu, that is story enough and if you didn’t see it, you can read the post at Dining Out in Stone Harbor.

But that’s not what I want to tell you about today.  The real surprise of the night came when the waiter uncorked the bottle of Calera Chardonnay that we’d brought with us and presented us with something that looked a bit like a glass drawer pull.  It was actually the “cork!”

Now, I’m familiar with synthetic corks, and I’ve even gotten used to screw tops on nice bottles of wine, but this is the first time I’d ever seen a class cork.  I did a little research and it turns out that its official name is Vino Seal, and it’s produced by Alcoa.  It first came on the scene in 2003 in Europe, and some American winemakers began using it for some of their wines as early as 2006.

Advantages of a Glass Cork

There are a couple of really nice things about the Vino Seal.  For one, it looks a bit like a regular decanter stopper, which is kind of cool.  It certainly looks much nicer than a plastic cork or a screw top.  Maybe I’m a bit old school, but I really do like natural cork.  I also realize that, while natural cork has been in use the longest and is the most accepted wine closure, it is not always the best choice.

Since cork is an agricultural product–the thick, spongy bark taken from a living tree–there are some down sides to its use.  For one, sometimes the phenols present in cork can react with the wine, causing cork taint.  Wines that are “corked.”  In short, mold forms and contaminates the wine. Sometimes the wine can smell or taste like mildew, but other times, the wine just might taste a little. “off.”  Regardless, anywhere from 5-10% of wines sealed with natural cork can end up with cork taint.

Since the Vino Seal is made of smooth glass, there is no chance of its interacting with the wine in any way.  The seal part of the Vino Seal is achieved with a small O-ring under the lip of the stopper.  This creates a hermetic, or air-tight, seal.

Another plus of the Vino Seal is that it is reusable.  If for some reason you don’t finish your bottle of wine, just reinsert the stopper into the bottle.  The O-ring again creates the seal, and you can finish your bottle the next day.  You can’t do that with natural or synthetic corks, because to pull a cork, you have to basically drill a hole all the way through it with your cork screw.

Wines that are sealed with almost any closure other than natural cork do not have to be stored on their sides.  Natural cork needs to be kept moist to maintain the tight seal.  Store your wine upright for too long, and the cork dries out, shrinks and then there goes your seal.  While this is a plus for the Vino Seal, it can also be a minus.  The foil that covers the seal and the neck of the bottle helps to maintain the air-tight seal. So, when unopened, you can store the wine either lying down or upright, but once you open the bottle, it is best to keep it upright to prevent any minor leaking.

Overall, I think that the Vino Seal is a pretty elegant solution to wine closure.  And while this very cool, classy way to seal wine is still seen primarily in German and South African wines, it is already taking hold here in the United States, with wineries in both Washington State and Napa Valley, California trying out the Vino Seal on some of their wines.

Oh, one more downside of the Vino Seal?  You can’t play the cork came where you drop the cork on the table and see who can get it to stand on end in the fewest tries.  It’s a small price to pay to end up with such an elegant wine stopper, so maybe I’ll just start carrying an old cork in my pocket, just in case we get the urge to play the cork game.

Have You Come Across A Glass Wine Cork Lately?

I’m interested to know how many of you have see this new type of wine closure and what wines are you finding it on. Please let me know in the comments section.

How to Pair Food and Wine

Lets start with a simple poll to see how you pair up your favorite foods with wine. You can choose more than one answer:

Even the most experienced cook can feel a little inadequate when faced with pairing food with wine.  It used to be red with meat, white with fish or chicken and I’m sure many of you still look at it that way but which red wine with red meat? – Cabernet Sauvignon, Pinot Noir, Barbarossa, Shiraz?

The same goes for white wine. There are hundreds of white grape varieties including the more well know Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio, Sauvignon Blanc and Semillon plus all those you probably never heard of like Azal, Inzolia, Juhfark. So which grape goes best with what you are serving?

With some wines going for literally thousands of dollars a bottle and flowery reviews that seem to be written in another language (nose? finish? terroir?), it’s no wonder that many of us just close our eyes and grab a bottle.  Either that, or we serve whatever our guests have brought over and hope for the best.

I think with a little guidance and a few rules for pairing, anyone can choose a bottle of wine to go with a specific dish.  So, take a deep breath and let’s look at food and wine pairing, knowing that at the heart of it all, it’s really no more difficult than “Drink what you like.”

Drum Roll Please – A Little History

First up, people have been making and enjoying wine with food for thousands of years.  I doubt that that Roman centurion ever complained that the red wine he was served didn’t go with his salt cod and he’d rather have a white, thank-you-very-much.  Please don’t go fact checking - I have no idea whether the Romans ate salt cod, but my point is simple:  people have been drinking wine with their food for eons, and if we try to over-think that relationship, we might miss out.

There is no doubt that food and wine go together.  Before global or even intra-continental shipping, wines were made and drunk locally, and that old adage “What grows together goes together” certainly held true.  Now, when we are able to get great wines made literally all over the world, the basic rule still applies:  Grapes grow.  Vegetables grow.  Meat grows.  Fish grows.

