The best wine pairings with venison (updated)

What is the best wine pairing for venison? An easy answer is the same sort of wine you’d drink with beef, but I’d suggest a few modifications as the two are not quite the same. Three qualities of venison, or cervena as it’s sometimes referred to in New Zealand, particularly distinguish it from beef and should influence your choice of wine match: 

• Venison is leaner
• Venison is gamier
• Venison is often combined with stronger flavours (e.g. juniper)

Let’s dive into each of these characteristics and see how they might influence the wine pairing for specific venison dishes.

For a start venison is quite a bit leaner than most beef cuts with a finer texture which tends to favour more elegant red wines such as red burgundy, barolo or mature Bordeaux - certainly when it’s served as a roast or a fillet (see this sensational match) Pinot noir is also particularly good with a venison tartare.

It is also a slightly gamier meat than beef which could lead you towards high end Rhône reds such as Côte Rôtie, Hermitage or Saint Joseph or a Bandol if it’s made into a casserole or venison stew. With more humble venison sausages try a Crozes-Hermitage. 

And it tends to be combined with strong flavours like juniper or wild mushrooms which again might lead you in a pinot direction or, as I suggest with this recipe for spiced venison with wild mushroom and truffle sauce with a more vibrant Western Australian cabernet merlot blend (or a younger, fruitier Bordeaux).

I also loved this recent pairing of amarone with a dish of venison and beetroot.

With a rich foie gras accompaniment it might even pair with a shiraz as I discovered to my surprise at a Wine Australia tasting a couple of years ago.

A more off-the-wall pairing, if you’re feeling adventurous, would be a German spätlese riesling which I greatly enjoyed with a dish of rare venison at a restaurant called Zum Krug. (But most people I suspect would prefer a spätburgunder (pinot noir) if they were thinking German wine.)

Image by Natalia Lisovskaya at shutterstock.com

The best food pairings for rioja

Rioja - and by that I mean red rioja - is one of the UK’s best-loved wines and one of the easiest ones to match with food too.

As you’d expect it pairs particularly well with Spanish food especially lamb and pork and recipes that contain red peppers, pimenton, garlic and saffron.

The main thing to bear in mind is the style of the wine - whether it’s a young (joven) rioja which can handle quite robust, even spicy dishes, or an older (reserva or gran reserva) one which would benefit from more simply prepared food.

Riojas that are made in a more modern style can also handle more spice than more traditional ones. Modern Indian food with rioja is a surprising hit.

These dishes will generally work with most riojas:

* Almost any kind of lamb dish from roast lamb to tender lamb cutlets grilled over vine clippings (a local favourite in the region) to slow braised lamb shanks or even a rogan josh. Shepherds pie, Lancashire hotpot, merguez, moussaka . . . It’s hard to think of a lamb dish that doesn’t work with rioja.

* Many pork dishes especially cooked Spanish style with beans. Chorizo and morcilla (black pudding) are both good pairings for younger riojas as are jamon (ham) and albondigas (meatballs) making red rioja a good match for more robust tapas.

* Dishes with red peppers and/or pimenton or paprika

* Almost any kind of mild or medium-hot dish with chillies like chilli con carne and other chiles. (Rioja suits south-west American food and American barbecue)

* Dishes with saffron such as paella or Moroccan tagines - including, surprisingly, chicken with preserved lemon and olives and Mediterranean-style fish stews

* Older gran reserva riojas are especially good with roast game birds such as pheasant and partridge. Indian-style game dishes work well with younger riojas

* Cheese, especially hard sheeps’ cheeses such as Manchego, although a mellow rioja reserva is a generally reliable choice with a cheeseboard - unlike many reds.

See also The best matches for white Rioja

The best wine pairings for partridge

I sometimes think partridge is my favourite game bird - less full-on and ‘gamey’ than pheasant, more subtle and delicate than chicken. But what wine should you drink with it?

The options are in fact similar to my recommended wine pairings for pheasant but because it’s a more delicate meat think lighter, finer-textured wines - a gran reserva rather than a reserva rioja, for instance. As you’ll see from the suggestions below 2009 and 2010 were good across the board

Whether you go for pretty youthful fruit or a more complex aged wine depends how you cook it (for me simply roasted is best) your personal taste and your bank balance but these would be my preferred options:

If you have a treasured red burgundy partridge is a good excuse for cracking it open. (2009 or ’10 should be drinking deliciously now). Or a top pinot noir (German spåtburgunder, for example). A ‘natural’ low sulphur pinot - or gamay - would be especially interesting.

