The Acorn TV docuseries The Wine Show, starring
the inimitable sommelier and wine merchant Joe Fattorini
and a supporting cast of well-known actors, has become
enormously popular. The mission was to visit wine-growing
regions around the world, collect specimens of the best
wines representing the particular traditions and cultures
associated with each terroir and locality, and
arrive at optimal pairings of vintages with appropriate
dishes.
The entire
theatrical display is a delight to watch, often tongue-in-cheek,
self-mocking, and unfailingly good-humored. Much of what
we are witnessing is plainly a scripted performance, down
to the very grunts of gustatory approval, and, of course,
we never meet a bad or mediocre wine. But Fattorini and
his sidekicks also offer detailed instruction in the art
and science of viticulture and oenology. The major element
in the production involves the mystery of pairings, the
marriage of a given wine and a particular serving or course.
The knowledge of what goes with what is the very zenith
of wine connoisseurship.
I have learned
from the maestro that Pinot Noir with its light tannins
goes with earthy ingredients like mushrooms and that a
funky Pinot will pair exquisitely with roast chicken.
A smoky Shiraz partners well with macaroni and cheese
dishes, a Riesling neighbors amiably with ham, a Pinot
Grigio matches a creamy béchamel, a big Cab complements
braised beef with grilled veggies (a Merlot will also
do), a not-too oaky Chardonnay flirts provocatively with
seafood, especially crab cakes, oysters and shrimp, a
Bastianich Vespa Bianco is a great fit with Osso Buco,
and a Chianti Classico is a hands-down winner with baked
lasagna—my own favorite Classico is the splendid
2018 Tenuta Di Arceno from the Etruscan area. I also appreciate
a high Brix Tempranillo with a rack of lamb, a knockout
combination that Fattorini & co. somehow missed. Of
course, the extent to which such combinations are merely
impressionistic is another matter.
The series
clearly owes its brand of humor to the hit film Sideways—a
dipsy story about wine and love’s redemption—and
is obviously based on the gastronomical comedy series
The Trip, featuring two British actors Steve
Coogan and Rob Bryden, whose Observer-sponsored remit
was to sample and write about cuisine in England, Italy,
Spain and Greece. We learned nothing about food but were
hugely entertained by the hilarious banter, repartee,
and celebrity impressions exchanged between the two thespians,
who made an excellent pairing, playing, as The Guardian’s
Laura Barton writes, “augmented versions of their
real-life selves” and occupying “the sweet
spot between fiction and reality.” The same is true
of the two Matthews (Goode and Rhys) in The Wine Show
and to some extent of late addition James Purefoy (not
so sure about Dominic West and Amelia Singer), who routinely
engage in friendly pairing competitions.
In a recent
discussion with one of my advisors at a wine emporium
I regularly visit, he confided that wine and food pairings
were largely an illusion, a specialists’ game unmoored
from actual experience. “You go with what you like.”
Indeed, as Roger Scruton lays it down in his witty and
erudite faux-Descartes volume I Drink Therefore I
Am, “you should drink what you like, in the
quantities that you like” (with the sane proviso
that “you should not, through your drinking, inflict
pain on others”). One thinks of the Wiccan Rede
(“An it harm none, do what ye will”) and of
bibulous monk François Rabelais’ Gargantua
and Pantagruel, where he describes the habit of “pantagruelizing”
as “drinking to your heart’s desire.”
Like poet Ernest Dowson, one calls “for madder music
and for stronger wine.”
There may
be considerable truth in such counsels. Aside from concern
for others, there are, apparently, no actual rules. Even
so, there is a temptation to regard much of life, or at
least the best part of it, as a wine tasting-and-pairing
festival with its own principles, guidelines, and criteria,
its own de facto rules. There is something charming
and inventive about the concept of pairings, or the craft
and discipline of distinguishing flavors, tangs, zests,
and savors as well.