It’s All About Terroir

You may have noticed that I mentioned “terroir.”  Terroir is a French term that really doesn’t have a one-word translation into English.  Terroir is the character a wine gets from the place it was grown - soil composition, amount of sunlight, what is growing near the grapes, microclimate—every environmental factor you can think of plays a role in shaping the final terroir of a particular wine.

I think that this is where Old World (European) wines differ from New World wines - most Old World winemakers showcase terroir while many New World wineries play down terroir in favor of a more consistent, mass market appeal.  Regardless, wines of northern Italy go well with the food of northern Italy just like the wines of Alsace go well with Alsatian foods.  It’s all about the terroir.

The great thing about pairing wine and food is that not only does the wine enhance the food, but the food enhances the wine.  Wine and food are a happy example of the whole being greater than the sum of its parts.  For example, I often find that if I have a wine that’s a bit tannic - one that makes my mouth feel really dry and like it’s turning inside out - serving it with meat really balances it out nicely.

Like I said earlier, up until fairly recently, the rule of thumb for pairing wine and food was “Red wine with red meat, white wine with white meat and fish.”  This isn’t necessarily a bad rule to follow, but I think it has more to do with matching body and complexity than it has to do with matching colors.

For example, if I stew or braise a chicken in wine and stock, it will have a pretty complex and deep flavor that I might prefer to pair with a complex wine.  If I poach a chicken breast, I’ll most likely end up with a more simply-flavored, much lighter dish that I might want to pair with a light wine.

While I find that, in general, red wines are more complex than white wines, the rule doesn’t always hold.  Often, it is a subjective comparison, and you have to decide for yourself what you think works best.  And this brings us back to “Drink what you like.”

Go Taste Wines

If you don’t know what you like, I suggest going to a wine tasting.  In most states, many local wine shops offer free tastings on weekend afternoons, and if you live near a Trader Joe’s, I know that they offer wine tastings as well.  Check with your local stores.

Not true in Pennsylvania where I now live, but some “big box” wine stores, such as Total Wine, BevMo or even your local ABC Store have tasting and their own experts you can talk to and ask questions.  If you tell them that you think you might prefer a light, fruity wine to a warm, spicy wine, they can suggest wines for you to try so you’ll know if you are right!

How Sweet It Is

Sweetness is a big consideration when pairing foods and wine.  Wines range in sweetness from very dry (not sweet at all) to syrupy dessert sweetness.  The general rule is NOT to have your wine be any sweeter than what you are serving.  Therefore, you’ll want to serve a very savory meal with a very dry wine.

Many dishes that have been seared either in the final cooking or as a step along the way (braises and stews) and those that contain sweeter vegetables, such as carrots and parsnips, can be paired with a sweeter wine.  Again, make sure the wine isn’t sweeter than the dish.

Sweet desserts go very nicely with a dessert wine.  An exception to this rule, as there are exceptions to every rule, is with sparkling wine.  There is something about the bubbles that sets these wines apart from others, making them appropriate to serve with almost any course.  This is a nice thing, because while many people think of Champagne and other sparkling wines strictly for toasting, they are lovely paired with “regular food,” too.  Give it a try sometime.

There is one rule of wine pairing doesn’t have any exceptions, in my opinion.  And that rule is that wine just doesn’t go well with vinaigrette.  The acid in a vinaigrette somehow deadens the palate and makes the wine taste almost metallic and just all around unpleasant.

If you want to serve wine with a salad course, use a creamy dressing, such as creamy blue cheese or even Green Goddess.  This brings me to another wine pairing point - just as you can sour milk by adding some vinegar to it, you can also sour a cream sauce by serving an acidic wine with it.  A buttery wine, such as an oaked Chardonnay, will pair much more effectively with cream sauce than will a lemony/acidic wine.

Of course, if you have in mind the flavor profile of the wine you are going to serve before you start cooking, you can add to the dish to enhance the food and wine pairing.  For example, if the back of your bottle or the wine tasting notes indicate that the wine has a lot of herbal components, you might consider adding fresh herbs to your dish to complement the wine.

If the wine contains notes of apple, think about making a pork dish, since apple and pork is such a nice pairing.  Knowing what your wine tastes like gives you a better chance of cooking something that is complementary.  That’s why it’s okay to accept a bottle of wine as host/hostess gift and then put it away for later.  The wine they brought you as a thoughtful gift might not go with what you’ve cooked, so it’s best to serve a “known” wine with your meal.

Conclusions

With everything I just said, I have probably touched on 1% of what there is to know about pairing food and wine. There are books written on this subject and web sites and blogs devoted to talking about wine and which ones should be served with what foods. I’ll try to talk more about this subject in upcoming posts and even get a few experts to help with the discussion.

It still comes down to serving what you enjoy and can afford with your meals. Just because a big, earthy Cabernet may go well with a juicy Porterhouse steak - if you don’t like Cabernet Sauvignon, don’t serve it.

As always, I would love to hear what you have to say about some of your favorite food and wine pairings. We can all learn from sharing ideas especially with a topic like this one.

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