The western culinary tradition is really quite simple. You take fresh produce, apply heat and embellish with herbs or spices and maybe a sauce.
Then you serve your dishes in a prescribed order. This makes matching your menu with wine relatively easy. You begin with white and switch to red, ratcheting up the weight and concentration as you go.
But how do you approach Chinese food?
The classical Chinese banquet consists of nine or 10 courses usually starting with Peking Duck or Suckling Pig, followed by Hot Appetizers, Shark’s Fin Soup and then into a range of dishes featuring fish, seafood, pork, chicken and noodles or pasta, ending with dessert.
The challenge to match these dishes with Western wines is four-fold:
a) the sequence of dishes moves from meat to fish, to soup, to fish, to meat and back to fish. b) the complicated spicing of each dish that can feature any mix of ginger, garlic, hoisin or oyster sauce, sugar and salt. c) the sauces and dips that may accompany the dishes are also highly spiced and hot. d) the main ingredient may be plated with jelly-fish, fish maw or other contrasting flavours, colours and textures.
Chinese cuisine is based on the philosophical concept of yin and yang: the balance of complementary opposites. This dramatic tension is the guiding principle of Chinese medicine as well as cuisine.
Boiling, poaching and steaming are yin cooking techniques, while yang methods are stir-frying, deep-frying and roasting.
Ingredients, based on their flavour and mouth feel, are also divided into yin and yang. So you may find on the same plate hot and cold items, spicy and mild, fresh and smoked, or pickled and soft and crunchy.
Your neighbourhood Chinese restaurant might not mount a 10-course feast, but you’ll usually choose five or six dishes to share around the table.
While it may be impractical — and expensive – to serve a different wine with each dish, there are certain wine styles that are versatile enough to match a variety of dishes.
These I have found to be: For fish dishes: Medium-dry Vouvray from the Loire or Viognier from the Rhône; Riesling Kabinett or Spätlese Trocken (where there is sweetness and peppery-ness in the dish) Unoaked Chardonnay (Chablis) and white Rhône for simply prepared fish dishes Meat dishes: Dry rosé or named village Beaujolais or Pinot Noir from New Zealand or Oregon.
Avoid tannic wines like Cabernet Sauvignon, Chianti and Barolo, and when in doubt drink champagne throughout.
At Chinese restaurants the dishes you order invariably all arrive at the same time. The best way to protect the integrity of each wine and food pairing is to ensure its isolation from the overall dining experience; treat each dish as a distinct and separate course.
This can be done most effectively by having water available, as well as green tea to cleanse and refresh the palate.
Five Ontario Chinese Food-Friendly Wines:
- Cave Spring Riesling Off-Dry 2008: $14.95, LCBO # 234583
- Hillebrand Artists Series Gewurztraminer 2008: $11.45, LCBO # 554378
- Flat Rock Twisted White 2007: $16.95, Vintages # 1578
- Pelee Island Reserve Pinot Noir 2007: $14.95, LCBO # 458521
- Chateau des Charmes Gamay Droit 2007: $16.95, LCBO 582353