Wine Dinner #1

 Dinner Blog

Last week, my friends and I got together to do a wine dinner at my place. We paired two white wines and a red with a light salad and ribeye steak with a side of roasted potatoes for our meal. I enjoyed the overall experience of trying different pairings of wine with certain foods to see how they played off of each other. Personally, my favorite was the salad paired with the Moscato. I thought the flavors played off of each other very well as the sweetness of the Moscato cut through the acidity of the dressing very well. I am personally very excited to do this again with my friends in the future. 

Pairing #1: Appetizer Salad Paired with a Moscato

Name: Castello Del Poggio

Variety: Moscato

Country: Italy

Vintage Year: Couldn't find

Price: $12.99

We paired the Moscato with a light salad as a start to our meal. The Moscato itself was light and had very citrusy and floral flavors. From my initial smell of the wine, I  got hints of a honey citrus aroma as well as some orange blossom. The salad consisted of lettuce, cucumbers, avocado, carrots and was dressed with honey Dijon. The acidity of the dressing was cut with the sweetness of the Moscato so I thought these two complemented each other very well. 

Pairing #2: Roasted Potatoes Paired With Gewurztraminer

Name: Hive and Honey

Variety: Gewurztraminer

Country: California, Monterey County

Vintage Year: 2020

Price: $9

Review: For our second pairing, we decided to go with a Gewurztraminer with a roasted potato. The potatos were served as a side for the main dish which was a ribeye steak. The wine was light and sweet which is why it was paired with a heavier dish in the potatoes. I could taste some grapefruits and orange, a citrusy flavor profile. The potatoes were seasoned with olive oil, salt, pepper, garlic powder, and paprika and roasted in the oven until they were crisp on the outside and fully cooked through. Since this dish was eaten at the same time as the steaks, I thought it was somewhat difficult to really get a good idea of how well these two items paired with each other. I did notice that the wine did help cut through the heaviness of the potatoes. A sweet wine with a savory dish wasn't my favorite combination but by no means does that mean it was a bad pairing, just not one of my favorites. It might be intersting to try the potatoes with another white wine to see if they work well together. 

Pairing #3: Ribeye Steak Paired with a Red Blend

Name: Red Dune

Variety: Red Blend (Castelao and Alicante Bouschet)

Country: Portugal, Peninsula De Setubal

Vintage Year: 2021

Price: $9

Review: For our main dish, we paired a blend of two red wines with a ribeye steak. This was a pairing that we knew we were going to do as a combination of red wine and red meat is a classic. The wine was very heavy and dry. I tasted some strawberry and plum which is likely from the Castelao, but those flavors were overpowered by the taste of black cherry from the Alicante Bouschet. The wine was decanted starting a little bit before the meal started. The ribeyes were seasoned with Montreal steak seasoning and cooked to a nice medium rare. I thought the two paired pretty well, the dry wine was able to cut through the saltiness and fattiness of the steak. I paired the two by taking a bite of the steak and washing it down with the wine and it worked very well. This was my second favorite pairing of the meal.