Pairings | PX

The best food and wine pairings for Valentine’s Day
If you’re planning a special meal for Valentine’s Day you may be wondering which wine to pair with your menu. I’ve picked some favourite Valentine’s Day foods and suggested some matches that should work well with them.
Asparagus
If served on its own with melted butter or a hollandaise sauce a subtle, creamy white burgundy or chardonnay would be the most seductive choice. If dressed with a vinaigrette or in a salad with seafood I’d go for a crisper white like a Sancerre, Pouilly Fumé or other top quality sauvignon blanc.
Camembert
Camembert baked in its box makes a sexy instant fondue but isn’t the easiest of dishes to pair with wine (even trickier than when it’s served cold). Funnily enough a glass of champagne - or similar style sparkling wine - works surprisingly well or go for a dry white like a Chablis.
Caviar (or, more likely, a caviar imitation)
Dry champagne. (Vodka is arguably better but not as romantic.)
Chocolate (dark)
There are possibilities with wine (sweet reds like Maury or Quady’s seductive Elysium being good choices - see
www.quadywinery.com) but my own preferred option with dark chocolate is a frozen shot of cherry brandy or other fruit-flavoured spirit or liqueur or a small glass of sloe or damson gin. An orange-flavoured liqueur like Grand Marnier also works well.
Chocolate (white)
An ice-cold raspberry-flavoured wine or liqueur like Southbrook Winery’s Framboise from Canada. Especially if the dessert includes raspberries.
Duck
Pinot Noir. Look to New Zealand and Chile for the best value
Ice cream (vanilla)
Tricky with wine. A toffee or chocolate-flavoured liqueur is your best bet. Very sweet PX sherry can be wonderful poured over it.
Ice cream (chocolate)
Try a coffee-flavoured liqueur like Toussaint or Kahlua.
Lobster
Good white burgundy (or other chardonnay) or vintage champagne.
Wine with lobster: 5 of the best pairings
Oysters
Champagne or Chablis. Not Guinness on Valentine’s Night, I suggest.
Passion fruit
Can be quite sharp so you need a very sweet wine to balance it. A sweet riesling or late harvest semillon or sauvignon blanc will work well. If it’s mixed with a creamy base as in a passion fruit brulée you could drink a sweet (demi-sec) Champagne or other dessert wine. Or a passion fruit flavoured beer. (Yes, such drinks exist! Try Floris from Belgium.)
Prawns/shrimp
If you’re serving a classic prawn cocktail I suggest a dry or off-dry riesling which would also work with an Asian-style stir-fry or salad. A sparkling rosé - including champagne - would be a suitably kitsch all-pink choice.
The best pairings for prawns or shrimp
Smoked salmon
Champagne on this occasion. But see
Scallops
Made for top white burgundy or other really good chardonnay. Champagne is also spot on if that’s what you’re drinking.
Top wine pairings with scallops
Steak
The best full-bodied red you can afford. Whatever turns your partner on . . .
My 5 top wine and steak pairing tips
Strawberries
If served plain and unadorned, gently sparkling Moscato d’Asti or Asti is lovely or go for the luscious
Fragola liqueur. If they’re served with cream you could serve a classic sweet wine like Sauternes.
My top pairings with strawberries
Image © 9MOT at shutterstock.com

The best pairings for sweet oloroso and PX sherry
Sherry gets a bad rap for being granny’s tipple of choice but if you’ve never tried an authentic Spanish style sweet sherry you haven’t lived.
There are two main kinds: sweet olorosos (though no longer officially referred to as that) which are aged without a protective layer of flor (yeast) and which I always think taste like liquid Christmas pudding and intensely treacley PX which is made from raisined pedro ximenez grapes. And cheaper cream sherries which are sweetened olorosos.
They are, of course, delicious to sip on their own but here’s some suggested pairings
Sweet oloroso and dark cream sherries
Blue cheese such as Stilton, Dorset Blue Vinney, Gorgonzola and Cabrales, especially with grilled figs
Mature Parmigiano Reggiano (parmesan) or Grana Padano
Mature sheeps cheeses such as Manchego
Mince pies
Eccles cakes
Panforte
Stollen
Christmas cake
Turron (Spanish nougat)
Dried fruits such as figs, raisins and dates
Nuts, especially brazil nuts
Pecan pie and walnut tarts
Pumpkin pie
Tiramisu
Chocolate creme brulée
Chocolate chip cookies
Coffee-flavoured cakes and desserts
Barbados cream/muscovado cream (see Nigella recipe here)
Caramelised banana desserts such as banana tatin
Millionaire's shortbread (shortbread with a toffee and chocolate topping)
Bitter orange- and marmalade-flavoured cakes
Gingerbread
Game terrine (I’d generally go for a drier sherry but it can work as you can see here)
Foie gras, if you eat it.
PX sherry
Ice cream especially vanilla, rum and raisin, brown bread and salted caramel ice cream (poured over as well as drunk with)
Dark chocolate
Chocolate sorbet as in this delicious dessert
Intense, dark chocolate tarts
More food and sherry matches:
- The best food pairings for dry oloroso sherry
- The best food pairings for amontillado and palo cortado
- The best food pairings for fino and manzanilla sherry
Download the e-book
If you love sherry but haven't got beyond sipping it with a few nuts and olives, then download my e-book, 101 great ways to enjoy sherry, packed full of pairings, recipes, cocktails, and more. Click here to download.
Image © © Maksim Shebeko at Adobe Stock
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