I have often
wondered why, for example, Scotch tasters and malt masters
will inevitably link a particular Scotch with an assortment
of fruit and other sometimes bizarre items that do not
exist in the environment where the whiskey is produced.
After all, a given single malt is more likely its own
distinctive beverage. An Orkney Scotch like Highland Park
may resist comparisons, as would an Islay Bunnahabhain
or a Glenmorangie Nectar D’Or from the Scottish
Highlands. Yet Scotch magus Michael Jackson in his Malt
Whisky Companion will depict Highland Park as variously
smoky, chewy, a touch woody, sappy, buttery, and honeyish,
Bunnahabhain as fresh, clean, and nutty, and Glenmorangie
as minty, walnut-like, and salty, with notes of butterscotch
and sandalwood. My own favorite is a Macallan Double Cask
Gold, with hints of dried apricot, a wink of vanilla,
and a nose of toffee and caramel. Or maybe it’s
sherry and bourbon laced with a tickle of pepper and an
edge of grass blade. And so it goes. As fanciful as such
comparisons may appear, I suppose that they, too, are
pairings of a kind, if somewhat displaced.
Is there any
truth to these pseudo-sophisticated detections? Are they
merely subjective responses or nothing more than imaginative
fabrications? Or is my palate simply not educated enough
to separate out these various correlations and relationships?
Hard to say. But one thing is certain: the metaphor of
pairings is seductive and enjoys a wide range of application
to many other fields of experience.
For example,
when I consider my own practice not only as a drinker
but as a poet, the technique or strategy of pairing the
wine of language with the tuck of subject is paramount.
To begin with, the language of poetry is clearly not the
language of prose, though they have unfortunately and
all too frequently been blended to the detriment of both.
Poetic language or prosody comes with its own unique and
settled devices, such as full rhyme, slant rhyme or internal
rhyme, assonance and alliteration, meter or melodic cadence,
precursor echo, aphorism, anaphora, extended imagery,
and much more. As in a good wine, structure and complexity
are essential.
Moreover,
different idioms clearly apply to different genres of
poetry. Dactylic hexameter may be suitable for epic but
not for sonnets. Iambic trimeter won’t fit Wordsworth’s
"The Prelude." Limerick and elegy are about
as compatible as rap and symphony. The pairings are mismated.
The linguistic apparatus or dialect of approach must be
made to fit according to mood, content, and historical
categories. True, prosodic and technical surprises are
always possible within certain frames of craft relevance,
like Joe Fattorini introducing a potent red with mackerel
or a Brazilian white with a gnocchi dish when a classic
Douro would have been the expected thing. But on the whole,
language and subject must pair appropriately; exceptions,
though possible, are rigorously controlled.
In any event,
the pleasure of wine is also the pleasure of seeing things
in a new way, of enhancing things that we know and refining
our perceptions. There is much to learn from the parallels
of wine and food, and from Scotch as well with its far-flung
comparative kindreds. Taste is highly personal and pairings
may be metaphorical. At the same time, the mystery of
wine and its analogical intimacies is deeply rooted in
human experience, hitting that sweet spot between fiction
and reality.
Elements of
taste and aptness of combinations are what Scruton in
his subtitled “philosopher’s guide to wine”
calls “virtuous products, in which honest labour
and the love of life have been distilled for your benefit.”
It is the art of learning “what to drink with what”
(the title of his concluding chapter). The trope is on
point. He calls this, citing C.S. Lewis, the “gift-love,”
the pairing of spirit and flesh, of mind and heart, of
man and woman. When I think of my wife Janice, which happens
often, it seems to me we make a pretty good pairing, her
buoyancy, grace, and sharp intelligence balanced by my
impulsiveness, klutziness, and extravagant indulgences.
She says I make her laugh. I say she keeps me honest.
So whether in wine, literature, or love, there may indeed
be some sense to the notion of implicit rules and the
general concept of appropriate pairings.
