Pasta with salty sausage matches well with a sweet white wine.
Wine lovers delight in pairing the perfect wine with each course of a meal. When you're serving a salty dish, whether it be an appetizer of oysters, an entree of well-seasoned ham or a side dish of potato chips, you can find a wine to pair well with it. Pairing highly acidic wines with salty food is trickier than pairing sweet wines with salty food, because salty tastes can accentuate the acidic qualities of white wines and the tannic qualities of red wines. Choosing a sweeter white wine or low-tannin red wine makes pairing wine with salty food simple.
Instructions
1. Select the salty food you will be serving. Salty foods that pair particularly well with wine include ham, sausages, chips, nuts, cheeses and oysters. Foie gras and pates also match naturally to wine.
2. Determine whether you wish to contrast the salty taste of the food with a sweet wine or use it to enhance the acidity of a wine. Occasionally you will want to bring out the acidity in a Pinot Grigio or Sauvignon Blanc by pairing it with a salty food such as oysters, but typically you will want a sweet wine.
3. Select your sweet wine. A wide range of sweet wines can be paired with salty foods, including Sauternes, which pairs well with salty cheeses, oysters and foie gras. Less sweet but still dry white wines such as Riesling, Muscadet, Pouilly-Fume, Pouilly-Fuisse and Chablis pair well with any salty food. Sparkling wines, such as Champagne or Spanish Cava, pair well with mixed nuts or even potato chips. Italian Valpolicella or Spanish Tempranillo are two low-tannin red wines that pair well with salty meats, sausages or cold cuts. Beaujolais or Beaujolais Nouveau are two other red wines that can be paired with salty food, including roast turkey.
4. Taste the wine alongside the food. Explore whether or not the saltiness of the food enhances the acidity of the wine or takes the sweetness down a notch. The fun of wine pairings is striking on new combinations, and you can always try a different wine next time.
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