food-and-wine-pairing-a-sensory-experience-robert-harrington

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Chapter 5 The Impact of Sweetness and Acidity Levels in Wine and Food
EXERCISE 5.3
SWEETNESS INTERACTIONS: TASTING WINES AND FOOD TOGETHER
This exercise incorporates the wine samples
and food items from Exercises 5.1
and 5.2. You will taste each of the food
items with each wine sample and determine
whether the food is less sweet than,
as sweet as, or sweeter than the wine
sample. You will complete one Food Item
and Wine Sweetness Comparisons sheet
for each food item (a total of four).
The basic rule for wine and food
pairing indicates that the food sweetness
level should be less than or equal to the
sweetness level of the wine to be perceived
as a match. As you are tasting,
you will want to think about this theoret-
MATERIALS NEEDED
Table 5.7 Materials for Exercise 5.3
ical relationship and whether or not you
believe it applies. Many people have individual
preferences in terms of food flavor
profiles and wine type preferences
that may not accord exactly with the basic
idea of sweetness matching. In a recent
research project I performed, I found
that while a sweetness match was a
strong indicator of overall perceived
match for wine and cheese pairing, significant
differences occurred in perceived
wine and cheese matches based on individual
preferences for red wine or white
wine, regardless of other theorized match
relationships.
OBJECTIVE
Prepackaged food items from Exercise 5.2 Napkins
The objective of this exercise is to assess
sweetness levels of wine and food together
and to evaluate the interaction of
equal or different levels of sweetness of
wine or food when tasted together.
Mise en Place: Things to Do Before
the Exercise Prior to evaluation,
make sure the wines are still at the appropriate
tasting temperature and that
you have a sufficient amount of each
food item to taste a bite or two with each
wine sample.
Wines from Exercise 5.1 Drinking water for each student
1 copy Food and Wine Sensory Anchor Reference sheet per student Glasses for water
Completed Wine and Food sweetness evaluation sheets 6 wineglasses on paper placemats
4 copies Food Item and Wine Sweetness Comparisons sheets per
student
Utensils for food items
Paper plates or bowls to serve food