* A mature red bordeaux which could be even a touch older, say a 2005.

* A top barolo (again the 09s and 10s were good from this region but beware, there’s a lot of dull barolo around)

* A gran reserva rioja - 2004, 2005 and 2010 were all good vintages. 2001 even better but it needs to have been stored well.

* A Jura chardonnay (which is less fruity, more savoury than most chardonnays) would be especially good with perdrix au chou (partridge with cabbage)

* Dry oloroso sherry - a spectacular pairing I once had in Jerez (see here) - maybe not for your pals but great as part of a sherry dinner -

* A Flemish red ale like Rodenbach, Duchesse de Bourgogne or the Wild Beer Company’s Modus Operandi would be the perfect beer match

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The photo is of partridge with cabbage as cooked by Stephen Markwick of the sadly now closed Culinaria in Bristol. © Fiona Beckett

Top wine and beer matches for game

We Brits have always had a reputation for liking our wines old and our game high but times have changed. Today the key factor in matching game tends to be not how ‘gamey’ it is but how it’s cooked and what is served with it.

In many restaurants now game is cooked quickly and served rare so can take a younger, more tannic wine than would have once been the case. Accompanying sauces also tend to be robust, and wine-based, bringing more full-bodied reds into play. Nevertheless the reason for serving wild game such as partridge or venison - as opposed to chicken or beef - is that it does have a distinctive flavour for which you generally pay a premium so you want to pick your wine with some care. Here are the sort of wines you might go for.

* Simply roast birds such as partridge, pheasant, or grouse with simple accompaniments (e.g. roast potatoes, bread sauce and a light gravy rather than a heavy wine-based jus)
These remain the ideal opportunity to bring out a serious bottle of burgundy, a mature red Bordeaux or their New World equivalents (see here) If you like your birds underdone a younger wine may be a more flattering accompaniment. A good Chianti is always a reliable match for more everyday occasions.

The best wine pairings for partridge

Belgian sour red ales such as Rodenbach are also delicious with simply roast game.

* more elaborate game roasts with foie gras and/or truffles or a concentrated ‘jus’
Similar wines to the above but from a more recent vintage. The richer accompanying flavours can handle a more tannic wine.

* pheasant casseroled with apples
Apples tend to lead in the direction of a white (a dry Riesling with a couple of years’ bottle age would be perfect) rather than a red, particularly if the sauce has some added cream. You could equally well serve a French cidre bouché (semi-sparkling cider) or a gueuze (a Belgian lambic beer brewed with wild yeasts) especially if you’re serving braised cabbage as an accompaniment.

The best wine pairings for pheasant

* pot-roast pheasant
With any other flavourings or a red wine sauce a robust red should work well, especially reds that contain Grenache, Syrah, Mourvèdre, Tempranillo or Malbec. (So good quality Côtes du Rhône Villages, southern French reds and Rioja all make good choices, and a wine like Côte Rôtie a sublime one). I’d avoid very muscular young reds which are likely to overwhelm the flavour of the meat.

* Venison
Generally you can serve similar wines to those you would serve with beef though as the game flavour is more pronounced you might want to choose accompanying wines with a slightly gamey flavour of their own. Good examples would be Hermitage, Bandol and Ribera del Duero (or other examples of mature Syrah or Mourvèdre) though be careful of flavour overload with very concentrated sauces. Sometimes it can be better to serve a slightly lighter (though still well-structured) wine when your sauce is particularly dense and rich.

The best wine pairings for venison

So far as beer is concerned, venison dishes can be an excellent match for porter, a strong Trappist ale like Chimay or a French bière de garde.

* Cold game/game pie
As with simply roast game this is a great opportunity to drink your favourite red burgundy but cold game is also a treat with a full bodied vintage rosé Champagne such as Ruinart (or, of course, Krug). If your game is in a salad (like a warm pigeon salad or a smoked duck or venison one) you could also try a sour cherry beer such as kriek.

Vegetables with game
Vegetables that will flatter fine wines include mashed potatoes and pureed root vegetables such as celeriac (good combined with potato) and parsnips. Carrots and mushrooms also work well. Take care though with braised cabbage particularly red cabbage cooked with sugar and vinegar which can be a wine killer. (Fruity young reds like Shiraz, Barbera or Zinfandel should survive)