Cooking with Wine

I cook with wine...sometimes I add it to the food!

The aging process allows wine to be called a “living” beverage. Wine is not only a beverage that we all enjoy but also an important ingredient to many of our favorite recipes. Wines complexity of flavors and aromas is one reason why cooking with wine works so well. Here, we will talk about the important factors of wine affecting our various dishes.

There are multiple factors that make cooking with wine a valuable option. The first is the alcohol. Alcohol itself is not added for the flavor when cooking with wine. Alcohol is added because it helps bring out the flavor in the other ingredients. Alcohol helps release the molecules in foods, while breaking down fats. This process helps individual ingredients release their own unique flavors.

Tannin is a funny little word that packs a big punch. If drinking a glass of red wine, the pucker and dry feeling in your mouth comes from the astringency in the tannins. The technical side of tannins can become complex and confusing. In simple terms, Tannins mix with fats and proteins to create a compound of flavor. Actually, tannins mellow with age and play a large role in red wine aging gracefully. Acidity is also an important factor in cooking with wine.

Now for the tough question, when cooking with wine, which wine should you use? Red meat and red meat dishes do well with young, medium to full-bodied red wines. Red sauces turn out best using full-bodied and robust red wines. Soups with beef stocks benefit best by using an earthy, full-bodied red wine. For seafood, poultry, shellfish and pork, a dry white wine or dry fortified wine will work best. The same wine will work for light or creamy sauces. Seafood soups and bouillabaisse need a crisp and dry white wine. Sweet dessert dishes do well with off-dry white wines. Finally, for any regional cuisine, cooking with a regional wine will bring out the flavor. It is important to remember to never cook with a wine that you would not drink alone. In the end, your personal taste is what will help you enjoy your dish.

If you are interested in cooking with wine, please try some of recipes we've created and collected over the years. Our Cabernet Sauvignon Selection, Valpolicella Selection and Vintners Reserve Liebfraumilch are fabulous wines that we highly recommend to use in almost any recipe. Please enjoy some great recipes we've tried over the years.