Wine Dinner Blog Report

 Wine Dinner Blog Report 

Wines: 

I used these three wines to match with my dinner pairing tonight. Before revealing what I chose to construct for this three course meal, the wines that accompanied them were Sauvignon Blanc, Zinfandel, and Port wine. I was very excited to try these wines and experience them in the way it was meant to be - which is alongside food. For the appetizer, I chose to use a Yellow Tail Sauvignon Blanc from Australia (New world wine) to provide some light and crisp flavor & feel to warm up the palate. Yellow Tail is a very well known wine and perhaps the most well known from Australia. I decided to match this with some veggies and hummus: 

I really enjoyed this as an appetizer and so did my roommate who was kind enough to enjoy this experience with me. I originally wanted to go with Assyrtiko wine to stay Mediterranean with the appetizer however I settled on Sauvignon Blanc due to limited choices. This wine was very light, acidic, and fruity - mostly with citrusy-grapefruit as the primary flavor profile. This was a great way to begin the dinner because it was not very filling - however the flavor companionship between the garlicy hummus and the Sauvignon Blanc were great - and the veggies also neutralized the garlic and overall balanced the dish out. Overall I would say it was basic however reliable. 8/10 for me

Next, for my entrée the wine that I had chosen was Zinfandel wine - which I hadn't yet tried until now. This was the only old world wine that I got for this dinner blog, however it certainly didn't disappoint. It is a zinfandel from Italy vintage 2021, and I decided to pair with with fajitas. These fajitas are homemade and were very tasty - and a great match with zinfandel: 

The immediate note that I received with my first taste of this zinfandel is that of cherry and other dark fruit flavors. This zinfandel wasn't as spicy as I feel some other ones are, which actually paired even better with the fajitas. It is certainly a fuller-bodied wine and really compliments the fattiness of the fajita meat and the oils. My roommate and I both enjoyed this as the entrée because it was the most satisfying dish and certainly made us the most full. The dark cherry complexations of this wine really completed this dish for me and made for a great all around entrée. 9/10 for me.

Lastly, I decided to try the infamous port dessert wine to match with the third dish - dessert. I was really excited to try port wine because I haven't yet had dessert wine and especially not alongside a dessert. It is very high in both alcohol and sugar and so I was intrigued to see how it tasted and how the body would feel. I got a port wine from California instead of Portugal, because those ones were quite expensive. I decided to match this with a slice of tuxedo cheesecake which I believe is at least half dark chocolate, which is a good match for port wine: 

Port wine was definitely the most interesting part of dinner for me. It is initially very sweet with notable flavors like sweet berry, however then sorta transitions into more of a bittery/dark chocolate taste with spice as it goes down. The tannins are heavily subdued by the dessert, and it is absolutely delicious. This is the best match for me as I can genuinely taste the difference of having the wine with/without food. With food it is much easier/more pleasant to swallow and washes down the rich chocolatey cheesecake. Very sweet though so I couldn't finish it, however just a small glass goes a long way - and for me this was my favorite part of the night. 10/10 for me.

Overall I learned a lot from this experience and I think it helps me a lot in understanding why wine is such a big part of human life. I am more versed in knowing what goes well with what typically, because what goes well for most will probably go well for me too. I learned this with port wine because it paired so well with dessert it opened my eyes to how much they can effect one another, and gave me a newfound respect for wine/dinner pairings.